Danger Signs That You’re Stuck in a Career Situationship

The term ‘situationship’ was coined to describe romantic relationships that lack definition and direction, yet continue anyway. Neither party is ready to leave, but their true commitment to the relationship is questionable.

What about your career? Can you be stuck in a similar type of relationship with your job where you're not sure where it's heading, or even if you care all that much?

The answer is a resounding yes—and it's best to give a career situationship your urgent attention before disillusionment sets in.

What is a career situationship?

When you’re stuck in a career situationship, you essentially have one foot in and one foot out. You’ll be able to identify pros and cons to your career, but you're not sure which side outweighs the other. If someone asks whether you’re happy with your work, your answer will be different on different days.

But are you really stuck in a career situationship, or are you just having a bad month or two? Here are some red flags that will let you know if it's the real thing:

1. You’ve stopped thinking about the future

In the past you were eager and motivated, thinking a lot about promotions and career advancement. Now? Not so much. Now it's mostly about survival, or just making it through each day.

2. You’ve had second thoughts about your career—not just in general, but at some point today

Everyone has stressful moments where they question their career choice. But for someone in a career situationship, these thoughts return again and again.

3. You come home tired every single day

Even when you’ve finished a difficult project or gotten praise from a manager, you still arrive home feeling weary and worn-out.

4. Little things bother you more than before

While ‘don’t sweat the small stuff’ was your attitude before, now the details of your work seem like drudgery and the personality quirks of your co-workers set your teeth on edge.

5. You see your work as just a job and not as a career

This is a subtle thing, but it's a clear sign of disillusionment. A job is something that pays the bills and keeps you occupied ("friends with benefits"), while a career has an upward trajectory and implies that better things are to come ("marriage potential").

6. You’re prioritizing work over other aspects of your life

A poor work-life balance will leave you feeling mentally fatigued and chronically unfulfilled. Letting your job take over your life is one of the surest ways to sabotage your love for your career.

7. You feel guilty because you think the quality of your work may have slipped

This can happen when your motivation has decreased but your sense of responsibility hasn’t. You still hold yourself to high standards, but you’re no longer confident in your ability to meet them.

8. The job is demanding more than it is delivering

You’ve been pulling a heavier load than you used to, but without any official change in your job responsibilities or pay, or any promise that such a change might be coming. This means you’ve been going along just to get along, and that is never healthy.

9. You haven’t experienced any career growth in a long time

 Instead of being actively engaged in your career, eagerly developing your skills and constantly seeking opportunities for advancement, you’ve become passive. You still hope for good things, but you no longer expect them.

10. Once the concept was explained, you could immediately relate

Maybe you didn’t even need to go through this list to realize you were in a career situationship. Maybe you already knew, and were just waiting for someone to put a label on your feelings.

How to Get Unstuck from a Career Situationship

So if you truly are stuck in a career situationship, the obvious question is, what can you do about it?

Your options are basically to cope or quit – rebuild a healthy relationship with your career, or find the courage you need to break off that relationship and start a new one somewhere else. These strategies will point you in the right direction:

1: Identify the problem areas

No job is wholly great or wholly terrible, so spend a few hours assessing everything: your responsibilities, salary, co-workers, boss, clients, commute, stress levels … anything that might be relevant. How many negatives do you have? Are the scales tipped in favor of staying or leaving?

2: Check your expectations

Is your career the problem, or is it you? Having sky-high expectations for your job puts a lot of pressure on it and makes it harder for you to be satisfied. So commit to some brutal honesty: are your salary, opportunities for advancement and work-life balance reasonable given your role? Are you comparing your current situation with a dream job that doesn’t exist anywhere? Would the job be better if all you changed was your own attitude?

3: Get as much as you give

Your enthusiasm for your career will fade if you let your boss dump too much work in your lap. We know that you’re a nice person who always wants to help, but this relationship will bleed you dry if you don’t set boundaries. And just like in a personal relationship, overcompensating for a partner never turns out well. The advice here is to set clear boundaries and hold them firm for a few months. See if this doesn’t help your attitude at work.

4: See what else is out there

Time to hit up the career equivalent of Tinder and start swiping right. You can do this by checking our job ads and talking to people who work in relevant fields to get the inside scoop. You should definitely take a career aptitude test or two as well, since these tests will introduce you to multiple possibilities that match up well with your talents, personal preferences and personality traits.

5: Stop letting fear control you

The idea of quitting your career situationship and venturing out into the great unknown is scary. Even asking for a raise or a change in job responsibilities implies a certain amount of risk, since you never know how your employer will react. But if you don’t do anything because you’re afraid of the possible consequences, nothing will ever change. What would you say to a friend who was stuck in a relationship because they were afraid of breaking things off? Give yourself the same advice – life is too short to stay in an unhealthy career.