Abstract

NUNES, Aline Vieira de Lima  and  LINS, Samuel Lincoln Bezerra. Federal public service agents: an analysis of pleasure and suffering at work. Rev. Psicol., Organ. Trab. [online]. 2009, vol.9, n.1, pp. 51-67. ISSN 1984-6657.

The present study aimed at identifying factors that provide pleasure/suffering at the work environment. For that purpose, that relationship was questioned within workers of a federal institution, due to the fact that it was a public one, and to previous knowledge of how the collaborators feel and react to such situations in the everyday activities of their work. Dejours' Work Psychodynamics theory was employed from the experiences of those workers. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with seven federal public servants. Through content analysis of the interviews, it was possible to detect the discourses presented by public institutions workers. As a factor linked to suffering, difficulties imposed by public service and the highly hierarchical and bureaucratically taken management mode were exposed. Pleasure factors were the perception of success when goals are achieved "despite of obstacles", expressing the ambiguity that is experienced in the work environment

Keywords : pleasure; suffering; public servant.

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