Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs at Work: What You Need

Maslow's hierarchy of needs says people are driven by five kinds of needs: physiological, safety, love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization. When the lower needs are reasonably met, the higher ones take over. At work, that means pay that covers your life, a secure job, a team you belong to, recognition, and work that uses what you can do. The hierarchy is a useful checklist for choosing your next job, as long as you treat it the way Maslow did: as a flexible order.

I work as a career coach at International Motivation Training Deutschland (IMT), an approved provider, in programmes funded by the Jobcenter and the Federal Employment Agency. Since 2022 I have coached more than 2,000 adults in Germany's career and integration programmes, most of them starting over in a new country. In the programme I coach in, one session covers Maslow's needs together with a self-test on professional needs. The question behind it is simple: before you apply anywhere, what do you need from a job right now? The self-test at the end of this post turns that question into a few minutes of work.

Maslow's hierarchy of needs: five levels at work

Abraham Maslow set out the theory in a 1943 paper, A Theory of Human Motivation (opens in a new tab), in Psychological Review.

Maslow's line on the top level is the one people quote: "What a man can be, he must be. This need we may call self-actualization."

What Maslow wrote in 1943

Three points from the 1943 paper get lost in most summaries.

The order is flexible. Maslow wrote that the hierarchy "is not nearly as rigid as we may have implied". He listed exceptions: people for whom self-esteem matters more than love, or creative people who keep creating despite unmet basic needs.

Needs are met in part, at the same time. Maslow offered "arbitrary figures for the sake of illustration": the average person might be 85% satisfied in physiological needs, 70% in safety, 50% in love, 40% in self-esteem and 10% in self-actualization. You don't finish one level and move to the next. You work on all of them, with more energy going to whatever is least met.

There was no pyramid. A 2019 study (opens in a new tab) in Academy of Management Learning & Education by Bridgman, Cummings and Ballard found that "Maslow never created a pyramid to represent the hierarchy of needs". The image took hold later, in management studies. The same paper notes that the theory gained "little support in empirical studies".

What the research says

One large test is a 2011 study by Louis Tay and Ed Diener (opens in a new tab) using data from 123 countries. They found that need fulfilment was consistently linked to wellbeing in every world region. Different needs matched different parts of wellbeing:

• Basic needs went most with how people rated their life overall.
• Social and respect needs went most with positive feelings.
• Basic, respect and autonomy needs went most with negative feelings.

The order held up less well. Diener put it this way: "a person can report having good social relationships and self-actualization even if their basic needs and safety needs are not completely fulfilled."

For your career, that means two things. All five needs count. And you don't have to wait for perfect security before you think about meaning, respect and growth.

What starting over does to your needs

Moving country or losing a job pushes the lower levels back to the front. If your income is uncertain, a job that pays reliably can be the right choice for now, even if it uses half your skills. That's a fair decision, as long as you name it as a step and plan the next one.

The opposite trap: taking a job that covers levels 1 and 2 and then staying for years while levels 3 to 5 stay empty. The self-test below helps you see both.

Self-test: what do you need from your next job?

Score each statement from 1 (doesn't matter now) to 5 (essential now):

Then:

1. Mark your dealbreakers. Any statement you scored 5 is a filter. A job that fails it goes off your list.
2. Find your current level. The level with the highest average is where your energy goes right now.
3. Write a one-line brief. For example: "Right now I need secure income and a team that helps me settle in; within two years I want my qualification to count again."
4. Test job ads against the brief. Read each ad and ask which of your 5s it meets. Ask the rest in the interview.

Repeat the test every six months. Your scores will move as your situation changes.

Using Maslow in a job interview

You can ask about every level without sounding demanding:

• Safety: "Is the position permanent, and how long is the probation period?"
• Belonging: "How does the team work together day to day?"
• Esteem: "How do you give feedback, and how often?"
• Growth: "What could someone in this role learn in the first year?"

For more interview questions, see job interview in Germany.

If you don't yet know which field to aim for, start with what career is right for me, then come back to the self-test. And if you want to sort your needs and your next step with someone, see career change coaching.