Completely agree. I’ve thought about this a lot, so I’d like to share. I think a lot of your points boil down to the senior management team as well as your direct manager. I’m happy when I have a manager who appreciates my work and commitment, who pushes me and helps me find the growth opportunities that excite and terrify me, who is transparent and honest with me, who is empathetic and is someone I can respect. But while a great manager will keep me happy with my job for a few years, how good I feel about where I work and what I’m contributing towards can play a big role in how long I can stay happy there. Thats sometimes driven by the management, when it has a clear vision and clear priorities, and enables a culture of transparency and empowerment among other things. It can also be driven by the meaning and significance I ascribe to the company’s product or services as well as my contribution towards those.

But most of those points put the onus of my being happy on someone else and I realize that focusing on those things can be a recipe for unhappiness. So while I can create a laundry list of qualities I’d like to see in my manager and company management, how happy I am in my job primarily depends on me — how much at peace I am with myself, my attitude towards everyone and everything around me, and my priorities and choices of what to do with my life.