My experience has told me that as an employee with no direct stake in the company, you should do little more than the minimum it takes to do what you're hired to do, and put all extra energy into literally anything else, like reducing your responsibility per dollar earned and total allotment of work hours. Anything else is a bad deal for you, but a great deal for real stakeholders.
I say this, because most of the time your employer wouldn't give two shits about you, beyond what they're required to, and your widgets being produced is the only thing they really care about. There are exceptions of course, like companies that obviously will give you that raise as you work to improve your skills etc.. which you should be doing. But usually it's just a Jason Bateman movie waiting to happen.
Way I see it, is that 'just doing the minimum' is utterly soul-destroying. And if you're doing that, then just you need to focus on everything else to stay sane. Work is never going to feel better.
However, if you can find at least a bit of interest in something that you do, then it's rewarding to focus on it. You take pride in that 5%, you polish it, read up on it, stay a bit late to add that shiny new feature, you tell others about it etc. If others agree with you, it grows and then becomes 10, 20% etc of your time.
Basically you're still stuck at work, when you'd rather be asleep under a duvet - but you've made that time more tolerable.
This is just pride in your work and a personal choice right? Which is great, but then sometimes you do this and it's so unreciprocated that you just burnout because you thought what you did mattered, and then your company fires you for whatever trite reason. That fucks with your head and it's probably not worth that much unless you know it can be.
Not disagreeing with anything you say..
But you can make things that satisfies you, and doesn't require external validation/utility.
Have an example:
About 8 years ago I was told two oracle dbs were behaving differently, despite "containing the same data and code"
I'm a biochemist, I can't code for shit, but fuelled by the logic that "there must be a difference" and google, I knocked out a block of PL/SQL that would generate hashes on schema, data, and packages.
At the time I just ran it against the two schemas, it showed me two tables were different and boom problem solved.
Over the subsequent years I've bumped into people with a problem that maybe my script could help debug - but the pride I felt each time was incredible. It's maybe fixed three issues, but something I did right so many years ago still being useful today, feels great.
I get what you are saying, but the fact that your company doesn't give a shit, shouldn't mean that you automatically don't give a shit about a company. Giving a shit is a great trait IMO. If your country doesn't give a shit about you, should you not give a shit about your country? Or your relatives? Or parents? Or children. I am perfectly fine not giving a shit about many things, but I do care about other things passionately, even if they don't reciprocate. Work is one of those things that I really would rather care about than not. When I don't - it usually makes me unhappy.
I agree, but also wasn't advocating for not giving any shit, more so not going "above and beyond" in what is ultimately a relationship that's transactional in nature, or maybe just beyond. Everyone loves someone who takes pride in their work and does a great job, but investing yourself in the company in a way they they won't reciprocate doesn't seem wise. Investing in that way in your actually family, your own business, or your community seems different.
Another way I'd phrase this is not to not give a shit, but to not give more than a shit.
Maybe, but only if you have control over that, and it's only a great deal if you can control it. Usually you control that if you're either a stakeholder, or you make smart choices in terms of what you work on and who you do it for, rather than to what degree you suffer. If you have no agency, and no way of getting that agency, then it's not worth displacing yourself past a certain point. If advancing your career because you suffered x amount only means you suffer more for the chance at a bit more money, bad deal.
I say this, because most of the time your employer wouldn't give two shits about you, beyond what they're required to, and your widgets being produced is the only thing they really care about. There are exceptions of course, like companies that obviously will give you that raise as you work to improve your skills etc.. which you should be doing. But usually it's just a Jason Bateman movie waiting to happen.