The article presents a questionnaire that was elaborated to measure components of the work meaning -- value and descriptive attributes -- and of the work motivation -- valence, expectancy and instrumentality -- and it relates the research that intended to evaluate their psychometric conditions and to explore also the relationship of the two phenomena. The research was developed in Natal though a sample of 642 participants (487 health professionals, and 155 employees of a bank). Applied factor was applied to each component of the phenomena and coefficients were estimated for identified factors. It was found that the questionnaire presents satisfactory measuring conditions. Employees of bank and health professionals obtained similar scores in the factors of value attributes, but they differed meaningfully in the scores of the factors of descriptive attributes. The motivational force mean of complete sample coincide with the median, but the employees of bank are less motivated, which is probably associated to the questions of work organization and the reduction in number of jobs.
meaning of work; motivation; factor analysis
