He'd taken in work and had aspirations (5)
I believe the answer is:
hoped
'had aspirations' is the definition.
(I've seen this in another clue)
'he'd taken in work' is the wordplay.
'taken in' means one lot of letters goes inside another (some letters have taken in others).
'work' becomes 'op' (short for opus).
'hed' placed around 'op' is 'HOPED'.
'and' is the link.
(Other definitions for hoped that I've seen before include "Expected and wished" , "Desired with the expectation of success" , "Desired, trusted" , "Aspired" , "and 25: Anticipated" .)