The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

Month: April 2007

  • Monday Tip: Forgive someone

    The Chief Happiness Officer's monday tipsThere’s a theme on the blog this week: Forgiveness.

    This is not something we see often in the workplace. It’s certainly not a practice that we speak off often, teach much in seminars, or ask about in new hires.

    But it is still a hugely important strength that some people possess and some don’t. The ability to forgive others, is one of the virtues that lead to a happy life.

    And that is why this week’s Monday Tip is to forgive someone at work. I’m sure that at some point, someone has done something that annoyed you, inconvenienced you or made you mad at work.

    Forgive’em for that. Right now. I’m not saying you need to forgive everyone who’s ever slighted you for everything they’ve ever done. No, no, just pick one thing that one person has done and then simply forgive him or her for that. Don’t tell them that they’re forgiven – this is not about them it’s about you. Just let it show in your actions and your behavior, that you no longer hold that against them.

    Choose one person and one act, and then forgive that person for that act. Once and for all, never to let that particular grudge return. Remember, you can still hang on to all your other grudges.

    Then notice how it feels to have forgiven. Then write a comment and tell me about it – I’d really like to know :o)

    The Chief Happiness Officer’s Monday tips are simple, easy, fun things you can do to make yourself and others happy at work and get the work-week off to a great start. Something everyone can do in five minutes, tops. When you try it, write a comment here to tell me how it went.

    Previous monday tips.

  • Quote

    One of the most thoroughly replicated findings in the field of social psychology states, the more you reward people for doing something, the more they tend to lose interest in whatever they had to do to get the reward.

    – Alfie Kohn (Source)

  • Make your body happy at work

    Move at work

    Imagine working closely together with a colleague who complains all the time: when you have been using the mouse for five minutes he will start bitching, and when you’ve been sitting for half an hour he starts yelling at you. This is the case for many people every day –only the colleague is closer than you think –it’s your own body.

    If you have office work, chances are that you regularly experience one or more of the following:

    1. Headaches
    2. Upper back and neck pain
    3. Lower back pain
    4. “Mouse arm??
    5. General stiffness and aching

    What’s this? You love your job so much. You jump out of bed in the morning shouting “Yes! I’m going to work today!?? And your body starts giving you all sorts of complaints. Why? Well, let’s take a look at what kind of work your body was originally designed to do.

    10.000 years ago, before the beginnings of any kind of civilization and through ages of natural selection, the human body (and mind) had become highly specialized in the art of hunting and gathering. Life was all about finding –and killing- food, and avoiding becoming food. If food became scarce, then you moved to find it elsewhere, living a nomadic lifestyle. Everyday, all day, nothing could be obtained without movement. Physical activity was essential. If you couldn’t move –you died.

    Nowadays most of us can easily live our lives with a minimum of physical activity, thanks to cars, elevators, e-mails, pizza delivery and the like. So why all these physical complaints and ailments? Your body should be happy to get off the hook, shouldn’t it? Well, it isn’t, and here’s why: Your body likes to move, and what’s more, it needs to! It is its nature, you might say. Strapping your body behind a desk with minimum movement for 8-10 hours a day is going against nature, on the physical level. And going against nature makes you… well, unhappy. Just like your mind grows dull without intellectual stimulation, your emotions wither away without love and companionship – so your body will start aching and complaining when you don’t exercise it.

    So, what to do, to make our closest colleague happy? Start moving! Here are some suggestions:

    1: Remember: moving is fun!
    If you have forgotten, then it is time to rediscover the joy of physical activity. Play more. Organize office chair races, or give lunch break dance lessons.

    2: Relax!
    If you cultivate a relaxed and easy-going attitude, then you are more likely to avoid stress. Without stress you will be less tense, and you are able to feel your bodily needs; also the need to move.

    3: Use any excuse to get out of the chair.
    Go see people instead of calling or e-mailing. Deliberately move your most used files to the opposite wall in the office.

    4: Move for no reason.
    For instance, decide to do phone calls balancing on one leg.

    5: Buy furniture that invites you to move about.
    Like elevating desks and gym-balls to sit on. Though apparently bean-bag chairs can go horribly wrong in the workplace:

    6: At least twice a week, do a proper work-out.
    Doesn’t matter what kind as long as you are sweating like a pig and having lots of fun. If you haven’t found your fun work-out yet, keep looking. It’s out there!

    The pay-off? Reducing any physical pains will of course improve your productivity and concentration. Also, more movement increases your physical energy, which in turn makes you more motivated and more positive.

    Happy moving!

    Nicolas KjerulfThis post was written by physiotherapist Nicolas Kjerulf (yes, that’s my brother!)

    Nicolas promotes health in companies in and around Copenhagen, Denmark. You can see his website here (in Danish) and you can contact him at nicolas@kjerulf.com.

  • Is your workplace happy? You can win a freezer full of ice cream!

    Dibs

    Ice cream company Dreyer’s (or Edy’s depending on where in the US you are) have just launched a campaign to find the happiest workplaces in the US.

    The happiest companies will win a fully stocked (and re-stocked as warrants) freezer full of Dibs bite-sized ice cream for a month. What is bite-sized ice cream, I hear you ask? It’s a package full of little bite-sized, chocolate-covered ice cream nuggets – so you don’t even need to get out a bowl or a spoon. Now that’s innovation.

    If you’d like to win, you must enter your workplace into the competition here and tell them what makes your workplace happy.

    I think that’s a wonderful way to brand your product, and I’ve long predicted this development – that companies would start branding themselves on happiness at work. In this case it makes sense for Dreyer’s/Edy’s, because they are themselves a fun place to work and because their product fits very well with this message. Think about it. Happiness. Ice cream. Is that a perfect fit or what?

    Which just goes to show that the idea of great workplaces is spreading and becoming more and more commonplace. I loooooove it :o)

  • Quote

    The Lazy Way to Success“Your work (I hate to even say that unpleasant word) should be fun. Pure, unadulterated FUN. Your work (Oh, God, I did it again) should produce happiness. And lots of it.”

    – Fred Gratzon, author of The Lazy Way to Success.

  • Kids today – they get it

    DogA commenter on my friend Bjarne’s blog tells this story:

    Not long ago my youngest son told me “I’ll do anything for money!”

    “OK, ” I said “I’ll give you 20 kroner ($4) to pick up the dog poo in the garden.”

    “Yuck!!” the kid said, “there’s no way I’m taking a sh*t job like that!”

    Kids today – there’s no way they’ll grow up and work jobs that don’t make them happy. That’s why companies today need to shape up and become great workplaces – or they’ll only ever be able to hire old, crotchety types who accept the idea of spending their days in unpleasant or just mediocre workplaces.

    I’m telling ya – the future belongs to the happy!

    In assorted news, I’m in the Danish media these days. I posted a link to this story at the fine Truthteller blog about a company that hired a happiness manager, and was interviewed for a couple of articles AND live on national radio. Cool :o) Article, article. The radio interview is not available on line yet, I’ll post a link later.

    Also, I’m still here – I’ve just found myself very busy this week. There are some good posts coming (including one on the top 10 things managers do that makes employees unhappy) as soon as I get my blogging mojo back :o)