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Happy Hour is 9 to 5

Learn How To Love Your Job, Love Your Life and Kick Butt at Work

By Chief Happiness Officer Alexander Kjerulf

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What is happiness at work?

Everywhere, people are taking charge and changing their work lives for the better. A group of young nurses rebel against the hospital's sour mood and turn their ward into a happy workplace. A sales manager finally gets enough of the bickering and competition in his workplace and quits for a much better job. A temp worker cheers up her co-workers with small, random acts of workplace kindness. A programmer at a bank learns what it takes to turn his department from boring to fun. You'll find their stories and many more throughout the book.

But what exactly is happiness at work? Let's start by learning a very strange-looking word.

Arbejdsglæde

We Scandinavians have an advantage over the rest of the world when it comes to happiness at work: Where most other nations are fairly new to the concept of happiness at work, we have a word for it. In Danish, my native language, the word is arbejdsglæde, and while that may look utterly indecipherable to the rest of the world, it’s a concept that is deeply ingrained in Scandinavian work culture and one that most Nordic businesses focus on to a large degree.

Consequently, Scandinavian workers are the happiest in the world. According to a study from 2005, 68% are happy or very happy with their current job, compared with 47% in the UK or even 35% in Belgium¹. This is a major factor behind the success of Nordic companies like Nokia, IKEA, Oticon (the world’s largest producer of hearing aids), Carlsberg, Ericsson, Lego, and many others.

Arbejde means work and glæde means happiness, so arbejdsglæde literally translates into work-happiness. In case you’re wondering, it’s pronounced ah-bites-gleh-the. And you thought Fahrvergnügen was a mouthful!

The wonderful thing is that this idea is spreading all over the world. Happy companies exist in every industry and in every country, and while happiness is not yet the main focus of most businesses, more and more companies have decided to go happy.

So what is it?

What exactly is happiness at work? This question seems like a good place to start, and I’ve been working long and hard to come up with a definition of happiness at work, precisely because so many people ask me just that.

Working with clients, big and small, private and public, got me closer and closer to the answer, and after long deliberation I came up with what I believe is a concise, spot-on definition.

This will amaze you. Are you ready? Here it is:

Happiness at work is…

A feeling of happiness derived from work

Boggles the mind, doesn’t it?!

See, happiness at work is an emotion. It comes from inside of you, and like all other emotions it is difficult to define, but inescapable once it’s present. Or not present. Can you define love? Poets have tried for thousands of years and aren’t getting much closer. But when you’re feeling love, you’re acutely aware of it, even though you have no formal definition.

Though we may not have a dictionary definition of happiness at work, all of us know when we are happy at work—and especially when we’re not. Happiness at work is that feeling you get when you:

• Really enjoy what you do.

• Do great work you can feel proud of.

• Work with amazing people.

• Know that what you do is important.

• Are appreciated for your work.

• Get to take responsibility.

• Have fun at work.

• Learn and grow.

• Make a difference.

• Feel motivated and energized.

• Know that you kick butt.

Most of us already know that feeling. We’ve been there at least some of the time in our working lives. The question is: How do we get there some more?

While the definition of happiness at work may be a little hard to pin down, the effects are unmistakable: Being happy or unhappy at work has a huge impact on our lives. People who are happy at work not only enjoy work more, they have a much higher quality of life overall. They also do much better at work. People who are unhappy at work not only suffer mentally, but are also more prone to stress, depression, and a variety of diseases including heart disease and cancer. Make no mistake about it: In the worst cases, bad jobs kill people. You’ll get the chance to find out what more happiness at work can do for your life, both at work and outside of it in Chapter 6.

But let’s lay down some theory first. Here are the most important things you should know about happiness at work.

One man’s happiness is another’s living hell

Here are Allan and Soren. They’re both men in their 30s and work for the same advertising agency. They have similar backgrounds, but what makes them happy at work is wildly different:

• Allan enjoys working closely with others, Soren prefers working alone.

• Allan hates writing reports, Soren loves it.

• Allan likes lots of new challenges, Soren prefers predictability.

• Allan likes risk, Soren tries to avoid it.

• Allan hates having to focus on only one project, Soren loves it.

While there are definitely some things that make most people happy at work, we need to remember that happiness at work is different for everyone. One man’s happiness at work is another’s living hell. That’s why happiness at work means treating everybody differently, because treating everyone the same only makes very few people happy.

Happiness at work is contagious

Three Italian scientists placed electrodes in the brain of macaque monkeys to study the neurons that control the actions of its hands, for example when it picks up an item. During each experiment, they recorded the activities of a single neuron in the monkey’s brain while the monkey was allowed to reach for pieces of food, so the researchers could measure the neuron’s response to certain movements.

One scientist explains: “I think it was Fogassi, standing next to a bowl of fruit and reaching for a banana, when some of the monkey’s neurons reacted. How could this happen, when the monkey did not move? At first we thought it was a flaw in our measuring or an equipment failure, but everything checked out OK and the reactions were repeated as we repeated the movement.”

A mirror neuron is a brain cell which is active both when an animal performs an action and when the animal observes the same action performed by another animal. Thus, the neuron “mirrors” the behavior of another animal, as though the observer were himself performing the action. These neurons have been observed in primates, in some birds, and, yes, in humans, and some scientists consider them to be one of the most important findings of neuroscience in the last decade².

This may explain why happiness at work is so contagious. Why one determinedly happy employee can lift the spirits of an entire department, and one happy executive can spread a positive mood throughout the whole organization. To parts of our brain, there is no difference between being happy ourselves and seeing someone else being happy.

The bad news is that unhappiness is even more contagious than happiness, probably because humans are conditioned by evolutionary forces to be more atuned to negative emotions. This makes fear and anger in the workplace more contagious than happiness, meaning we must actively work to spread happiness instead.

This also means that your work-happiness depends on the people around you. I’m sure it’s theoretically possible to be the only happy employee in a department with 20 unhappy people, but I’m also sure that it’s really, really difficult! Being happy, surrounded by 20 happy people, now that might be a lot of fun…

Happiness at work is long-term

Having fun and being happy is not about blowing off work that must be done. It’s not about avoiding unpleasant tasks to enjoy yourself in the moment. And it’s not just about being happy here and now.

It’s about happiness for today and tomorrow and next year and 10 years from now. It’s about realizing that without long-term happiness and enjoyment at work, you will not be your best, contribute as much, make as many people smile, or make as much of a difference.

You can't force people to be happy

I have a co-worker who takes it upon herself to act as the happiness police, and it has had the result of creating an antagonistic attitude towards positive thinking! I had to calm down one team member who was genuinely insulted by her attempts, because by constantly goading him to be happier she very much implied that his current life just wasn’t happy enough (and thus, the implication was, not worthwhile). Having someone try to control your “happiness” can be a very unpleasant experience indeed!

—Comment on www.postitivesharing.com

If you purposely or inadvertently create a mood at work where it’s somehow right to be happy and wrong not to be, people will be less happy. You can even end up making happiness at work a dirty word—something people ridicule and actively resist.

That’s why happiness at work must always be an invitation. You can open the door and invite people in—but you can’t push them through the door against their will. The more you try, the more they will cling to the door jamb, kicking and screaming.

Job satisfaction is not happiness

People always ask me why I use the term Happiness At Work rather than the more traditional terms job satisfaction or employee satisfaction. And by always, I mean two or three times a year. At least!

Here’s why: There is no way you can energize or excite yourself or the other people in your workplace around the theme of satisfaction. “Come on, everybody, let’s make this a workplace where we can all be satisfied with our jobs!”—it’s not exactly the rallying cry of the century.

Seriously: Do you want to spend your working life simply being satisfied? When you look back on 50 years spent in business, do you want to be able to say, “Well, I was satisfied”?

No! Make happiness your goal. As in, “Let’s make this a workplace where people are insanely happy to work.” As in, “I’ve been working for 50 years now, and it rocks! I want to go on for another 50!” As in, “Yes, it's Monday, I get to go to work!”

It has way more potential and sends a much clearer and more interesting message.

So, to sum it up:

Happiness at work = Exciting. Ambitious. Energizing. Fun.

Job satisfaction = Booooooooring!

Happiness at work is here and now

Happiness at work does not come from mission statements, corporate values, white books, committees or workplace policies. It comes from the things you and I do, here and now.

It’s not something we can do tomorrow or next week or next fiscal quarter. Happiness is something you have now—or never.

Happiness at work is not eternal

You can’t be happy at work every day. No matter how much you love your job, there are still going to be bad days. And that’s cool—it’s always OK to have a bad day at work.

But, if the bad days start to mount up or even outnumber the good, then it’s time to consider what that does to you—and what you can do about it.

It’s 10% about the job and 90% about you

The perfect job does not exist. There is no workplace out there that only has the things you like. There will always be a few boring tasks, a few co-workers you don’t like, a few rude customers, a few unpleasant managers.

If your plan is to be happy at work as soon as your work and your workplace are perfect and trouble-free, you will never get there. And if you did you’d probably be bored out of your skull.

Happiness at work is not about eliminating all the bad stuff from your job. It’s about being happy at work even though some of these bad things are present. It’s about building your skills and your energy to fix the problems, and to create more and more positive experiences at work.

Happiness at work looks different on different people

One of the very first Happiness at Work Workshops I did was for the Scandinavian logistics department of a large American car manufacturer. At the end of the workshop I asked the participants to share their thoughts, and one gentleman in his 50s stood up to speak. He was formally dressed in a suit and tie (the only one in the group) and with his gray hair and glasses he looked every bit the accountant. Which in fact he was.

He’d been very quiet throughout the workshop, but now he stood up to address the group. He paused for a moment. “I want all of you to know,” he said in a somber voice, “that I’m not as unhappy as I look.” The room erupted in laughter.

The serious face, the somber voice, the quiet demeanor and the formal manner—that’s how this man looked when he was happy at work.

Happiness at work does not necessarily mean running around ecstatically all day long. You can sit at your desk, quietly doing your work, and be discreetly happy. You can be sitting in a hectic meeting, arguing forcefully for your point of view, and be happy.

However, it pays to express your happiness at work, because:

1. The more your happiness shows, the more you spread it to others.

2. The more you express your happiness, the stronger it becomes inside you. If you hold your happiness in and never express it, it gradually dissipates. Express it clearly and visibly and it gets stronger and lasts longer.

While some people believe that you must be serious at work—in your speech, your clothes, your demeanour—I disagree completely. There is nothing to say that you can’t be highly professional and really good at your job and show that you’re happy and energized.

Happiness at work is possible in almost every job

Some people think that it’s only possible to be happy in certain kinds of jobs—those fun, creative ones. This is simply not true. You see many unhappy people in supposedly fun professions, and many happy people with supposedly unpleasant jobs, like sewage workers or funeral directors.

Even if you’re not crazy about the actual work you do, you can still be happy in your job, provided that job makes you happy in other ways—we’ll discover those ways in Chapter 2.

Anyone can be happy at work

That’s right, anyone! Happiness at work is not only for people with fun, creative jobs. It’s not the prerogative of managers and executives. It’s not limited to the highly paid and the powerful.

Any person who chooses to be happy at work and then does something about it can go from, “Oh crap, it’s Monday, I have another workweek ahead of me,” to “Yes! It’s Monday! I have another workweek ahead of me!”

Happiness at work starts with a choice

“Happiness, like unhappiness, is a proactive choice.”

—Stephen Covey

Do you know someone who seems to have given up on happiness at work? Someone who has accepted that work is bad, that this won’t change, and who has now chosen simply to survive rather than try to improve their situation?

The path to happiness at work starts with a simple decision: You must want to be happy. If you don’t commit to being happy at work, you won’t be. You won’t make the choices that make you happy. You won’t take the actions needed to get there. You won’t change the things that need to change.

On the other hand, if you say, “Yes, I choose to be happy at work and to do what it takes to get there,” then things will start to happen. Just making that decision won’t magically make you happy—but it must be the starting point.

And something interesting happens when you decide on happiness: You take charge. When you decide to become happy at work and to do the things necessary to get there, you’re in charge of your career and your work situation. You’re no longer dependent upon the whims of your manager, co-workers or workplace.

You don’t need to make this decision right now. Read this book and then think about how your life would be different if you were happy at work… Let’s start with a look at what it takes to become happy at work.

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