The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

Author: Alexander

  • Non-inspirational quotes

    Got this in the mail today. Pretty funny!

    Top 20 Sayings we’d like to see on those office inspirational posters:
    1. Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings, they did it by killing all people who opposed them.

    2. If you can stay calm, while all around you is chaos…then you probably haven’t completely understood the seriousness of the situation.

    3. Doing a job RIGHT the first time gets the job done. Doing the job WRONG fourteen times gives you job security.

    4. Eagles may soar, but weasels don’t get sucked into jet engines.

    5. Artificial Intelligence is no match for Natural Stupidity
    (more…)

  • Aaaaaaand: Action

    When I got up this morning, I had no idea that I’d end up on the set of director Thomas Vinterbergs next movie Dear Wendy.

    I had a meeting at Filmbyen (Film city), and suddenly, there I was, standing right behind the directors tent, while they did a re-take of one of the films final scenes. The film is set in West Virginia, and they’ve built a real slice of america right outside Copenhagen. It was fun to get a glimpse behind the scenes, and to get a sense of how Vinterberg directs his movies. There’s a picture of the back of the set on the photoblog. Notice the american style water tower.

  • I want to live in something like…

    The Haus R 128 by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Werner Sobek.

    It’s even better by night.

  • Quote

    I’m a businessman, but I’m still going to do things on my own terms. I’m going to break a lot of rules, and we’re going to blur the distinction between work and play. So we have a policy here – it’s called “Let My People Go Surfing.” A policy which is, when the surf comes up, anybody can just go surfing. Any time of the day, you just take off and go surfing… That attitude changes your whole life. If your life is set up so that you can drop anything when the surf comes up, it changes the whole way you do your life. And it has changed this whole company here.

    – Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia

    Yvon explains the surf boards lined up in the entrance hallway of the companys headquarters in Ventura, California. Quoted in “Good Business” by Mihaly Csikszentmihaly.

  • Going to DC and Seattle

    I’m going to 2 conferences in the US in november. First I’m going to World Dynamics conference for democratic CEOs in Washington DC arranged by Traci Fenton and her crew, and after that I’m going to Washington state to be a part of the Practice of Peace conference. While these two conferences look quite different on the surface, I actually believe there’s a huge overlap between them and with the happiness at work project.

    If you’re in DC or Seattle, and would like to meet and talk, drop me an email. I’m available om november 6 in DC and on november 13 and 14 in Seattle. Also if you know of a place I could stay in Seattle, I’d like to hear about it.

    A big thank you to Kasper of Culture Adventure for the excellent travel arrangements. If you’re travelling, I can definitely recommend him.

  • Beaten to it – by the Dalai Lama

    We’re currently writing a book about happiness at work that will:
    * Describe why happiness at work is important to both companies and employees
    * Show concrete methods that are proven to work
    * Attempt to energize the reader to work towards being happy at work

    The writing is going beautifully. I’m finding my voice and the right style, and I’m simply churning out pages. Writing 10 book pages takes me about half a day. And fortunately I have a lot of help in the process, from fellow happiness-at-work-member Lars Henrik Nielsen.

    And I’ve just discovered that the Dalai Lama has written a book called “the art of happiness at work“. Dammit! There’s a fine review of it here. I’ll have to read the book soon, to see if there’s anything in it that we can steal, er, borrow.

  • Want happiness at work? Control your own time!

    Giving employees something to smile about at the office may be as simple as offering them more control over their time, its recent survey suggests. One-third (33 percent) of workers polled said greater schedule flexibility would result in increased job satisfaction.

    From an article in the Sillicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal.

  • Workday simulator

    Try it.

    I can’t quite decide whether it’s funny or depressing.

  • Most read posts in September

    These were the ten most read posts in September:
    * Autumn Poem
    * Selling fish in Seattle – and having fun
    * Book review: Man’s search for meaning
    * Possibly the best music video ever
    * Book review: The fifth discipline
    * Psychological test
    * Book review: Cryptonomicon
    * Book review: Getting to yes
    * Book review: Small world
    * Book review: Nuts!

  • Standup magic

    Last night was “culture night” in Copenhagen, meaning all the shops and museums were open ’till late and there was lots of music, events, sports and other fun stuff going on.

    Patricia and I went to see a film consultant talk about “What are movies” illustrated by some of his favourite scenes, including:
    * The balloon dance and the barber scene from “The Dictator”
    * The opera scene from “Pretty Woman”
    * The opening scene from “Atlantic City” where Susan Sarandon rubs lemon juice over herself
    * A scene from “The Last Tycoon” with a VERY young Robert de Niro

    And then we saw Rune Klan perform his unique brand of standup magic, and I nearly laughed my head of. Apart from being an extremely good stage magician, he has a wonderful hyperactive, happy and extremely funny act. This is a guy who knows great magic, but can turn it to his own use.