The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

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  • 5 things to know before you try to motivate your employees with money

    5 things to know before you try to motivate your employees with money

    Do financial rewards motivate employees to work better? I really don’t think so.

    Companies that use rewards and bonuses to make employees happier and more motivated are largely wasting their money. The promise of a bonus has never really done anything for me personally, and the research in motivation is very clear: Rewarding people for better performance tends to reduce performance. See the book “Payoff” by Dan Ariely for some great real-life studies.

    But maybe I’m wrong – it wouldn’t exactly be the first time :)

    So I recently asked this question on twitter and LinkedIn:

    Have you ever received a bonus or other monetary reward at work, that was given in a way that made you happier at work and/or more motivated? If so, what about the reward was it that worked for you?

    The replies clearly show that we can’t completely dismiss the use of monetary rewards and bonuses at work – and they also reveal when they actually make people happier and more motivated.

    Here are 5 lessons from the replies I got.

    1: Financial rewards work better when they are surprising

    One factor that showed up in may comments was that surprising rewards work much better than expected ones. This is a crucial finding because many companies promise certain rewards when employees achieve certain goals, making the rewards expected and reducing their effectiveness.

    Here are some examples:

    “My husband recently received an unexpected bonus, for exceptional service. It was not asked for, not expected but welcomed with great warmth and happiness.”

    –

    “I have this clear recollection of my former manager handing me a gift certificate for a lunch. Compared to my other bonuses and incentives this was nothing – in a monetary perspective and yet it made a huge impression the reason being that it was unexpected. He just wanted to appreciate my work.”

    –

    “Yes I have – the fact that it came out of the blue and was accompanied with a handwritten card from the bosses meant all the difference in the world.”

    –

    “One time. It came as a complete surprise (as opposed to those ‘entitled’ bonuses) + some nice personal words to go with the $$$.”

    –

    “It came as a surprise, so was a reward rather than incentive, and with a genuine, and face to face, conversation about why it was being given.”

    2: Financial rewards work better when they’re clearly tied to recognition

    People also found rewards motivating when they were given as recognition for good and meaningful work.

    “Yes, when it was clearly linked to the result we as a team had made. Everybody got paid from the hard work and because we succeeded. Being part of a result and seeing that in your wallet – I believed made us happier.”

    –

    “I was fortunate to work for an executive who understood the value of appreciation. The company didn’t have a bonus system as such (at least not for my level) – yet, from time to time, when I had done a particularly good job – he would come to my office, give me feedback on the extra value of this effort, an gave me 3 bottle of good red wine, paid for a pair of expensive sunglasses I was looking at, … smaller tings like that.

    He frequently gave med feedback on what I have done – but sometimes, it was just a tad more than that – and it made me feel good and truly appreciated … and really wanting to do what it takes to experience that again.

    Oh – by the way – the executive was not my immediate manager, but the managers manager.”

    3: Financial rewards work better when they are given as a good experience

    Many people mentioned that they’d gotten rewards that were given as a good experience rather than as a monetary amount.

    “At one of my workplaces the bonus system allowed me to study an MBA. The reward system was built on pretty simple financial KPIs and depending on the result my employer would pay for the following year’s tuition….that affected my motivation positively.”

    –

    “Yes – anything you can share with your family is great! They also ‘suffer’ from us working hard :-)”

    –

    “Good question Alexander ! I worked during 5 years for a Hotel group chain in the world, with work contracts of limited duration for each mission. One day, between two contracts, my manager offered me (to reduce my waiting of my working visa for Kenya and to thank me), a free Flight where I wanted in the world. 10 days after, i left with my best friend for Mauritius island !! Beautiful reward of my work : to offer me a moment to rest !!!”

    –

    “Looking back I am more happy with a dinner my great boss gave me many years ago than a loyalty bonus of substantial value from an ahole years later.”

    –

    “Does “go on vacation and bring me the receipts – you look like you need it” count? If so, yes – and what worked was the fact that this particular boss noticed that I was run down and ragged and did, in fact, sorely need a vacation, and that I was going to find an excuse not to go unless she did something about that, too. Also, I couldn’t really afford a trip at the time, so the money did actually matter, too.”

    4: Financial rewards work better when people need money

    This one ain’t exactly a mystery – if employees need money, giving them money makes them happy.

    “A friend of mine once told my managers manager that I was so tired (I was working 14-16 hours a day, seven days a week for 3 months) I had fallen asleep in the cinema watching the latest 007 movie (so, not something by krzysztof kieslowski). My managers manager said that he’d reimburse my ticket. I thought nothing of it, but got a note from him saying that there’s money for a dinner also, and then a 2.500 USD extraordinary payout. It made a huge difference and impact, I felt really appreciated (because money was a factor in my life back then). Today, it wouldn’t make any big changes.”

    –

    “Once, when I was young and working at my first real job. When Christmas arrived I got a box full of Christmas related food and snacks. This was also my first time living on my own – I expected nothing and was very happy to get food and snacks that I could not afford on my own back then.”

    5: But many say rewards don’t work for them

    I got so many replies from people who said that they had never received a financial reward in a way that worked for them. In some cases, they even made things worse. Here are some of the replies:

    “I have also tried being incentivized where it felt more like a stressful factor than an incentive. I think – for me at least – the task has to hold meaning and the reward has to be at a reasonable level to balance out the extra effort.”

    –

    “Never. I was always rewarded with recognition, a new problem to solve and more responsibility. The pay was always more than I wanted to spend, and I never thought about it”

    –

    “Nope. Did once get one so small the entire team thought of giving it back. As a reward for our efforts it was actually a demotivating insult. No bonus is better than a belittling bonus IMO.”

    –

    “Yes, momentarily. Because the amount was substantial. Another time, yes, because I didn’t expect it. Both times, the feeling lasted about a week….. then it was ‘same old, same old’🤨”

    –

    “Honestly, no, I don’t think I have. I’ve valued the money, and sometimes felt trapped in my role and retained by the expectation of receiving it, but not felt motivated by it. Achievement, thank yous, helping my team, making things better and purpose all motivate me more.”

    –

    “Only ever earned sales commission as a bonus, and never has it had any effect on my motivation or behaviour.”

    –

    “In the past I’ve received a surprise bonus at the end of a big project and it was a moment of happiness and motivation. “Hey, these people appreciate the work we did!” But when the next three projects finished up and no such bonus appeared, it was demoralizing in that the Board appeared to have lost interest or appreciation for the years of work that went into the projects.”

    The upshot

    Monetary rewards are one tool that companies can use to motivate employees and keep them happy – it’s just that for some companies it’s the only tool they use reliably and that is doomed to fail.

    If your employees need money, giving them money will make them happier. If they don’t, you might find it  much more effective to:

    1. Make the reward a surprise
    2. Give an experience instead of money
    3. Give the reward as recognition for good work

    And note that these three can easily be combined, making rewards that much more effective.

    And ESPECIALLY note that if when companies give “bad” rewards they can actually backfire and make employees less motivated. How dumb is that?

    Related posts

  • How common are good work days and what makes them good? See the results of our international survey.

    How common are good work days and what makes them good? See the results of our international survey.

    We all have good days and bad days at work and being happy at work is not just about avoiding having bad days at work – it requires having mostly good days, where we actively enjoy our work.

    But how often do people around the world have good work days and what makes them good? Is it about compensation, perks and promotions – or do we value other things more?

    Our brand new survey of more than 2,500 people worldwide shows how frequent good work days are and reveals their main causes.

    For instance, 1 in 3 say they have a good work day every day or almost every day – while 22% experience at most 2-3 good work days a month!

    Here are the most important findings from our survey.

    And here’s a video where we explain the survey and the main findings:

     

  • The Cult of Overwork is Killing Startups

    The Cult of Overwork is Killing Startups

    The New York Times has a great article called “In Silicon Valley, Working 9 to 5 Is for Losers” that examines workaholism in startups. It even quotes one entrepreneur as saying “I rarely get to see my kids. That’s a risk you have to take.” I wonder if he asked his kids if that was a risk they were willing to take.

    The piece also quotes from this excellent article by David Heinemeier Hansson, where he points out that startup investors are the main driver of this culture:

    There’s an ingrained mythology around startups that not only celebrates burn-out efforts, but damn well requires it.

    It’s not hard to understand why such a mythology serves the interest of money men who spread their bets wide and only succeed when unicorns emerge.

    There’s little to no consequence to them if the many fall by the wayside, spent to completion trying to hit that home run. Make me rich or die tryin’.
    …
    It’s bullshit. Extractive, counterproductive bullshit peddled by people who either need a narrative to explain their personal sacrifices and regrets or who are in a position to treat the lives and wellbeing of others like cannon fodder.

    These two articles do a great job of exposing the toxic overwork culture in many startups but I just want to add five few quick points on the topic:

    1: If hours are all that matter, an entrepreneur working 80 hours a week will be beaten by one working 90 hours a week. Where does it end?

    2: Many of the mental qualities that make a startup successful are lost when people are overworked, tired, stressed and unhappy, including networking, creativity and effective decision making.

    3: Permanent overwork kills people. For instance, those working a 55-hour week face 33% increased risk of stroke.

    4: Permanent overwork doesn’t result in increased output.

    5: Pointing to successful startups that worked 80 hours a week proves nothing. What about all the startups that worked 90 hours a week and failed?

    Imagine starting your own company and ending up creating a workplace where you hate to work. How stupid is that?

    On the other hand, employees of a startup where people are happy to work and have full lives outside of work, will be more productive, motivated and innovative, boosting the startup’s chance of success.

    Even if working crazy long hours did enhance a startup’s chance of success (which it does not), it would still be wrong because it hurts employees physically and psychologically.

    Related posts

     

     

  • Being great at your work vs. feeling great about your work

    Being great at your work vs. feeling great about your work

    If we want to be happy in our jobs, we need to be good at our jobs.

    We human beings have a basic need to know that we contribute, create value and can make a difference and effect change in our environment.

    That’s why doing a good a job feels amazing. It gives us feelings like pride, accomplishment, fulfilment, growth and worth.

    On the other hand, when we feel that we don’t perform well at work, it creates feelings like inadequacy and lack of control plus of course fear that we might lose our jobs.

    And it’s also in the company’s best interest to make sure that every single employee and team is getting great results and living up to their potential. Companies typically focus on 4 areas to make that happen:

    • Skills: Training, competencies, job skills match,  …
    • Resources: Time, tools, IT-systems, …
    • Structure: Organization, plans, goals, budgets, strategy, processes, …
    • Support: Coworker+manager support, coaches/mentors, …

    These are all important and enable us to get results. If your workplace is not giving employees these 4 things, then how on earth can you expect them to perform well?

    If we want people to be happier at work, we can definitely help them get better results. We can give them better training, more resources, more support, etc. in order to help them perform better.

    However, many people already get great results – but don’t feel that way. And if that’s the case, then they won’t be very happy at work.

    This is a crucial distinction that few companies make – the distinction between getting good results and feeling good about those results. If we want employees to be happy at work, they also need the latter – and many don’t have that.

    When that is the case, employees may get great results right now but it won’t be sustainable. When people are not happy at work, it hurts their motivation, productivity and creativity. Stress and burnout tend to follow.

    So in addition to helping employees get great results, companies also need to make sure that people feel great about their results.

    There are 3 things that give us that feeling of results.

    1: Meaning

    I saw this sign in the lobby of Danish pharmaceutical company Xellia, carrying probably the simplest and most inspiring company purpose I’ve ever seen.

    As you may know, one of the biggest current medical crises is the increasing risk of infection by multi-resistant bacteria, which are immune to traditional antibiotics. Xellia produces an antibiotic that is still effective against multi-resistant bacteria. Their research and products directly saves lives all over the world.

    It’s crucial that we know what we have to do at work, but  equally crucial that we know why we do it.

    That is what gives work meaning and purpose: when you know why you do each task and how it somehow helps someone.

    And it’s not enough that your work is meaningful to the organization – it must be meaningful to you. Your work must have a purpose that you believe is worthy.

    On the other hand, if you have no idea why your work matters and no sense that it makes any kind of a difference, it really doesn’t matter how good you are at your job – you won’t be very happy.

    Many workplaces take great pains to give employees performance goals to clearly show them what they are expected to do. But we must make equally sure to show employees why their work matters and how it makes a positive difference.

    US online retailer Zappos are a great example of this. Whereas most customer service reps are measured on how many calls/emails they handle, Zappos’ employees are measured primarily on how happy they make their customers. The former metric makes sense only to the company, the latter is meaningful for employees too because it shows them that they make a positive difference for the customers.

    2: Autonomy

    When you are free to do your job your way, you are much more likely to take pride in your results and feel good about them.

    On the other hand, if a micro-managing boss is telling you exactly what to do, how to do it and when to do it, you are much less likely to feel good about the results you get, because they won’t be your results.

    As much as possible, we should be free to choose:

    • What we work on
    • Who we work with
    • What approaches and methods to use
    • When and where we work

    One of my favorite examples of this is Middelfart Savings Bank in Denmark, one of the happiest workplaces in Europe. How did they achieve that? They gave their employees huge levels of freedom and responsibility. Their former HR directors said this:

    “You’d be amazed what happens once people are empowered to make decisions.”

    Another amazing example comes from the US Navy, where nuclear submarine captain David Marquet gave his sailors unprecedented autonomy. He explained how he did it at our conference in 2015:

    3: Appreciation

    And finally, we feel good about the work we do when we are recognized for it.

    Harvard Business School professors Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer talk about this in their awesome book The Progress Principle. They sum up the book’s main message like this:

    Of all the things that can boost emotions, motivation, and perceptions during a workday, the single most important is making progress in meaningful work.

    Even a small win can make all the difference in how people feel and perform.

    Creating a culture of positive feedback in an organization is one of the simplest and most powerful ways to give employees a feeling of results.

    When your coworkers, your boss or even the customers praise your good work, it clearly shows that you make a difference and get great results.

    On the other hand, if you feel you do good work but nobody ever notices, it becomes much harder to maintain pride in your work. Some companies even take it a step further – they never praise good work, but all mistakes are instantly and severely punished.

    Our absolute favorite way to praise others at work is The Poncho. Try it!

    The upshot

    It’s not enough to help employees get great results – we must help them get a feeling of results.

    Of course we first need them to do good work. No one should expect to feel good about their work, if they’re not doing a very good job in the first place.

    But that’s not enough.

    Happiness at work only comes when people know that their work has meaning and purpose, when they have freedom and autonomy in how they work and when they are appreciated and recognized for their good work.

    Imagine the opposite. Imagine that you’re very good at your job and get great results. But you have no idea why any of your tasks matter, somebody else has decided how you work on those tasks leaving you no freedom and autonomy and you are never recognized for any of your efforts.

    How happy could you be at work under those conditions? How good would your results be in the long run? How soon would you lose all motivation and burn out?

    So improving how people feel about their results is crucial.

    It’s also a lot easier. Provided a person is very good at their job already, improving their feeling of results may be a lot faster and easier than improving their actual results.

    It’s also a lot more effective, because if we can’t figure out how to make people feel proud and appreciated about their work, it doesn’t matter how stellar their results are – they will never be happy at work and their performance will ultimately suffer.

    Related posts

  • 11 government policies that promote happiness at work to give a country a competitive advantage

    11 government policies that promote happiness at work to give a country a competitive advantage

    Discussing public policy in Dubai

    Given that happy companies have significant competitive advantages, governments have a strong interest in enacting public policies that promote happiness at work in their country.

    But what exactly could a government do to achieve this?

    At the World Government Summit in Dubai earlier this month I was part of a panel that discussed how public policy could promote workplace happiness.

    We had  a fascinating and wide-ranging discussion and came up with many cool ideas. Some of these may seem radical or weird but many of them are already in place in countries around the world.

    Here are 11 ideas I would suggest:

    1: Regulate and inspect psychological workplace safety

    Pretty much every country has a government agency that sets requirements for physical workplace safety and sends out inspectors to visit e.g. factories and construction sites to make sure that the correct safety equipment is being used and that workers are following safety regulations.

    So why not do the same for psychological workplace safety?

    In the Scandinavian countries, this is actually in place. The Working Environment Authorities conduct inspections in cases where they suspect that working conditions are psychologically unsafe. They inspect things like:

    • Amount of work and time pressure
    • High emotional costs of labor
    • Bullying and sexual harassment
    • Contradictory or unclear work requirements

    If they find that the workplace is psychologically unsafe they can issue orders that the company must follow. In serious cases they can even issue fines.

    Breaking a leg because you trip over something at work is painful and can take a long time to heal. But make no mistake about it: being bullied by your boss or working under constant stress can affect your mental and physical health just as severely.

    Therefore it makes perfect sense to mandate standards for psychological workplace safety and inspect workplaces to make sure they’re followed.

    2: Regulate against permanent overwork

    In Denmark, we have laws protecting employees from permanent overwork. The result is that Danes tend to leave work at a reasonable hour most days, and they also get five to six weeks of vacation per year, several national holidays and up to a year of paid maternity/paternity leave. While the average American works 1,790 hours per year, the average Dane only works 1,450.

    Even Japan where the culture of overwork is so rampant that they have a word called karoshi that means death from overwork, is trying to enact similar laws:

    The law, introduced as a response to the social problem that has been serious since the late 1980s, makes it the state’s responsibility to take steps to prevent death from overwork. It calls on the government to study the situation of heavy workloads that impair the health of company workers and lead them to take their own life.

    Protecting employees from permanent overwork makes them happier and more productive.

    3: Mandate employee representation on board of directors

    Here’s another idea from Scandinavia – give employees representation on the board of directors:

    Employees in Danish companies employing 35 employees or more, are entitled to elect a number of representatives to the board of directors. The number elected by employees should correspond to half the number elected by those who own the company at the general meeting, and should be at least two.

    Crucially these employee representatives are not mere observers – they have all the same powers and responsibilities as the “regular” board members.

    This means that employees are informed about and have influence on major strategic decisions.

    4: Make government workplaces role models

    I would love to see governments take a leading role by making public sector workplaces among the best in the country.

    Sadly, the public sector usually has a bit of an inferiority complex. Since they usually can’t offer the same salaries, perks and incentives as private sector workplaces, they feel that they can’t be as good workplaces.

    However, it turns out that those factors matter very little for workplace happiness, as long as they’re fair. However, public sector workplaces have a huge potential for being happy because they can offer something that many private workplaces struggle to give their employees: Meaningful work.

    Public organizations almost by definition work for an important purpose. Schools educate children, hospitals heal the sick, city planners create better and more liveable cities – even the garbage men play a huge role in making people’s lives easier and better.

    By contrast, let’s say  you work in an ad agency. The end result of your hard work might be that some company somewhere sells a fraction more detergent. Is that really meaningful to you?

    If public sector workplaces would take the lead on offering their employees things like meaningful work, great leadership, good working conditions, work/life balance, professional development and employee empowerment they could serve as role models for all workplaces.

    5: Promote lifelong learning

    When a government makes education available cheap or free to its citizens, there is a much bigger chance that they get to realize their full potential and become happy at work.

    And this should not be limited to young people. Lifelong learning should make it easy and affordable for anyone to upgrade their skills so they can get different or more interesting work.

    6: Require companies to measure and report on employee happiness

    Pretty much all countries require strict financial reporting from companies.

    So why not require companies to measure and report on employee happiness?

    7: Require all government suppliers to be certified happy workplaces

    The government of any nation buys huge amounts of goods and services from private sector companies.

    No government should knowingly buy from a company that used slave labor or child labor or polluted the environment.

    So why not require that all government suppliers be good workplaces?

    8: Don’t hobble trade unions

    Trade unions have a somewhat mixed reputation and can fall victim to corruption or cronyism.

    However, on the whole it is clear from the research that collective bargaining is a powerful tool to improve working conditions not just for union members but for all workers in many areas including compensation, vacation time, maternity/paternity leave and workplace safety.

    Employers and lobbyists in some countries are trying to restrict unions, making it easier for employers to keep costs low. If a government protects workers’ rights to organize, the result is better working conditions and happier workplaces.

    9: Celebrate the best workplaces

    Several private companies conduct surveys to find the best workplaces in different countries, but these rankings are always limited to those workplaces that pay to be included. This limits their usefulness.

    So why not let the state publish a ranking of the best workplaces in the country?

    10: Make unemployment benefits widely available and liveable

    When unemployment benefits are too low to live on or too hard to obtain, employees are locked in to their jobs, because leaving a bad workplace could have disastrous financial consequences.

    However, when unemployment benefits support a decent standard of living and are available also to people who quit a job, getting away from a toxic workplace is much easier.

    11: Make bad workplaces and managers legally responsible for the harm they cause

    If a workplace is run in a way that systematically harms its employees mental health, causing stress and depression, it should be possible to hold the leadership of that company legally accountable.

    We already do this for workplaces that don’t live up to physical workplace safety regulations – serious violations can lead to fines or even jail time for the managers responsible.

    I think it makes perfect sense to do the same for companies or managers that harm their employees mental health.

    The point

    Any government has an interest in enacting public policies that strengthen the competitive advantage of companies in that country.

    However, this is often done by cutting corporate taxes, deregulation or corporate subsidies – none of which have much of a track record of success.

    If a government is truly serious about giving companies a sustained, strong competitive advantage, they should really focus on policies that create happier workplaces.

    This would not only be good for the companies and the employees, it would also be good for the national economy, as it would boost national productivity and reduce absenteeism, stress and related healthcare costs.

  • 5 reasons you should close your inbox on your next vacation

    5 reasons you should close your inbox on your next vacation

    If you have some vacation time coming up, and if you’re like most people, you will put up an autoreply email just before you leave, saying that you’re gone, when you’ll be back and who to contact if it’s urgent.

    Although this approach is nearly universal, it has two massive flaws:

    1. Emails still reach your inbox, tempting you to check work email on your vacation just to make sure that nothing urgent is happening that requires your attention or to reduce email overload when you get back.
    2. When you come back from vacation, there may be hundreds of emails in your inbox.

    I have talked to many people who mention both of these as a source of stress and I’ve just seen too many parents on family vacations handling work emails on their phone/laptop by the pool, when they should’ve been playing with their kids.

    Fortunately there’s an alternative: Close your inbox while you’re away. This may seem like a weird idea but some workplaces are already doing it:

    The car and truck maker Daimler has implemented a new program that allows employees to set their email software to automatically delete incoming emails while they are on vacation.

    When an email is sent, the program, which is called “Mail on Holiday,” issues a reply to the sender that the person is out of the office and that the email will be deleted, while also offering the contact information of another employee for pressing matters.

    I think this is brilliant and ought to become the standard way we handle emails on vacations.

    The autoreply during your holiday would then look something like this:

    I’m on vacation and your email was not delivered to me. You can resend it when I’m back at the office on August 4 and I’ll be happy to get back to you then.

    Or if it’s urgent, you can contact these great people:

    lisa@company.com
    stephen@company.com

    Best,

    John

    Email

    Here are 5 reasons why you should close your work inbox completely on your next holiday.

    1: The “normal” way is fundamentally unfair

    Here’s the problem: You’re away from work. As part of your contract with the company, you have time off and yet emails still reach you. This means that some of the work from your vacation time is simply shifted into your post-vacation work days.

    And I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a company that plans for their employees to have extra time after a vacation to deal with the emails that came in during the vacation. Therefore this becomes extra work you have to do on top of your regular tasks.

    One consequence of this is that many people end up checking their emails and responding to them during their holidays, which is also unfair. You’re entitled to time away from work. That’s what a holiday is.

    But one of the most insidious effects of this is that taking longer stretches of time away from the office is punished immediately upon return, because your inbox will be full to overflowing. I haven’t seen any research on this, but I could easily imagine that this would subconsciously discourage people from taking time off or at the very least increase stress around any time off.

    2: You can relax more on your vacation

    When you know in advance that not a single work email will tick in, you can relax more. You can better be present in your vacation activities and be with the people you love.

    3: You get to find out you’re not indispensable

    Imagine going away for 2 weeks without dealing with incoming emails and coming back to find that the world has not ended, the office is not on fire and the company didn’t bankrupt itself in your absence. In fact, things went pretty smoothly without you.

    Being indispensable at work can give you quite a kick, but it’s a dangerous addiction.

    In short, while you’re a valued employee who does great work, you are not indispensable. No one is. Or at least, no one should be. If your workplace cannot function at all without you, that is a clear failure of organization and leadership.

    Knowing that things can function without you leads to a lot less stress and makes it easier for you to take time off in the future.

    4: You teach others you’re not available 24/7

    In my company, bosses send emails at all hours –  late at night, on the weekend or during vacations – and always expect an answer. If you don’t react within 20 minutes, you get a text message demanding a reply. If you don’t react to that, they call you on the phone. They basically expect us to always be available.

    Some clients (these can be external or internal clients/managers/co-workers) have developed an expectation that others are available to them 24/7.

    Closing your inbox sets boundaries and shows them that this is not the way things are.

    5: Come back more productive

    And finally, closing your inbox means that when you get back to the office, you can instantly be more effective because you don’t have to deal with a backlog of hundreds of emails and having to figure out which of them were important, which are still relevant and which were handled by others while you were gone.

    If you go on vacation with an empty inbox, you come back to an empty inbox. Anything important that wasn’t handled in your absence can be resent to you now that people know you’re back.

    What if your workplace won’t let you do it?

    I took most of July off this and did exactly this. However, I’m self-employed, so I can do whatever I want :)

    But what if your workplace won’t allow you to do it? If that’s the case, there’s also a middle way.

    Julian Troian is the Chief Happiness Officer of a company in Luxembourg called Etix Everywhere. His autroreply gives people an option to interrupt his vacation but also makes it clear that there’s a cost:

    I am currently out of the office on vacation.

    I know I’m supposed to say that I’ll have limited access to email and won’t be able to respond until I return… but that’s not true. My iPhone will be with me and I can respond if I need to. And I recognize that I’ll probably need to interrupt my vacation from time to time to deal with something urgent.

    That said, I promised my family that I am going to try to disconnect, get away and enjoy our time together as much as possible. So, I’m going to leave the decision in your hands:

    If your email truly is urgent and you need a response while I’m on vacation, please give me a call on +352.xxxxxx and I’ll try to take your call and provide you with assistance.

    If you think someone else at Etix Everywhere might be able to help you, feel free to email one of my colleagues at HR : xxxxx@etixgroup.com and they’ll try to point you in the right direction.

    Otherwise, I’ll respond when I return…

    Warm regards,
    Julian

    Julian says it works really well and people only interrupt him when it’s something urgent that only he can deal with.

    Your take

    How will you handle emails on your next vacation? Could you close your inbox?

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  • 10 simple things the CEO can do to create a happy workplace

    10 simple things the CEO can do to create a happy workplace

    happy org chart

    Happiness at work starts from the top. This is one of the fundamental truths of happy workplaces.

    In any organization where people consistently love to work, you will find a CEO and executive leadership team that places employee happiness among their top strategic priorities and act accordingly.

    One of our favorite examples of a CEO who truly gets this is Herb Kelleher of Southwest Airlines (since retired), who put it like this:

    When I started out, business school professors liked to pose a conundrum: Which do you put first, your employees, your customers, or your shareholders? As if that were an unanswerable question.

    My answer was very easy: You put your employees first. If you truly treat your employees that way, they will treat your customers well, your customers will come back, and that’s what makes your shareholders happy.

    So there is no constituency at war with any other constituency. Ultimately, it’s shareholder value that you’re producing.

    If, on the other hand, you have top brass who don’t give a damn about anything but the bottom line and their own bonuses and stock options, I can flat-out guarantee that you will create an organization with very little happiness but with a lot of fear, stress and frustration. And, ironically, with poor bottom line results.

    So top executives MUST make employee happiness one of their most important goal. Both because it’s the right thing to do for the sake of their people, but also because it will actually make the company more successful. Studies consistently show that happy workplaces make more money.

    But how does a CEO or top executive practice this on a daily basis? What can they do to make their organization happier?

    Here are 10 great real-life examples that we’ve seen work really well in workplaces around the world.

    10: Regular lunches with employees

    During a speech in Istanbul, I met an executive of a huge Turkish organization who has had a monthly lunch with 10 randomly picked employees for years now. Every month 10 employees get a chance to have a nice lunch and over the course of a couple of hours get to ask any question they want and air any concerns or complaints.

    They also get a chance to meet him in an informal setting and get a sense of who he is as a person.

    9: Random acts of workplace kindness

    medis 1

    Some CEOs enjoy doing little random things to surprise and delight their staff. Here’s an example from Medis, one of our clients in Iceland, where the CEO decided to make fresh pancakes and waffles for anyone passing by.

    He even had a great time himself:

    I thoroughly enjoyed it – the biggest joy I actually got out of observing the reaction of the colleagues !

    FYI we did not announce anything but simply showed up in the corridor without notice and took people pleasantly by surprise.

    8: Celebrate accomplishments

    The Danish Competition and Consumer Authority is a government agency whose 200 employees work to enforce consumer regulations and keep markets competitive.

    Every month they have a breakfast meeting where important information is shared with all employees. At this meeting, the director Agnete always shares 2-3 successes that the organization has had since the last meeting. She’ll highlight how they’ve completed a big project or won a court case and make sure that the people who worked on that are recognized and celebrated.

    7: Encourage bad news

    One CEO we know had a strong desire to receive all bad news as soon as possible. He knew bad things happened (they do in all workplaces) but he also knew that some employees were to afraid of reprisals to come out and directly say that they might miss a deadline or have to disappoint a client.

    So he has trained himself and his managers to always receive bad news with a smile and a phrase like “Thank you for telling me that.” This took some practice.

    That way bad news come out early and can be dealt with before it turns into a disaster.

    6: Meet with new employees

    One fast-growing company of ours has a tradition where the CEO hosts a monthly afternoon tea at his home for all new hires that month.

    It’s a completely informal gathering that serves two functions: He gets to meet all the new people and get a sense of who they are and he takes some time to talk about the company’s history and vision which is a powerful way to show the new hires the values and purpose of the organization.

    5: Solve problems

    Overall Board

    South African social media agency Quirk has a process in place that encourages employees to bring about any problems they see to the attention of the executive team. The process gives all employees a voice and guarantees action from the executives in two weeks at the most.

    You can read about their process here.

    4: Give employees time for family

    Here is a letter that US vice president Joe Biden sent to his staff in 2014:

    biden

     

    He explicitly tells them that it’s OK to prioritize important family events over work.  Appreciating staff and giving them time for family makes them happier – and happy staff are more productive. It also combats the ubiquitous cult of overwork.

    3: Say good morning

    Carsten and Karsten, two sales managers at Danish company Solar, wanted to do something nice for their employees.

    Early one Monday morning, they stood at the entrance and greeted every employee with a cheerful “good morning” and a breakfast they could take to their desks.

    2: Celebrate mistakes

    In one company, the CEO was told by a trembling employee, that the company website was down. This was a big deal – this company made most of its sales online, and downtime cost them thousands of dollars an hour.

    The CEO asked what had happened, and was told that John in IT had bungled a system backup, and caused the problem. “Well, then,” says the CEO “Let’s go see John!”

    When the CEO walked into the IT department everyone went quiet. They had a pretty good idea what wass coming, and were sure it wouldn’t be pretty.

    The CEO walks up to John’s desk and asks “You John?”

    “Yes” he says meekly.

    “John, ” says the CEO, “I want to thank you for finding this weakness in our system. Thanks to your actions, we can now learn from this, and fix the system, so something like this can’t happen in the future. Good work!”

    Then he left a visibly baffled John and an astounded IT department. That particular mistake never happened again.

    In many workplaces,  employees who do good work are rarely recognized but anyone who makes a mistake is immediately and harshly punished. This is dumb.

    When we can openly admit to screwing up without fear of reprisals, we’re more likely to fess up and learn from our mistakes. And that’s why top executives should help employees celebrate mistakes.

    As an example, IT company Menlo Innovations in Michigan has this banner hanging in their office:

    Make mistakes faster

    1: Walk the halls and meet people


    One day, the IKEA store in Gentofte, Denmark was a hive of activity. Not only was there a European executive meeting taking place, but the company founder, Ingvar Kamprad himself, was in the house. That’ll make most employees straighten up and put in a little extra effort.

    The execs wrapped up at 6 in the evening and Ingvar then took a stroll through the entire store as if this was the most natural thing in the world, kindly greeting each and every employee. He encountered two female employees talking to each other and approached them with a smile and the words: “And what are you two lovely ladies talking about?” – following up with big hugs for both of them.

    I love this because it shows a genuine interest in the employees and because Kamprad is clearly happy himself and not afraid to show it.

    We know from psychological studies that emotions are contagious and top leaders can spread a lot of happiness simply by being happy themselves.

    The point

    This list is by no means exhaustive and it’s definitely not meant to be prescriptive. We’re not saying all executives should do these things.

    What we are saying is that top executives play a huge role in creating happy workplaces. They do this in the big stuff – by making sure that the strategies, plans, goals and values they set for the organization are defined with the employees’ well-being in mind.

    But they also do it in small, daily, interpersonal ways where they can show that they genuinely care about their people, can build relationships with employees and can let employees see them as real human beings.

    However, this can only work under a few conditions:

    1. It must flow from a genuine care for the employees. If the CEO doesn’t honestly care about her employees, she shouldn’t try to fake it. But I’ve always said that if you don’t care about people, you have no business leading them.
    2. Executives must WANT to do things to make employees happier. It’s OK to go a little outside of your comfort zone but if you do things you actively hate, that fact will shine through and it probably won’t work.
    3. Actions must match words. You can’t on the one hand make pancakes or hug employees and on the other hand introduce large-scale organizational changes with no regard for how employees feel. They will see right through that.
    4. Consistency over the long term is mandatory. If you do this for a short while or only do it some of the time, it will be recognized as fake.

    Understanding this and acting on it gives the executives in a workplace huge leverage to make their employees feel valued professionally and personally – thus increasing happiness, engagement and motivation as well as productivity.

    Not doing this – and let’s face facts, most executives don’t – means failing your employees, your customers and your investors.

    Your take

    Do you think executives should care about the happiness of their employees? Do the executives in your workplace honestly care about their people? How do they show it / not show it?

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  • How to praise yourself at work – and how NOT to

    How to praise yourself at work – and how NOT to

    i-am-awesome

    Is it OK to praise yourself at work?

    Could you tell a coworker something like “Hey, let me tell you what I just did – it was AWESOME!”

    Is it OK to send an email to the rest of your team to proudly share  that you found a creative solution to a tough problem?

    Can you take a little time in a project meeting to tell others about that task you just completed on time and under budget?

    Most people are reluctant to do that. They don’t want to seem arrogant or boastful or like they have a big head. But if you ask me, it’s perfectly OK to be proud of the good work you do AND to share that pride with others.

    Just as an example, If I’ve given a speech that I felt went REALLY well (which happens all the time these days) I share that with my coworkers. I tell them what happened and what it was that worked so well.

    However, self-praise can become really annoying if you do it wrong :) Here are 8 tips for praising yourself at work:

    1: Only praise yourself when you’ve earned it

    Just like any other praise, self-praise must be earned. You must have done something awesome before you praise yourself, otherwise it’s completely meaningless.

    2: Share the praise

    If you praise yourself for something you’ve done together with others, then you must include them in the praise. In that case you don’t say “I’m awesome,” you say “We’re awesome.”

    3: Don’t always only praise yourself

    It’s no good if you always only praise yourself and never recognize others. It’s required of all of us self-praisers that we’re especially good at acknowledging the cool things others do.

    4: Admit your mistakes too

    If you’re good at praising yourself when you rock, you should be the first to admit when you suck, apologize for your mistakes and be willing to learn from them and improve. People who can only see the good they do and completely overlook their own flaws  invite nothing but scorn and contempt.

    In fact, why not celebrate your mistakes?

    5: Praise yourself with genuine enthusiasm

    When you praise yourself, do it with an honest infectious enthusiasm. It’s OK to be proud of yourself. It’s OK to have a smile on your face, a spring in your step and pride in your voice when you share your accomplishments. In fact, it will be received more positively by others than if you do it with false humility.

    6: Moderation in all things

    It goes without saying that anything can be overdone – including self-praise. Don’t overdo it.

    7: Practice, practice, practice

    Practice makes perfect. It’s banal but true. Try it, see what works and then improve from there.

    8: Be ready to face skepticism

    Praise is sorely lacking from many workplace – including self-praise. This may lead to skepticism and resistance from others if you start doing it. If this happens, consider carefully if the criticism is because you’ve gone too far – in which case you should listen to it – or if it’s simply that people are not used to it – in which case you should continue doing it.

    Why you should praise yourself

    We can see four major advantages of self-praise. First, when you share your successes, others can learn from your best practices and maybe apply them themselves.

    Secondly, genuine enthusiasm is infectious. When you share something that made you happy, others become a little happier too.

    Thirdly, you can inspire others to also share their victories, so the whole team becomes better at sharing what works, to the benefit of all.

    And finally, if you are good at praising yourself, you’re not as dependent on receiving praise from others. As Spencer Tracy put it:

    It is up to us to give ourselves recognition. If we wait for it to come from others, we feel resentful when it doesn’t, and when it does, we may well reject it.

    And if all else fails, there’s always the self-praise machine that an employee at one of our clients built:

    Your take

    What do you think? Do you ever praise yourself at work? How do you do it? What are good ways or bad ways to do it? Write a comment, we’d love to hear your take.

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  • The 5 most important findings from the science of happiness that apply at work

    The 5 most important findings from the science of happiness that apply at work

    Happy workplaces are more profitable and innovative, attract the best employees and have lower absenteeism and employee turnover rates. Simply put, happy companies make more money.

    But how do you create a happy workplace? We believe some of the answers are found in positive psychology – a fascinating field and one of the main inspirations for the work we do with our clients around the world.

    Traditional psychology looks at everything that can go wrong with our minds – psychosis, neurosis, phobias, depression etc – and asks how it can be treated/cured. It’s an incredibly important field but positive psychology asks the opposite question: When are we happy? What does it take for people to live good lives  and thrive psychologically? The field has been especially active for the last 30 years and we are learning some really interesting and surprising things about happiness.

    Here are the five findings from positive psychology that we believe are the most relevant in the workplace.

    1: Positive emotions have many beneficial effect on us and on our job performance

    We tend to trivialize emotions in the workplace. It doesn’t matter what you feel, the prevailing thinking goes – it matters what you think.

    You should never show emotions at work and the true professional has no emotions at work. You should be like Spock from Star Trek who once said “Emotions are alien to me. I’m a scientist.”

    But this turns out to be impossible. Not only do we have emotions, those emotions affect our physical and mental well-being in many ways and, in general, positive emotions have some strong positive effects on our work performance.

    Here’s one example:

    … a number of the participants were either shown a comedy movie clip or treated to free chocolate, drinks and fruit. Others were questioned about recent family tragedies, such as bereavements, to assess whether lower levels of happiness were later associated with lower levels of productivity.

    … they found happiness made people around 12% more productive.

    So far, studies have shown that experiencing positive emotions makes us:

    • More productive
    • More creative
    • Healthier
    • Braver
    • Less stressed
    • More resilient
    • More helpful
    • Less biased
    • More optimistic
    • More intrinsically motivated
    • Faster learners
    • More likeable
    • Better team players
    • More generous

    Simply put, happy people not only feel better and thrive more, they also do better work. This helps explain why happy companies are more profitable and hence why no workplace can afford to ignore how people feel at work.

    2: Emotions are contagious

    One study in emotional contagion at work brought test subjects together for a simulated negotiation. They didn’t know that one member of the group was an actor extensively trained by the researchers to exhibit certain emotions during the meeting.

    Would the emotions of one person affect the rest of the group? The answer is yes – and when the emotions transmitted by the actor were positive, the whole group became more effective:

    There was a significant influence of emotional contagion on individual-level attitudes and group processes. As predicted, the positive emotional contagion group members experienced improved cooperation, decreased conflict, and increased perceived task performance.

    It turns out that how people around you feel rubs off on you and vice versa. Being around others involves taking on some of their emotions and transferring some of yours to them. We have all experienced this. Being around happy people makes us a little happier. Being around miserable bastards has the opposite effect.

    This is highly relevant in the workplace because it shows we don’t exist in isolation. Happiness is a social phenomenon and each of us influence, and are in turn influenced by, the people around us.

    3: Small actions can have a large effect on our happiness

    One of the coolest things about positive psychology is that it is highly research-based and the various interventions are tested in numerous studies.

    You may think that in order to become happier in life, you have to win the lottery or achieve massive amounts of success. But what they have consistently found is that simple interventions are surprisingly effective. Here are some examples of proven happiness interventions:

    • Write a gratitude letter to a person who has helped you
    • Make a list of 3 good things that happened to you today/this week
    • Perform a random act of kindness for someone else
    • Receive positive feedback

    In the workplace, this means that while organizational factors like strategies, vision, values and processes do matter, it also matters how we work together and interact in our teams on a day-to-day basis. Do managers treat their employees with respect and kindness? Do coworkers trust each other, help each other and maintain good relationships? Do people take the time to treat each other well in the workplace?

    However, the research also shows that happiness interventions only work under 2 conditions:

    1. You have to do it and keep doing it. This is hardly surprising.
    2. You have to want to do it yourself. If someone else forces you to do it, it doesn’t increase happiness. This is why you have to be careful not to mandate certain behaviors at work in the name of happiness.

    4: Unexpected things make us happy

    According to research, we become a happier when good things happen to us (duh!) but the effect is even bigger when good things happen to us unexpectedly:

    Emory University and Baylor College of Medicine researchers used Magnetic Resonance Imaging brain scans to measure changes in human brain activity in response to a sequence of pleasurable stimuli.

    They used a computer-controlled device to squirt fruit juice or water into the mouths of 25 research participants. The patterns of the squirting were either predictable or unpredictable.

    The researchers found that the MRI scans showed a brain area called the nucleus accumbens to be much more active when the subjects received unpredictable patterns of juice and water.

    So:

    • Something nice happens that you expect = good
    • Something nice happens unexpectedly = even better

    This is interesting in the context of happiness at work because many of the things companies do to make their employees happier are utterly predictable: Summer parties, Christmas parties, Bonuses, team events, and so on happen on an almost completely fixed schedule, which serves to diminish their effectiveness.

    This is why we advocate also doing random acts of workplace kindness. According to this research, a small well-meant surprising gesture towards an employee or a team may make them much happier.

    So what could you do, to surprise a co-worker today? Here are some examples:

    5: Making others happy, makes us happy

    It’s been shown consistently that doing things to make yourself happier has a small effect on your happiness but doing things for others, elevates their happiness AND yours much more.

    In one study, participants received a small amount of money that they could spend either on themselves or on others. Their happiness was measured before and after, and subjects who spent the money on others experiences a much larger boost to their happiness.

    This means that one of the most reliable paths to happiness at work is to focus less on your own happiness and more on making others – be it coworkers or customers – happier.

    This is not to say that you should sacrifice yourself for others, to the point where you neglect your own happiness. It just means that focusing only on your own happiness is likely to be a shallow, meaningless and ultimately unsuccessful.

    The upshot

    Happy employees are healthier and more productive and happy companies make more money.

    That’s why every company and every manager need to make happiness at work their most important strategic priority. These findings from positive psychology  help point the way on how to do it.

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  • 3 reasons why “Never Give Up” is really bad advice

    3 reasons why “Never Give Up” is really bad advice

    Ever seen one of these little “inspirational” images on facebook or linkedin? They’re are all over the damn place :)

    Not only is this kind of advice vapid and simplistic (and frankly it annoys the crap out of me), I believe that it might ultimately be doing us a major disservice.

    Here are 3 reasons why “Never Give Up” is really bad advice.

    1: Sometimes giving up is just the right thing to do

    TinaKibergI’m reminded of the story of the world famous opera singer Tina Kiberg.

    As a child, Tina was a competent violinist and spent her free time practicing and practicing. One day she participated in a violin contest and realized that she would never be more than a mediocre violinist and that she also enjoyed singing more. She gave up the violin, took up singing and became a leading international opera singer.

    If she had seen quitting as always the wrong thing to do, she might have been stuck as a run-of-the-mill violinist. Her courage to give up is what allowed her to become a world famous opera diva.

    Now try to guess what these somewhat successful people have in common: Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Tiger Woods, Reese Witherspoon, John McEnroe and John Steinbeck?

    Yep, they all dropped out of Stanford.

    Ever heard that “Winners never quit and quitters never win?” What nonsense!

    Look at pretty  much any successful person and I bet their past is littered with things they did at one time and then gave up.

    Sometimes you’ve got to stick with something, even through tough times. But sometimes you have to have the courage to give up. And you have to be open to the fact, that sometimes giving up is the right way forward.

    2: Powerful psychological biases already make it hard for us to give up

    There are a number of cognitive processes that systematically make it harder for us to leave existing situations and move on to something new – even when we’re miserable with the status quo.

    Just off the top of my mind, here are some cognitive biases, that conspire to keep us stuck in bad situations:

    The sunk cost fallacy
    When you’ve spent a lot of time/money/focus on something, it becomes very hard to walk away from it. People think “I’ve invested so much in this already. If I quit, that will all have been wasted.”

    The ambiguity effect and the status quo bias
    People tend to select options for which the probability of a certain outcome is known, over an option for which the probability of that outcome is unknown. Example: “I know my current situation is tough, but I know what I have. If I give up, I don’t know what I will get.”

    Loss aversion and the endowment effect
    Once we have something, we hate to lose it. Things we don’t have yet, don’t carry the same value.

    Given these cognitive biases, it’s already hard enough for us to give up, which might help explain why people stay stuck in bad jobs, bad marriages,  abusive friendships etc. We don’t need the added burden of simplistic “Never give up” advice making it even harder for us.

    3: Society attaches a stigma to giving up

    And yet, in the face of all this evidence to the contrary, society stigmatizes people who give up. Quitting is seen as weak, as a lack of passion or as personal failure.

    As I see it, “Never give up” is easy to say and therefore gets repeated a lot. It’s still not true and that makes it tremendously bad advice.

    I think it makes more sense to tell people to know why they do what they do and occasionally evaluate if it still makes sense to be doing it. There should be zero shame in giving up a fight you can’t win or in dropping a goal that no longer works for you.

    Quite the opposite – it’s the sign of a strong, mature mind to have the courage to reevaluate what you’re doing and either choose to keep doing it or to choose something else.

    So the next time you see someone post one of those “Never give up” type images on facebook, be sure to tell them just how wrong (and potentially harmful) that type of advice can be.

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