You do not lead by hitting people over the head – that’s assault, not leadership.
– Dwight D. Eisenhower
-
Check out my op-ed piece
Today The CS Monitor published an op-ed piece I wrote called “Yes, you can be happy at work” which talks about the difference between American and Scandinavian attitudes.A quote:
“You get paid to do your job, not to like it,” seems to be the attitude of most US managers and workplaces. What’s worse, American employees seem to be willing participants in this arrangement. When I ask Americans what makes them happy at work, they rarely talk about the work itself – many tend to see it as a means to an end, rather than as something to enjoy.
The result is that US workplaces are dominated by status-seeking career climbers, where the paycheck is the only motivator, where employee turnover is shockingly high, where bad management is never challenged, where burnout and cynicism are the order of the day, and only Dilbert comic strips provide relief.
Click here to read the whole thing.
It’s inspired by this earlier post about my experiences from a recent trip to America.
Before the paper would publish it, I had to agree to a few edits though. For instance this line didn’t make it into print:
In fact, recent studies have Denmark leading the lists of happy nations – so eat it, Sweden!
Though I kinda figured it wouldn’t :o)
-
Go check out jiibe
I previously blogged about jiibe, a really cool site that lets you discover the corporate culture most likely to make you happy at work.You answer a few questions (at least 14, but the more you answer, the more accurate your results) and the site can then tell you how well you match the culture in your current workplace and also make some suggestions for where you might fit in even better.
Give jiibe a whirl – their test is fun and simple and the results can be pretty revealing :o)
Full disclosure: While we may do some work together in the future, jiibe are not paying me to advertise for them – I just really, really like their concept :o)
-
Quote: Work is love made visible
And what is it to work with love?Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
– Kahlil Gibran in The Profet
-
Karoshi vs. arbejdsgl
The Employee Factor blog has a great post about the Japanese word Karoshi:“Death by overwork” or karoshi (Kah-roe-she) is killing the Japanese Manager in his prime. How? Marathon hours at work lead to heart failure and brain bleeds.
…
We’re talking a lot of overtime. Maybe 100 hours of overtime as estimated by an expert on karoshi.Take a moment to take that in.
Imagine death from overwork being so common in Japan, that there is actually a word for it. From the Wikipedia entry on Karoshi:
The first case of kar?shi was reported in 1969 with the death from a stroke of a 29-year-old male worker in the shipping department of Japan’s largest newspaper company.
It was not until the latter part of the 1980s, during the Bubble Economy, however, when several high-ranking business executives who were still in their prime years suddenly died without any previous sign of illness, that the media began picking up on what appeared to be a new phenomenon.
This new phenomenon was quickly labeled kar?shi and was immediately seen as a new and serious menace for people in the work force. In 1987, as public concern increased, the Japanese Ministry of Labour began to publish statistics on kar?shi.
As you may know I’m Danish, and I take pride in the fact that there is no word for Karoshi in Danish. Instead we have a very different word: arbejdsglæde. Arbejde means work, glæde means happiness so arbejdsglæde simply means happiness at work.
And in case you’re wondering how that little sucker of a tongue-twister is pronounced, you can hear me explain it a little more here:
The word arbejdsglæde and how to pronounce it. (2 Mb mp3 file, 2 minutes).This word exists only in the Scandinavian languages (I’ve checked!) and this is not a coincidence. Nordic business culture has a decades-long tradition of focusing on the well-being of employees.
UPDATE: Apparently it exists in Dutch as well. Thank you to Virgil for pointing that out.
Vocabulary matters. It says something about Japanese vs. Scandinavian business cultures that we have arbejdsglæde and they have karoshi.
And I have absolutely no doubt which culture is more likely to make people happy and to create great workplaces.
Related posts
-
The best definition of success I’ve seen
Here is how I know someone is successful — If you are able to give from your abundance then you are successful.
– Fred Gratzon (source)
This is Fred Gratzon, author of the excellent book The Lazy Way to Success, in top form giving the best and shortest definition of success I’ve ever seen.Having abundance is not enough – you are only truly successful when you can share your abundance. And if you only read one book on success, make it Fred’s – it seriously changed my thinking on work, and is one of my favorite books about happiness at work.
Fred’s thought reminded me of the ancient Greeks – they measured a person’s wealth not by how much he owned but by how much he gave away.
-
Ask the CHO: Overwork
Here’s a question that came in an email on Sunday(!)
:Hi Alex,
I’ve just being surfing your website after typing in ‘overwork’ in Google and found it most interesting.I’m an environmental consultant working in a medium size risk management consultancy. I’ve just been working on a report for a client on Sunday while my two kids and husband wait for me to finish.
I am contracted to work 4 days per week but usually end up working 5-6 days. My company has an unstated policy of never ever saying no to work, no matter how small the job. We have won several large tenders lately which has resulted in massive increases in workload for everyone (I am currently on 216% of my target for the month).
We deal with the clients ourselves (which is usually empowering) but if work isn’t completed on time or of the quality they require then we get the nasty phone calls or emails. I am usually known in the company as having good client relationships and lots of repeat business but I don’t answer the phone anymore.
Sorry for the sob story but could you offer any suggestions?
Cheers
Kirsten
This is an interesting follow-up to my previous posts on working at home, flexibility at work, The Cult of Overwork and this question from another reader.
I asked Kirsten if I could post her question here and ask for your input and she agreed and is looking forward to reading any input we can give her.
So what do you think can be done in this situation? Is this typical? What if the problem is more systemic to the way the the whole business is set up?
-
Still more book reviews. My book is STILL good :o)
Reviews of my book keep coming in, and people have been saying amazingly nice things about it.Eric Deniau writes:
I discovered your website several months ago while searching the web when I finished reading another excellent book, “Peopleware” by Tom De Marco & Tim Lister. I loved it right away. I first read the online version of the book (very good idea indeed – I then purchased several paper versions) and found everything in it so true and well written, full of funny pictures and convincing contemporary examples !
One of the brilliant things in the book is that it gives very practical and workable advice on what we can do to improve. Up to the point that I recently explained in a board meeting (I am engineering head in a high-tech company) what is a happy plan. I just started to implement one in my team, and believe me, the first feedback is extremely positive. I’ll provide updates about my experience on this site.
Thanks Eric! I can’t wait to hear how this goes for you – keep me posted!
Barry Egan wrote:
I find your book very helpful in maintaining employee satisfaction. I think it’s great that you offer a free online version of your book. I’ve referred to it many times, when dealing with employee rewards and motivation. It truly is a great read. I’m constantly keeping up with new ways to make my workplace inspiring and just an overall great environment to work. I believe employee satisfaction is the key to happy customers.
Thanks! And I could not agree more – happy employees = happy customers.
More great reviews of my book here:
- Gene Fowler’s review – with comic strip!
- Lynsey Gedye’s review: “Kjerulf has helped make me happy, and you too”
- David Zinger’s review: “Alexander outlines the usual traps of plans and suggest that our plan be fun rather than ambitious, embrace one small thing a day, follow up without pressure, celebrate results, and share what we do. Make your happy plan fast , easy, and fun.”
- Graham Chastney’s review: “The book is a great holiday read without too much detailed analysis of research, but with loads of practical examples and comments.”
Interested? You can read the whole book free online or you can buy it on paper or pdf.
-
Do you work at Google? Do you know someone who does?
Here’s the deal: I’d love to speak at Google.I admire the way they do business and I’d love to get a chance to speak at the happiest company in the US.
I know they have these Authors@Google talks all the time, and I’ve been told by my new pal Alan Gregerman who gave one recently, that the way you get to do one is by having a Google employee sponsor you.
I just happen to be an author myself so if you work at Google, or know someone who does, why not get me over there.
Hey – this approach got me to India. In May 2007 I wrote this post about how I’d love to go to India and speak. Regular reader S. Nand happened to know some of the right people and in December I spoke at a management conference in Indore and gave two workshops to leaders at Tata, India’s biggest corporation.
So… next stop Mountain View?
-
Quote: Numbers don’t lead
Numbers and money follow; they do not lead.
– From the Quicken Loans web siteThat is absolutely brilliant – and beautifully phrased.
If you let the numbers lead you end up with management by spreadsheet in which all decisions are made for short-term gains with no regards to the fact that workplaces rely mostly on the thoughts, feelings and reactions of human beings who are inexplicably difficult to get to follow the stats.
Humans lead. Numbers follow. I like it.
