The supreme accomplishment is to blur the line between work and play.
– Arnold J. Toynbee
Thank you to David Zinger for telling me about this excellent quote.
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Banksy: The Bear And The Bee
The anonymous british street artist Banksy made a hilarious piece on the side of a trash container in Notting Hill, that is highly relevant to happiness at work. The text is a parody of a La Fontaine fable and goes like this:“Once upon a time there was a bear and a bee who lived in a wood and were the best of friends. All summer long the bee collected nectar from morning to night while the bear lay on his back basking in the long grass.
When Winter came the Bear realised he had nothing to eat and thought to himself ‘I hope that busy little Bee will share some of his honey with me’. But the Bee was nowhere to be found – he had died of a stress induced coronary disease”.
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Top performers leaving in droves
One large company finds that many of their top performers are absconding:It’s like clockwork. Every year a portion of our top talent decides it’s time to move on. Once those bonus or holiday checks are cashed, the flood gates open and the resignation letters start flowing in.
They’ve done an exit survey among the top performing employees leaving the company:
Of the 178 files, 83 people listed money as a reason for leaving. 62 listed it as the only reason.
Their conclusion: They must adjust salaries and compensation. My conclusion: They’re wrong. Here’s why.
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What makes people happy or unhappy at work
I recently asked you what makes you happy or unhappy at work and got a lot of great answers. Thank you to everyone who responded! Though small, unscientific and totally without academic merit, there are still a few things to learn from this mini-survey, and any managers reading this could stand to take a look at the answers. Here are some of my conclusions.
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Appetite lost in translation
Yesterday my wonderful girlfriend suggested crab chowder for dinner. We found a great recipe a few years ago by british TV chef Ainsley Harriott which quickly became one of our favorites. Ainsley is a man who is very obviously happy at work – as you can probably tell by looking here.
We Googled our way to a danish version of the recipe… which had lost a little something in the translation though:
And no, that’s not the danish spelling of crab chowder :o)
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Ze Frank on happiness
This just in: Ze Frank is forced to explore happiness on The Show all this week.
Hilarious :o)
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Finding happy companies? What do you think?
Josh Peck emailed me a great suggestion last week:I’ve been keeping up with your blog for a few months now and first, thank you for bringing some sanity to the world of work. Secondly, as I read the blog, I keep seeing examples of great companies that are doing things right. How can I find companies near me that “get it”?
Could it be time for a CHO job board, where only enlightened companies are allowed to post?
Could it ever! And what if we add a Google map, where we can all plot in companies we know to be happy and what makes them happy? That way it would be easy to find happy companies to go work for in any country/city/town.
What else would we need? What would make this idea really great? Does something like this already exist?
Write a comment :o)
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Great graphics by Tdenham
In case you’re wondering where I get all my weird clip-art from, I get almost all of it from stock.xchng, and most of it from just one of their users: Tdenham. His series of pictures of himself in a suit enacting various business scenarios are hilarious, technically excellent and already separated on a white background (making my life a LOT easier).
Thanks, Tom!!!!
I then take his pictures and mangle them utterly using my -ahem- meagre graphics skills and the excellent open source graphics program The Gimp. Here are some of the results:
Click each image for a close-up.
And if you’re looking for some great illustrations for your blog, website, document or PowerPoint presentation, check out Tom’s work.
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Great research on happiness at work from Gallup
I have found a veritable treasure trove of articles on happiness at work over at the Gallup Management Journal.
Here are a few great ones:
Construct the workplace to encourage interaction
You are three times as likely to have a close-knit group if the physical environment makes it easy to socialize.Dilbert Is Right, Says Gallup Study
A national employee survey confirms that uncomfortable work environments do make for disgruntled employees.Bringing Work Problems Home
Employees who aren’t engaged in their jobs are more likely to be unhappy in their personal lives too.Can Employees Be Friends With the Boss?
Yes, according to research. In fact, managers who demonstrate care for employees have more engaged staffs.
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How to lose your fear of being fired
Last year, my friend Jakob got a job he really likes in a medium-sized IT company. His boss is a great guy, his co-workers are competent and fun and his clients are all terribly nice people.
There’s only one fly in the ointment: Jakob’s boss’ boss (one of the VPs) is… less nice. He tends to summon all his employees to meetings and chew them out collectively and loudly for whatever problems he sees. He’s abrasive and unpleasant, always complains and never acknowledges his people for the good work they do. His emails to his underlings are a case study in rudeness. And, of course, he’s known for summarily firing people who cross him in any way.
Now, while Jakob likes his job, he doesn’t need it. He’s independently wealthy and so skilled he can always go out and get another job, and therefore has zero fear of being fired. Where other people in the company feel they must watch their tongue for fear of the consequences, he feels free to say and do exactly what he thinks is right.
And here’s the thing: When Jakob stands up to this VP and tells him that he won’t stand for his unpleasant approach and exactly why his abrasive style creates problems for the company, he listens. Nobody has ever told any VP at the company these things before, and for the first time the company has an employee that is totally unafraid of doing so.
The result: This particular VP is slowly changing his ways. And he certainly pulls none of his usual attacks on Jakob, who he knows simply won’t stand for it.
The risk of being fired is the biggest axe a company or a manager holdes over employees’ heads. It’s a mostly unstated, but well-known fact of working life that if you as an employee get too far out of line, you’ll be fired. Or terminated/axed/given the chop – don’t you just love those terms, with their unsubtle flavor of death?
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