Happy at work.
Happy? At work?
Happy… at work?
Is it possible to be happy at work? Can we go to work and be energized, have fun, do great work, enjoy the people we work with, have fun with our customers, be proud of what we do and look forward to our monday mornings? Can we create workplaces where happiness is the norm?
Or must we simply accept that work is unpleasant and tough and that is why we get paid to do it?
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For my very first monday tip, I’ll start with something really, really simple but extremely powerful: Praise.
Your monday mission: Praise someone.
Pick a co-worker and give that person positive feedback. It can be on something he or she has done recently (“I really enjoyed your idea about developing the Hansen account”) or on what you generally appreciate about that person (“I really like the way you always add great ideas to our project meetings”).
Don’t make a big production out of it, just go up to a colleague, deliver your praise and then get back to work. Do not hang around waiting to be praised back :o) Also do not add a “…but you really need to improve your…” after the praise :o)
Remember that whatever praise you choose to give has to be genuine. You can’t praise just to praise, so think about something you truly appreciate about that person.
For extra bonus points:
The Chief Happiness Officer’s monday tips are simple, easy, fun things you can do to make yourself and others happy at work and get the work-week off to a great start. Something everyone can do in five minutes, tops. When you try it, write a comment here to tell me how it went.
We’ve looked at what we think makes us happy at work but doesn’t. We’ve looked at what actually does work.
But what actively makes people unhappy at work? What are the most important things to avoid? Let’s take a look at that.
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People are constantly asking me why I use the peculiar term Happiness At Work rather than the more traditional job satisfaction or employee satisfaction.
And by constantly, I mean I get asked this two or three times a year at least!
Anyway, here’s why: There is no way you can energize or excite the people in an organization around the theme of satisfaction. “Come on, everybody, let’s make this a workplace where we can all be satisfied with our jobs!??? is not exactly the rallying cry of the century.
Make happiness your goal instead. As in “Let’s make this a workplace where people are happy to work???. It has way more potential and sends a much clearer and more interesting message.
In summation:
Happiness at work = Exciting. Fun. Ambitious. Energizing.
Job satisfaction = Booooooooring!
All clear?
Imagine getting in to work one monday morning. Early. Too early. It’s raining. Not even coffee seems to help. The work week ahead of you seems very, very long.
Perfect time to do something to make yourself or your colleagues happy at work. But what to do?
This is where the Chief Happiness Officer’s monday tips come in. Every monday I’ll post a simple idea, tool or trick you can use to make yourself and/or others happy at work. Something so simple that:
First monday tip is coming this monday. Let me know how it goes when you try it.
I talked to a journalist from Berlingske (a major danish newspaper) yesterday, who was very excited about the top-executives-meet-a-guru event I’m setting up. She wrote this excellent piece about it (in danish).
There are two things that organizations traditionally use to make their people happy, but which simply do not work, and which may even be harmful:
As long as companies look to these two things to make people happy at work, we will get nowhere. And make no mistake: Businesses use enormous amounts of money, time and effort trying to fairly apportion money and rewards.
There’s one more thing that just doesn’t make people happy at work, but which employees and trade unions oftgen cling to it: Job security.
Let’s look at why money, rewards and job security don’t make people happy.
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Maria’s new job had it all: An organization with loads of money, interesting tasks, great salary, impressive offices, a french chef, a gym, free fruit, massages and a view out of her office windows that took your breath away.
Maria is an easy-going, attractive woman in her forties with a broad business background, but even in her first month at the new job she noticed that things were very wrong. As wealthy as the organization was, it still completely lacked human and social values. The workplace was plagued by distrust, infighting, slander, backstabbing, sexual harassment, lack of respect, repression and veiled threats.
She spent the second month pondering how she could change things. By the third month Maria realized that she probably wouldn’t be able to change much and that she might get crushed trying. She quit without having found a new job.
Maria is now a publishing editor, and is also responsible for HR and the work environment at her new workplace. Her salary may be lower, but her quality of life is much higher, and she told me: “I’m now a believer when it comes to happiness at work, and want to help spread the happy message.???
While all the traditional trappings of a good job don’t hurt, they’re just not enough. It doesn’t matter how nice your office, how large your salary or how good the food is, if the mood at the company is bad.
I think that some of the things we strive for at work (the title, salary, perks, etc.) aren’t the things that make us happy. I’m not saying that a high salary will make you unhappy, at least that never happened to me :o), but it won’t make you particularly happy either.
So what will? Let’s look at that.
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Why is happiness at work important to you and me? I just finished the chapter on that in the happy at work book, and in that chapter I reference a study that shows that happy people are more likely to be successful. Here’s some more info on that study:
a lot of research has pointed in another direction, contending that happiness is the result of a lot of things — success at work, a good marriage, a fit body, a fat bank account.
But according to psychologists at three universities, that’s backward. People aren’t happy because they are successful, they conclude. They’re successful because they are happy.
The researchers combed through 225 studies involving 275,000 people and found that most researchers put the proverbial cart before the horse. Most investigators, they concluded, “assume that success makes people happy.”
They conclude that happy people are easier to work with, more highly motivated and more willing to tackle a difficult project. Thus, they are more likely to be successful. That fits neatly with a study done several years ago that concluded the main reason people get fired isn’t incompetence or unreliability or tardiness or any of the other things that distinguish some of our co-workers from ourselves. It’s that they can’t get along with their colleagues.
Read more about the study here, or read the chapter about why happiness at work matters for people.
So not only is being happy at work more fun, it will also make you more successful.
I think Southwest Airlines realized this a long time ago, and that it’s the reason why they mostly hire people based on personality, citing the motto “Hire for attitude, train for skill”.
What happens when a group of western top executives meets a genuine Indian guru?
I have absolutely no idea, but next week we’re finding out.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, the founder of The Art of Living Foundation is coming to Copenhagen and I came up with the idea of setting up this east-meets-west-event, which will focus on two questions:
There are only five seats left for the event, so if you’re an executive and you’re in Copenhagen on July 6, here’s your chance to meet and learn from a man who is the spiritual leader of hundreds of thousands of people al over the world.
The practical details: Thursday July 6 3:30-5:30 PM at the Copenhagen Marriot Hotel. Registration is 2.000 kr. Contact me to sign up.
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