Archive for energy

What Brings You the Greatest Joy?

 “What do you do?” a new acquaintance asked me the other day. “I’m in the business of changing people’s lives,” I replied.

“Tell me more,” he smiled. “I use co-active coaching, positive psychology and the science of happiness to help people become healthier, more productive and to flourish,” I said.

I followed up by asking him what in his life brings him the greatest joy. “My partner,” he replied. “She is an amazing woman, and we have a wonderful relationship. Every day is a new adventure, and I cherish our every moment together.”

“What would it be like if you could have that passion in other areas of you life—in your career, for example?” I invited him to explore. “It would be great!” he replied. “I’ve never really thought that could be possible. The place I work at is so miserable. While I try to stay positive, there is so much negativity around me when I’m there. I don’t think I can make lemonade out of the lemons I’ve been given at Blankety-Blank Company.”

Isn’t that the way so many people feel? And what a shame. The thing is, each person has the option to control a good deal of his or her own happiness. Here’s where the science of happiness at work comes in. Because we can measure the key drivers of happiness at work (contribution, conviction, commitment, culture, confidence—coupled with trust, recognition and pride), we can focus in on the areas that need a boost. My business, Capiche, does this with individual coaching and team workshops. The results are impressive—both for the individuals and for the company. Individuals gain greater confidence, creativity, energy and job satisfaction. The company gains longer-term employees with 100% greater productivity who take ten times less sick leave, provide better customer service, make more accurate and better decisions, and are better team players.

Are you interested? I’d love to explore how the science of happiness can work for you. I invite you to contact me for a 30-minute sample coaching session to explore your personal happiness—either as it pertains to work or anything else. If you are a team leader and want to explore how your team can be happier, contact me for a free team happiness at work report that shows where your team could use a boost. Nothing to lose. No obligations. No kidding! I’m in the business of changing people’s lives. chris@capiche.us or 541-601-0114

 

Is Anyone Sick of Happiness at Work? I’m Not, and Here’s Why

Happiness at work is a big topic these days. I spoke to a packed room at the Medford Rotary about it just last week. Even with unemployment still looming large, most people are carrying 150% or more of the workload they were hired for. Companies are cutting their workforce without lowering the expected output. Someone needs to pick up the slack. How can employees stay positive and how can a company justify investing in workforce engagement programs?

How can they not? 

The billboard you see above is posted all over the San Francisco Bay area. There are many terrific books on happiness at work, and more and more articles continue to be published as the research continues. Just Google “happiness at work” and you will find articles in Forbes, the Wall Street Journal, the Harvard Business ReviewPsychology Today, etc. There is even a great LinkedIn group that I belong to called ‘Happy at Work.’ Check it out!

According to one of my favorite happiness gurus, Shawn Achor, “Nearly every company in the world gives lip service to the idea that ‘our people are our greatest asset’. Yet when the Conference Board Survey came out last year, employees were the unhappiest they have been in their 22 years of tracking job satisfaction rates. Around the same time, CNNMoney reported a survey that indicated 84% of Americans are unhappy with their current job. Mercer’s “What’s Working” survey found that one in three US employees are serious about leaving their current jobs.”

Why is this lack of happiness at work important? Job satisfaction is not only the key predictor of turnover rates. In The Happiness Advantage, former Harvard University professor Achor makes the research case for the fact that the single greatest advantage in the modern economy is a happy and engaged workforce. A decade of research proves that happiness raises nearly every business and educational outcome: raising sales by 37%, productivity by 31%, and accuracy on tasks by 19%, as well as a myriad of health and quality of life improvements. Yet even those companies that do take leadership training seriously still ignore the role that happiness plays in leadership effectiveness.

So the secret is out! Happiness, job satisfaction and fulfillment, and employee engagement are WIN-WIN situations for employees and employers. How does your company invest in yours?

(Photo credit to: Anne Espiritu – Google+ http://bit.ly/pElTPu.)

Trying to do more with less – less personnel, less cost and less time?


Earlier this week I spoke to a group of human resources professionals from the Rogue Valley about their most pressing challenges. What rose to the top? Finding ways to retain and motivate good employees without increasing payroll. Why is this important? Because their organizations are trying to do more with less – less personnel, less cost and less time.

I shared some startling statistics with them related to retention, sick leave, time on task and energy levels of the employees – and then I tied it to The Performance-Happiness Model.

Fact: The least happy employees take 5+ sick days per year compared with their happiest counterparts, who take .75 days.

Fact: The least happy employees plan to stay on the job for 1 year compared with their happiest counterparts, who plan to stay 5 years.

Fact: The least happy employees focus on task 20 percent of the time compared with their happiest counterparts, who are working productively 80 percent of the time.

Fact: The happiest employees are 180 percent more energized.

An organization of 100 people with an average pay of $40,000 per year can save more than $650,000 per year in sick pay, employee turnover and lost productivity by increasing employee happiness by just one standard deviation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How does an organization do this? By employing The Performance-Happiness Model (see https://capiche.us/services/organizational-development/performance-happiness-model for details).

Contact me if you are interested in seeing if your organization could benefit from using this model. I will provide you with a free team report and consultation. You may be surprised!

Is Happiness a Luxury Small Businesses Can’t Afford?

As I am preparing for next week’s “Leveraging the Science of Happiness at Work” presentation to the Rogue Valley Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), I’m reflecting on a comment a Facebook friend made the other day when I shared results from a Wall Street Journal survey on happiness in the workplace.

She wrote, “As a small business-owner, no matter the type of business, my primary concern is to make a living, to pay my staff, my taxes and my vendors. Since 2008 when the recession slammed all of us, it’s been a very, very hard slog. Like many other businesses, we’ve laid off employees and we’ve cut costs to the bone. I’m concerned about survival – of my business and of my family. Frankly, ‘happiness’ on the job is merely a luxury, an afterthought that I cannot afford.”

I expect that many people are feeling the same way. What business owners don’t understand is that happiness at work – defined as “a mindset that enables action to maximize performance and achieve potential” – actually saves them money.  In fact, research has proven it can enhance revenue.

Empirical research by iOpeners Institute for People and Performance, involving 9,000 people from around the world, reveals some astonishing findings. Employees who report being happiest at work:

  • Stay twice as long in their jobs as their least happy colleagues
  • Spend double their time at work focused on what they are paid to do
  • Take ten times less sick leave
  • Believe they are achieving their potential twice as much

This means greater outcomes and profits for employers.

And the “science of happiness at work” has big benefits for individuals too. If you’re really happy at work, you’ll solve problems faster, be more creative, adapt fastest to change, receive better feedback, get promoted quicker and earn more over the long-term.

So the next time start to feel that happiness at work is a luxury you can’t afford, think again. Give me a holler if you’d like to see how you can be happier at work. I’ll provide a free individual or team happiness assessment to the first person that contacts me.

 

 

 

Most employee problems are directly related to . . .

I’m presenting tomorrow at the University of New Mexico’s Mentoring Institute Conference on Leveraging the Science of Happiness at Work. Excited! Also doing a poster session and getting my paper published in the proceedings. A copy will soon be on this website.  

Today’s offerings opened with renowned researcher and publisher David Clutterbuck. I was pleasantly surprised that most of what he said was a refrain of the learning and research I have been doing – always nice to confirm!

He is colorful and has some pretty interesting points of view. 
1. Most employee problems are directly related to their supervisors. 
2. If succession planning works, then why do the wrong people keep getting to the top (I think his next book is on succession planning). 

Also, he shared some very powerful questions to use in coaching. 
1. What’s the risk in succeeding?
2. How many lies are you telling yourself about this?

He noted that men and women consistently tell themselves different types of lies. I invite you! Who wants to guess what the differences are?

 

If Happiness Drives Performance, How Do I Get Happy at Work?

In Happiness at Work: Maximizing your Psychological Capital for Success (2010), author Jessica Pryce-Jones takes her research with more than 3,000 respondents from 79 countries and gets to the heart of what drives happiness and (this is so cool!) found that happiness drives performance.

Happiness at work is defined by Pryce-Jones as a mindset that allows individuals and organizations to maximize performance and achieve their potential. This happens during the highs and low—when working alone or in teams. By mindfully making the best use of the resources you have, you overcome challenges. This not only builds your happiness but also that of others—who will be affected and energized by what you do.

Happiness predicts employee time on task, intent to stay in job, sick time, motivation, engagement, satisfaction, self-belief, and respect for self and others. The Performance-Happiness Model, which was developed based on the above research, has been successfully applied in more than 8,000 cases.

The Performance-Happiness Model

Performance Happiness Model VAt the center of the Performance-Happiness Model is believing that you are achieving your potential. This is important because that belief makes you happy, and the statistics around happy versus unhappy employees are staggering.

Pryce-Jones’ research (2010) shows that the happiest employees compared to their least happy colleagues:

  • are 47% more productive;
  • take on average 1.5 sick days per year compared to the United States average of 6 days per year (in the public sector the sick days range from 11 to 20 days per year);
  • are 108% more engaged;
  • are 50% more motivated;
  • have 180% more energy;
  • have 82% more job satisfaction;
  • are 25% more efficient and effective; and
  • have 25% more self-belief (pp. 28 – 29).

The five strong factors important to achieving your potential at work are the 5Cs: contribution, conviction, culture, commitment, and confidence. Three vital sub-themes giving additional perspective of happiness are trust, recognition, and pride.

Stay tuned as I explore the 5Cs, trust, recognition, and pride in upcoming blogs. And please share examples from your workplace on how you’ve seen the Happiness-Performance Model in action.

 

References

Pryce-Jones, J. (2010). Happiness at work: Maximizing your psychological capital for success. West Sussex, United Kingdom: Wiley-Blackwell.