Beware bosses bearing 'workplace happiness' jargon

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This was published 8 years ago

Beware bosses bearing 'workplace happiness' jargon

Companies like Google and Facebook have transformed the way we look at the modern workplace – but Neil McMahon finds the key to tapping into the "happiness" revolution is about much more than bean-bags and a games room.

By Neil McMahon

Science sometimes wanders off with simple things we thought we understood, has a tinker and sends them back from the lab with a makeover. A cloned sheep. A blue carnation. And now – a new, improved, more complicated definition of "happiness". It's not a mutant form, just a better understood one – and while it applies across every aspect of our lives, nowhere is its impact being felt more potently than in the modern workplace.

Happiness, as now defined by scientific research, is a multi-faceted state of being that incorporates a range of feelings from the immediate buzz of the moment to our longer-term perspective on life, place and purpose – and we need to fulfil both to be truly described by that most amorphous of terms – "happy".

A slide at Google's offices in Zurich.

A slide at Google's offices in Zurich. Credit: Google

Applied specifically to the modern office, the concept of "workplace happiness" is on the march, a buzzword said to hold the key to a healthy, loyal, productive and profit-spinning workforce. But it's wise to beware gurus bearing buzzwords. As the "workplace happiness" industry spawns everything from happiness training workshops to offices crammed with feel-good accessories from beanbags to dogs, there's cause for caution.

Most of us are familiar with the trend, started by tech behemoths such as Google and Facebook, to create corporate playgrounds by replacing the traditional formalities of office life with slippery dips and skateboards to create super-chilled workers generating big ideas and big profits.

Allana Burns, receptionist with Trinity at WME Group, a digital marketing agency, on its "bring your dog to work day" on May 13.

Allana Burns, receptionist with Trinity at WME Group, a digital marketing agency, on its "bring your dog to work day" on May 13.Credit: Eddie Jim

But that is only half the picture, and therein lie the pitfalls for companies playing copycat. For management, there's the danger of rushing to be "seen" to do something on the mantra of the moment and ending up with window dressing. For employees, this means: beware the boss bearing table-tennis bats and a gratitude journal.

If your company is serious about making your working world the driver of your happiness index, the changes must extend to a top-to-toe overhaul of corporate culture.

Emma Brace, of recruitment giant Randstad which does quarterly surveys of employee satisfaction, embraces the "happiness" concept, but says: "Having 'bake-a-cake day' and 'Santa-in-the-park day' doesn't mean anything if it's not intrinsically linked to other factors."

The road to happiness is there to follow if you have a good map. But as happens when the word "human" bumps up against "resources" and things are ever being "actioned" and acronymed to meet those KPIs, there's a danger of being killed in an avalanche of jargon before you get to the end.

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Allana Burns, receptionist with Trinity at WME Group, a digital marketing agency, on its bring your dog to work day.

Allana Burns, receptionist with Trinity at WME Group, a digital marketing agency, on its bring your dog to work day.Credit: Eddie Jim

Dr Peggy Kern, a lecturer at Melbourne University's Centre for Positive Psychology, says: "The terminology is important. You immediately turn everybody off. Get away from the catchphrases. [You can] put this gimmicky stuff in the office, but if people don't feel a sense of trust and they don't feel a sense of respect, the gimmicks are just gimmicks and it feels like it's not very useful.

"There's a lot of misperceptions about it – people think it's 'happiology', just smile and everything's good. Studying it and reading it, it's so much more than that. It's about what gives people meaning in life, it's about the relationships we have."

Ray Milidoni, general manager (right), and Nick Bell, managing director, with dogs belonging to staff at WME Group.

Ray Milidoni, general manager (right), and Nick Bell, managing director, with dogs belonging to staff at WME Group.Credit: Eddie Jim

Adam Hall, of global human resources consultants Towers Watson, says issues driving happier, more committed workplaces are more complex than even the old yardstick: the salary package. "The [gimmicks] are OK if they're part of a broader strategy but if you think that's going to solve your happiness or wellbeing problem, it won't. Just like paying people more won't solve a turnover problem."

To take proper advantage of the happiness era requires delving into the science behind it. Research into what makes us happy generally – and what the word actually means beyond a smiley-face bumper sticker – has exploded. Professor Lea Waters, director of Melbourne University's Positive Psychology Centre, says there has been a 415 per cent increase in peer-reviewed research over two decades.

Ray Milidoni, general manager (rear second left) and Nick Bell, managing director (rear left) and their staff with their dogs at WME Group.

Ray Milidoni, general manager (rear second left) and Nick Bell, managing director (rear left) and their staff with their dogs at WME Group.Credit: Eddie Jim

What they call "human flourishing" is like a bookend to our typical understanding of inquiry into the human mindset. Simply put, traditional psychology involves solving a problem; positive psychology is about building on a strength. "[Traditional psychology] comes in to deal with with an individual from a healing perspective – what is wrong and how can we fix it? The goalposts of positive psychology aren't about healing what's wrong. It's about enabling what is working and what is right."

Waters says there are two pillars underpinning the broader concept of "wellbeing". The "hedonic" aspect – think hedonism – is about immediate feelings of happiness, the "booster shot" of pleasure. But it's of little value without the "eudonomic" element – a sense of place and purpose, which in the workplace means a focus on autonomy, engagement and relationships. "We have to have enough pleasure and happiness in our life but that in itself won't create a larger sense of wellbeing – we need to have sense and purpose behind that."

In a workplace, it's hedonics that drive the trend to reimagine the office as a cross between a rumpus room, a social club and a cafe. Or even a park. There are beanbags, table-tennis tables, massage therapists – and at one Melbourne digital marketing company, dogs. The "bring your dog to work day" initiative at the CBD offices of WME is what the experts consider an example of a wellbeing initiative done well – part of a broader program of shifting company culture, and it ticks key boxes such as developing friendships and encouraging staff encounters that might not otherwise happen.

Ray Milidoni, who launched WME's happiness push late last year, says: "People are smiling all day and interacting with the dogs. It just added an extra vibration to the workspace."

Milidoni says the wider drive to improve wellbeing is showing benefits for employees and the company. "We've had record-breaking months with a lot of KPIs. Staff turnover has dropped dramatically. Our retention rates are much better than they have been."

When it comes to convincing corporate Australia to embrace the wellbeing concept, it's this factor that can be the clincher: better results on the balance sheet. "Sick days down, turnover down, productivity up" is a mantra any manager can love. "Happier, more-engaged workers are going to be more productive, they're going to take fewer sick days, they're going to have fewer health costs. All in all, it's going to lead to greater profit," Peggy Kern says.

Macquarie Telecom is a convert. Group executive Luke Clifton cites bottom-line results to explain the company's wellbeing strategy, which is changing the kinds of people hired, how they are deployed, and understanding what the employee wants from the relationship.

"It's the age-old problem that we've hired people with the right skills and abilities but we haven't hired people with the right attitude and aptitude. We think our attrition rate is slightly too high and we want to do a better job on that over time and that's the reason we're moving in this direction."

At Bupa Australia, they are practising what they preached when releasing a global survey last year pointing to poor employer engagement with the health and wellbeing of staff. Bupa national medical director Dr Rob Grenfell says: "More than a third [of employees] said they found work had a negative impact on both physical and mental health. And over half are happy for their company to take a role in promoting health and wellbeing."

This means encouraging activity as an integral part of the working day – stand-up desks, stand-up meetings (good for health, good for productivity because they go faster) and the "walking meeting" – Grenfell loves holding meetings while strolling the Melbourne CBD. "They say the only problem is I walk too fast," he jokes.

At Macquarie Telecom, they have brought in "happiness" expert Henry Stewart, of London-based Happy Ltd, to train executives. Stewart, who is spending a week with the company at the end of May, says he has seen companies jump aboard the bandwagon without giving proper thought to their goals.

"One of our clients decided they'd appoint someone to make people happy," Stewart tells Fairfax Media from London. "So this person brought in hula hoops and games and wanted everyone to have lots of fun. They measured happiness before and happiness afterwards and found it had actually fallen," Stewart said.

"It's not the trivial stuff, it's the core of 'how do you do your job, do you feel good about yourself and, crucially, do you have freedom in choosing how to do that job?'. In all our research we find that is the biggest difference [for wellbeing] and also the biggest difference for productivity. There's got to be a real coherence."

Locally, Stacey Ashley runs workshops for corporate clients that involve "happiness assessment" surveys as a starting point to measure employee satisfaction. But she says it's about much more than simply asking people what makes them feel good.

"When we look at the science of happiness what we're really talking about is positive mindset being resilient to what's happening around you," Ashley says. "About 50 per cent of it is innate – how we show up, glass half-empty or glass half-full. Ten per cent is circumstances – things that affect you in the moment. And the other 40 per cent is about what we do every day."

Those numbers suggest 50 per cent of our psychological wellbeing is up for grabs at work. How employers deal with it is shaping as the workplace battleground of the 21st century.

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