Can Happiness Be A Good Business Strategy?

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

In 2018, in Ukraine, 22.6% of adults often experienced a low mood during the last month, 19.6% of respondents noticed a lack of interest or pleasure in things, and only 6.4% among those who had at least one of the two symptoms, addressed these complaints to a medical professional. In the Kiev region, 36, 4% experience a low mood, melancholy; 25.3% notice a lack of pleasure in activities

I will never forget one of my clients. His story reveals the horror of a state in which there is fear and no pleasure in life. On a late winter evening, a man called me and asked to make an appointment. As it turned out, he has been in business for over 23 years. We met in my office. "Tell us why you decided to meet?" In response, I heard silence. He could not utter a word. After a while he said: “I am very tired. You have no idea how tired I am … I don't know what to do with my business, with my family. " As it turned out later, his wife decided to leave him, as there was a threat of losing the business. The children didn't understand. We sat in a quiet office. Gradually, I began to feel the burden of problems rolling over me. Then I asked: "Tell me, have family relationships always been so difficult?" Unfortunately, I heard silence in response. He did not have loved ones who could support. Loneliness enveloped me like acrid smoke.

We can say that we live in a country where happiness and business are not compatible. However, our Ukrainian culture is a culture of suffering, compensation for which is possible in obtaining pleasure, but not joy and happiness.

I often hear similar stories from business clients. Stories in which there is no place for happiness and joy. To a greater extent, they are associated with a lack of relationships or, more precisely, a decrease in the time spent in the family. Work takes all the time. We can say that we live in a country where happiness and business are incompatible. However, our Ukrainian culture is a culture of suffering, compensation for which is possible in obtaining pleasure, but not joy and happiness. How can you experience happiness at work, and is it possible? Can happiness be a business strategy? How not to come to the state of my client?

Happiness and business: basic prerequisites

1st prerequisite. Clients increasingly talk about exhaustion: "I don't feel joy … I don't feel anything at all" or "Nobody asks: Are you happy?.." Human. Organizations are responsible for the mental well-being of their employees.

2nd prerequisite. In 2018, Yale University launched the Psychology and the Good Life course, which I was fortunate enough to study. Prof. Laurie Santos, the developer of this course, says she has seen high levels of anxiety, stress and depression in many students. This is an innovative training sponsored by David F. Swensen, who, in turn, was an economic advisor to the President of the United States. In American culture, happiness is not an academic but a completely practical concept. They understand well how important this is for people and the economy as a whole.

3rd prerequisite. The turn to mental well-being and happiness as the main human capital took place in the West in 1961. Main appeal: the most important are the social relations of people and their mental and physical health; and the best indicator of adult satisfaction with life is their emotional health. This call is in line with Thomas Jefferson's thesis: "Caring for human life and happiness … is the only legitimate object of good government."

4th prerequisite. Over the past 35 years, psychologists such as Martin Seligman, Ed Diener, Barbara Fredrickson, Sonja Lyubomirsky, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Daniel Gilbert, Robert Emmons have studied happiness in different contexts of human life. Especially in the business area. Tony Shay, CEO of Zappos, based his business philosophy on happy employees (remember his book Delivering Happiness?) On the data of these authors. Looks like Tony Shay is doing pretty well.

Practical task

I want to offer you a test. Sit comfortably. Close your eyes and answer:

A) Rate your level of happiness on a scale from 0 to 10, where 10 is high and 0 is low. Try to feel.

B) Which emoticon reflects your condition? Please draw.

C) Ask someone close to rate how happy you are on a scale from 0 to 10.

What are the results? It is important that the first and third results match

When there is no joy, then …

1. Life turns into normativity and obligation. Life goes on automatically. There is no personal involvement.
2. A person never asks himself, "What do I like?" or "What would I like?" If at the workplace only work is important, then the question "like" automatically disappears. Once a client said: “When I was working in the office, it was uncomfortable for me to sit under the switched on air conditioner, but, unfortunately, I could not do anything. The leadership did not respond."
3. Life happens at a distance. One client, working for a prestigious company, confessed: “I don't feel involved in the life of the team. I am watching from the sidelines. It's like watching a movie. " The man complained of strong apathy and unwillingness to work, but no one from the management knew about it, and he was afraid to say.

What is happiness?

Here I will briefly provide theoretical calculations, and then practical tools on how to develop joy and happiness in yourself

1. Victor Frankl's model. Austrian psychiatrist who went through three death camps. He proposed the following model for understanding a person:

Rice. one

The first dimension is the physical level, where the needs for food, sleep, sex are satisfied. The second is the psychological level, where there is a need for emotions, affects, in a good mood. The third dimension is the spiritual or noetic level, where a person devotes himself to the highest goal of an idea. If we stay between the first and second level, then we are talking about a homeostatic state of satisfaction. But the personality develops, reaching higher goals. For example, the pursuit of tasks that go beyond my own boundaries. Within an organization, we talk about being committed to the mission of the organization. Happiness from this perspective means resonating with your own value and the value of your organization. The authenticity of its value and the values of the organization will lead to an experience of happiness, not at the level of satisfaction, but as a result of giving back to something greater than ourselves.

2. The model of Martin Seligman and Mihai Csikszentmihalyi. Based on personality strengths and flow theory. M. Seligman says that happiness can be learned. Strengths theory was proposed by him as a result of analysis of the characters of leading leaders. 24 characteristics were proposed, which are divided into six subgroups. Many studies have confirmed that when employees or couples discover their strengths, it increases happiness. The "flow theory" looks like this:

Rice. 2

If a person performs tasks that are difficult for him, he feels anxiety and anxiety; if the lungs - boredom and melancholy. And if these tasks have difficulty with which he can handle, and he likes it, then he gets into a state of flow. “The best moments in our life are not passive, receptive, relaxing. The best moments do happen when a person's body and mind are stretched to the limit in a voluntary effort to do something difficult and rewarding,”says M. Csikszentmihalyi.

According to this model, happiness is seen on three levels:

1. Pleasure level. It can be the pleasure of simple things: shopping, sex, going on vacation. But the pursuit of pleasure does not affect life satisfaction. Disadvantage: although this is good, you get used to it, like ice cream.
2. Absorption in a favorite pastime: raising children, writing articles, walking, any hobby. Time flies by.
3. A meaningful life. A person realizes and feels happiness. A good life comes when time stops.

Research has shown that if there is a 2nd and 3rd kind of happiness, then the 1st kind brings maximum pleasure. Below you can see what these 3 types of happiness look like in relation to "flow theory".

The criterion for a happy life is that you don't notice the time. Your personality develops and forms, despite the workload

Rice. 3

What creates joy / happiness?

1. Due to external stimuli / things / themes … that attract a person (nature, dog, loved one):

A. What did you want to do in the past.

B. What was the interest, but it was lost.

Q. What I would like now.

D. Awareness that "do not like".

2. Thanks to internal incentives: what you like to do; inner values (love and interest in music).

A. I don't want to do anything … I want to be myself;

B. a sense of security;

B. protecting your space.

3. Thanks to the desire coming from within. Desire for life or desire for activity. If external stimuli meet with an internal disposition, they begin to stimulate and awaken the "spirit of life."

A. Work with an attitude towards yourself, the world and people. For example, everything is decided for me. I want to be liked, and that's a way to get attention.

B. Working with self-worth.

4. It is important to find your way. Meaning cannot be imposed or made to believe. A person must find his own worth.

5. It is important to understand that joy can be discovered and practiced on three levels: bodily, emotional, and spiritual. There are many and many practices now. But it is precisely the feeling of happiness that is achieved in finding one's own meaning of activity.

6. The criterion for a happy life - you do not notice the time. Your personality develops and forms, despite the stress. But this is definitely not boring dragging out of your days, hours and minutes from year to year.