Organizational happiness – The three angles to watch for
I have been asked this question several times ‘What would you do to make your company a happy work place’?
The answer is not so straightforward, but it is obvious that it is not one person alone who can create a happy workplace. It is everyone’s responsibility to achieve this.
Organizational culture however is the most important foundation to achieve this. I wanted to bring out the reasons for unhappy and disengaged workplaces, which in turn will help us bring out the methods, which can create happy work places.
I would clearly divide the organization’s happiness into three buckets
a.Employee alignment with the job
b.Employee engagement at the work place
c.Employee’s personal beliefs and factors external to work
More than forty percent of employees globally feel unhappy because they are unclear of their objectives in the organization. Each and everyone in the organization wants to have clarity for their existence and be part of the team which comes out with some outcomes. More than money, sense of accomplishment is what drives employees across the organization. The mistake many do is to hire the best person for a position where the job is not as challenging
as they expect. This leaves most of the people dissatisfied with their contribution as the platform they get is not as challenging as what they look forward to accomplish every day.
Another common mistake many organizations do is hire to fill positions. The position in general has a job description but little clarity on the growth path and alignment to the organization’s goals.
The second piece is the employee engagement. This is a major outcome of the organization culture. The famous proverb ‘As you sow, so shall you reap’ is a perfect metaphor to describe how organizational culture relates to employee engagement.
Lack of transparency from top management would lead to a similar outcome at every level leading to distrust. Great organizations have clear goals and perfect alignment.
The reinforcement thereafter happens with a good organizational culture giving not only a positive image of the organization but also a great sense of belonging to the employees.
The less controllable bucket is the employee’s personal life and external ecosystem. I have observed that great work culture helps employees to cope up with personal issues far better. Colleagues at work
place are more accommodating,company policies help employees to settle personal matters and in many cases,an ex-employee can even join back.
With these three clear buckets of employee happiness and engagement it becomes easy for us to understand as to what can make our workplace a great and happy place to work.
Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below.
Another very good article:)..the flat organization structure along with the ideas mentioned
in the article will bring down the Attrition rate and extracting BEST out of the hired/salaried employees
….i think only one point is missing :calling back ex employees who got potential of making the difference..