Is Your Organization Happy?

"Are you happy?" I wonder if you have a simple answer to this question. "What makes you happy?" might be easier to answer. The perplexing truth is that many people spend most of their time with things that do not make them happy.

Why is this important for you as a business leader? Because people try to dedicate most of their energy and time to things that increase their level of satisfaction and happiness. And these are always defined through emotions.

There is no exception when people show up for work. Consequently, if you want to increase the staff's dedication and performance you must make it easy for people to link their positive emotions to your enterprise. Here are three tips:

1. Make your organization less boring (check our last blog post for some tips). Boring organizations might survive. Emotional organizations will thrive.
2. Ask people about their emotional condition. When was the last time you asked your employees: "What makes you happy here?" Do not rely only on surveys. As a leader, ask directly.
3. Balance factual and emotional communication. A good part of your information sharing should be emotional.

Important: The emotional communication is only effective if it is authentic. The worst result is great stories that contradict the facts. Dissonance makes people unhappy, too.

This post is from our Friday noon memo #58. Interested in regular updates? Sign up here.

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