Group effort

First of all: do it together!

• Find ambassadors to get started together

• Decide why you are going to do this: what problem do you want to solve? What do you want to change or add within your team? Why do you think workplace happiness is important? What goals do you want to achieve? Make sure you write it down so you can keep track of how well you're doing!

 

Knowledge

Make sure you have the right knowledge

• There's a lot of confusion out there about what makes us happy at work. Thankfully there's been a lot of scientific research done to figure this out, and a number of organizations that have gained practical experience with what works and what doesn't work. (Here's a hint - doing great work alongside great people!). Before picking specific initiatives, make sure they're the types of things that will either help strengthen relationships within your team, or empower people to do their jobs to the best of their ability. A great place to get great insight and practical tools and tips on how to create a happy and healthy workplace is the Global Online Happiness at Work Summit - free to register!

• Start by measuring in your organization how happy employees feel from day to day. This is not the same as an annual/semi-annual employee engagement or satisfaction survey (job happiness and job satisfaction are two different concepts, with different inputs and outputs). Not sure how to do this? Feel free to connect with us and we'd be happy to give you guidance!

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Ideas

Here are some ideas to start creating happy employees!

• Start your meetings by sharing 3 awesome things staff did this week

• Organize an inspirational keynote or workshop on happiness at work

• Arrange a townhall meeting where the CEO shares why happiness at work is so important to them personally

• For one-on-one meetings, go on a walk for your discussion instead of meeting sitting down

• Attend the Global Online Happiness at Work Summit as a team

• Set up a challenge: eg. a feedback challenge, a vitality challenge… or participate in the Week of Work Happiness challenges

• Create moments of happiness at work, where everyone hangs their moments of happiness with post-its, photos or notes

• Offer yoga and/or meditation breaks every day for those interested in participating

• Make a point of getting to know your colleagues beyond the workplace

• Start measuring happiness at work in a tangible manner

• Start mapping the employee journey

• Create a physical or virtual"wall of recognition", where people can give praise or recognition to colleagues who have done something awesome

• start with a vegetable garden next to the office for your own tomatoes

• organize a Lego Serious Play session to talk about happiness at work, values ​​or purpose

• Clean the area around the office together, all the papers from the street

• Organize a workshop or training session on preventing burnout and managing stress

• Organize a lunchtime roundtable on happiness at work

• Talk to management about what they can do to make this a happier workplace

• Start an initiative to give more positive feedback

• Play a game to get to know each other better, like Personality Poker or the Choose Happiness at Work game

• Organize drinks with your colleagues

• Have lunch together rather than at your desks

• Talk about your organizational culture and how you can make changes

• start a book, cycling, walking or other club

• Hang a joke by the coffee mater every day

• Come up with a way to visualize the goals of your organization or team in a fun way, and keep track of your progress

• Start the day with a team challenge (for example, planking!)

• Tell your colleagues what you like about them

• Learn to give good feedback, and do it!

• Make a point to say hi to your colleagues in the morning

• Do a random act of kindness for someone

• The list goes on!!!