It’s common sense that being happy is probably a good thing for the human psyche. And yet happiness and work are not easy bedfellows. Happiness is often a dirty-word in organisations, feeling altogether too frivolous for the very important work being undertaken. And yet we have an ever-growing body of evidence to demonstrate that happiness is not just a ‘nice to have’.
Did you know for example that being happy is good for your heart?
Harvard School of Public Health looked at over 200 research studies on happiness (or psychological wellbeing to use its academic term) and cardiovascular health. They found that both optimism and positive emotion give protection against cardiovascular disease, slow the progression of heart disease and reduce the risk by 50%, of experiencing a heart attack or cardiovascular event. There is now a body of evidence to show that happier people have better overall health and live longer than their less happy peers.
Being happy not only feels good, it also sets you up for success, both in and out of work. Shawn Achor, an educator, speaker, and consultant, spent 12 years at Harvard researching what makes people happy. His book, The Happiness Advantage, describes how happiness at work fuels success and performance.
We often believe that the path to happiness is to achieve our goals and become successful. But research in psychology and neuroscience show that this formula is backward. What we find is that being in a happy is actually a precursor to success. And there is a relatively simple, scientific explanation as to why this is the case.
When we experience positive emotions, we observe a rise in levels of serotonin and dopamine, which are neurotransmitters: chemicals released by nerve cells to send signals to other nerve cells. These particular chemicals not only make us feel good, but they also enhance the learning centres within our brains. These learning centers help us to organize new information more effectively, retain information for longer, and retrieve information more quickly. They also enable us to make and sustain more neural connections which then allow us to think quicker, more creatively, see things in a different way, improve our problem solving capability, and analyse complex information more skillfully.
There is a wealth of evidence to back up these claims. For example in one study, doctors who were primed to be in a positive state before making a diagnosis, showed three times more intelligence and creativity than doctors in a neutral, stressed or negative state. They also made accurate diagnoses 19% faster. A team of positive psychologists conducted a meta-analysis to further test this hypothesis, looking at over 200 studies on 275,000 people worldwide. What they found was that in nearly every domain the findings were the same, happiness, and positive emotions lead to success.
Obviously priming employees to be in a positive state before they perform critical tasks each and every time they perform them would be fairly intensive. However creating a workplace that develops, supports and enhances employee engagement means that there is much higher likelihood of employees experiencing positive states and emotions.
What’s interesting, is that despite this groundbreaking research, it is still little known or used within the business world. Happiness is often still a dirty word within organisations, with a view that if employees are happy they aren’t working hard enough. Legitimising happiness at work via the implementation of a Chief Happiness Officer could just make all the difference to your organisation.
But can we really help people to be happier? Within the Happiness Advantage, Shawn Achor argues
“[It’s] the lens through which your brain views the world that shapes your reality. And if we can change the lens, not only can we change your happiness, we can change every single educational and business outcome at the same time.”
So how do we go about changing the lens? We have more control over our happiness than we realize, and making small changes in our daily lives can have a big impact on how we feel longer-term. You can train your brain to be more positive by following the simple steps below for 21 days:
- Gratitudes – each day write down three things you are grateful for. It is easy to get caught up with focusing on everything that has gone wrong, but by consciously focusing on the good parts of out day we are retraining our brain to scan for the positive as well as the negative
- Conscious acts of kindness – each day do something altruistic. Research shows that people who report carrying out acts of kindness report feeling much happier than a control group and this effect is found to last for days after the exercise has ended
- Exercise – each day engage in some kind of physical activity, even if it’s only popping out for a walk. There is a huge body of evidence that demonstrates exercise not only boosts positive moods, but also reduces stress and anxiety and provides us with mastery experiences – all of which contribute to our wellbeing
- Meditation – meditate daily for 10 minutes, or more if you have the time or inclination. Neuroscientists have found that monks that mediate are actually able to grow their left prefrontal cortex, which is the part of the brain associated with feeling happy
- Looking forward – find something each day to look forward to. Research shows that even just thinking about watching our favourite movie can increase endorphin levels by 27%
Have a go at the steps above for 21 days and keep a journal to record how you feel at the beginning, during and at the end. Think about what worked for you and if any learning from this exercise could be applied to your organisation to improve engagement and employee wellbeing.
If you want to find out more about how these techniques can help your organisation please get in touch and we can arrange a call with you.
