Remember this number: 2.9013. I’ll explain why later.
I’ve just finished reading “The Happiness Advantage” by Shawn Achor, which I thoroughly recommend to anybody who’s a leader and/or wants to spread more happiness and positivity in the workplace. You can also catch Shawn’s super-fast, funny and thought-provoking TED Talk here
There are many useful insights in the book, and I’ve picked just one for this week’s tip. It’s about leading with the happiness advantage. It’s about using recognition, encouragement and positivity, not just as a reward for high performance, but as a driver for it.
I can’t believe anybody would now question the crystal-clear research evidence from around the globe – people who are happy at work produce more, think better, solve problems more creatively and effectively, take less time off sick, and collaborate better with colleagues and customers. There is a real bottom-line pay-off – the Happiness Advantage.
Achor demonstrates how it’s often the small things that make a difference.
As a manager, how would you feel if you passed by a staff member’s office and they were laughing at a 3-minute YouTube video? Or talking to their 5-year old son on the telephone? Or sharing a joke with colleagues? These are exactly the kind of ‘quick-hit’ emotional boosters that can make productivity and well-being rocket.
Companies that understand the Happiness Advantage have more ‘formal’ policies in place too to encourage the benefits of a positive mood in the workplace. Gym membership, time out for reflection or meditation, on-site yoga classes, and the like have all been shown to boost productivity.
Google is famous for keeping scooters in the hallways and video games in the break-room.
A Danish car company instituted “The Order of the Elephant”, which is a two-foot tall stuffed animal that any employee can give to another as a reward for doing something great for customers. The benefits come not just from the feelings of recognition at the time, but also afterwards. Other employees stop by their desks and say “Hey! You got the elephant! What did you do?”, which means that best practice stories get shared across the teams.
A very successful boutique hotels chain has a practice of making time at the end of top team meetings to allow one person to talk for a minute about someone in the company who deserves recognition. A different executive then volunteers to visit, call or e-mail that person to tell them how much they’re appreciated.
Now, back to the number 2.9013. A decade of research on high and low performance teams by psychologist Marcial Losada shows the importance of this number. Through studying 100’s of corporate teams, this turns out to be the ratio of positive to negative interactions necessary to make a team successful. This means that it takes about three positive comments, interactions, experiences or expressions to fend off the languishing effects of one negative.
Dip below this level, known as the Losada Line, workplace performance quickly suffers. Rise above it, and the results are predictably positive.
Losada’s mathematical ratio joins the increasingly long line of evidence in support of the Happiness Advantage – just one more way that groundbreaking science is triggering what Achor calls a “Copernican Revolution” in the workplace. The idea that Happiness is the centre around which Success orbits – not the other way around. Once we accept this new order, we can change the way we work, interact with colleagues and lead our teams – to give ourselves and our whole organization a real competitive edge.
This week’s call to action:
- Take the next week to notice where you are in your team or organization. Are you above or below the Losada Line? What will you do to boost this ratio?
- e-mail me at kim@kaizen-training.com if you want to delve more deeply into the rigorous scientific research about this.
- Go watch Shawn Achor’s TED Talk: and/or read his book.
