Posted by Anne Decker
What actually happens when a company focuses on employee happiness?
What if you were as happy at work at 8:00 Monday morning as you were at 5:00 Friday afternoon? That was the question posed by our own Aimee Bucher, a consultant on the creation of happy workplaces. She told us that companies experience tremendous benefits when the employees are happy. "Employees come first because happy employees do better work. Better work makes the customer happy because they get great service, and that makes the stakeholders happy because the customers keep coming back and the company makes more money."
Aimee says the results are measurable:
  • Happy workers are 20% more productive than their unhappy colleagues.
  • Happy employees are 19% more accurate at their tasks.
  • Highly engaged teams show 21% greater profitability.
  • Happy sales people increase sales by 37%.
So how do you make employees happy? "Happiness is created in an organization when people feel good about themselves and their work, leadership communicates and rewards positive cultural behavior, and all employees believe their work has purpose and meaning beyond the bottom line."
 
Aimee says you can get started by doing a regular weekly check-in to see how your people are doing and act on their input. Second, allow employees adequate time to accomplish their tasks. Third, tell the success stories of how your company puts its employees first and how your employees deliver great customer service.

"When you intentionally create a culture of happiness you will see incredible benefits in every part of your organization."