Nowadays, talking about employee happiness is vital and makes perfect sense, however, it was not always so obvious. For the so-called baby boomers and even the first of the generation x, it was very natural to remain in a job for many years, without even questioning whether the work performed produced happiness. At that time, productivity was measured, not job satisfaction. With the passage of time and the new generations, this has changed drastically and now we have a much higher turnover culture, with millennials giving up left and right, or at least that is the reputation they have earned, deservedly or not.
With the new demands of the workforce, leaders must understand what are those motivators that manage to “hook them” to gain their commitment and ephemeral loyalty. Achieving this objective is a challenge, it requires a deep analysis of many aspects that affect the work life cycle, here are some examples:
- Talent attraction strategy, key question: what makes me different from others to be attractive and even considered the best option?
- Retaining new talent, key question: how do I manage to maintain interest and commitment during the first year?
- Growth and development: key question: am I opening attractive growth paths and working on focused development plans?
Initiatives such as the above must be accompanied by constant listening that allows us to measure the “happiness index”. In this regard, I must emphasize that we should no longer be satisfied with the traditional annual work environment survey. This practice is too reactive, slow and ineffective. Instead, we must open channels to constantly listen to our employees, at different key moments in the work life cycle, which allows us to measure the “happiness index” and make the necessary adjustments proactively.
It is important to ensure the happiness of employees for two essential reasons:
- to ensure business success, as happy people are more productive and
- by social responsibility, in the sense that happy employees make happy people and happy people make happy citizens. If we follow the chain of repercussions, we can say that social responsibility is the impact we can have on society, to make the changes we need to be better.
