Happiness and work?

Happiness: One word with so much meaning, possibility and emotion all held together with warm memories of great times. Work: Thought by many as the root of all evil; ‘the things I have to do’ or ‘the place I have to go’ because ‘that is life’. Surely these two concepts cannot coexist to create a sentence like: Happy and Engaged Modern Workplace. Or can they?

For those who attended (or viewed online) our February 2015 BridgeTalk with Nic Marks, you will recall that he gave relevance to this topic with his talk ‘Happiness is a Serious Business’. I personally found inspiration in this talk as Nic brought to life the power that this emotion can have on individuals and the benefits that it brings to organisational culture. It also made me positively reflect on the Bridge strapline ‘connecting your people to your brand’, as within this connectivity sits many powerful emotions; one of which is happiness.

It is now my extreme pleasure to bring more happiness to the Bridge stage and focus today’s spotlight on Paul Dolan who will facilitate an informative and challenging debate with our four panellists on what drives happiness in their businesses. Sharing the stage with Paul will be senior representatives from Google, TGI Friday’s, Home Group and Lush who will collectively give us behind-the-scenes access into their cultures.

The many different ways in which we define happiness affect what we can do to improve it. To create a happy and engaged modern workplace we must first define the experiences of pleasure and purpose that we want our people to have at work. Then as leaders we can begin to develop an environment that embraces the happiness and engagement that leaves a lasting impression on those that share our employee journey.

Paul is a leading authority on the subject, and off the back of his best selling book he will bring life to a topic that many take for granted. Many books and happiness experts make prescriptions about what to do in order to be happier, without defining what happiness is in the first place. Paul will take the panel beyond this by giving practicality to what is being pursued and the impact that this has on daily activities. Happiness can have many meanings and the exciting thing about this panel is where the topic may take them.