In his book ‘Homo Deus’, public intellectual and historian Yuval Noah Harari mentions that after humanity has secured prosperity, growth and better healthcare facilities, the immediate next goal is to achieve maximum happiness. It’s no different for organizations that are simply a collective of human beings.

We are in the era where ’employee experience’ is as essential to business as ‘customer experience’. The ongoing pandemic has elicited the pressing need to foster a culture that promotes work-life balance and focuses on employee wellbeing. Happiness and wellness have also become crucial aspects of hiring and retaining talent.

The discussion on employee happiness is increasingly dominating leaders’ priorities across levels, industries and geographies. A survey by People Matters found that 43% of working professionals believe that a healthy work environment is the key to happiness.

Scandinavians — toppers of the world’s happiness index for years — take the need for imbibing a culture of happiness at work so seriously that they even have a word for it — Arbejdsglæde — which means happiness at work. It isn’t surprising because, ultimately, there’s no greater motivator than being happy to go to work every day.

But what is happiness in the context of work? Narrowing it down to job satisfaction is an oversimplification. Instead, happiness at work is an outcome of being positively engaged. This inspires employees to love what they do, which eventually leads to improved productivity and use of potential.

So, what can organisations do to ensure happiness at work for their employees? There are several approaches to infuse a sense of delight into daily operations. But there are some emotional aspects that are essential to ensure employee wellbeing. These are:

• Psychological safety: This is a significant factor in experiencing joy at work. Employees need to feel that they can voice ideas and issues without the fear of being judged. It empowers them to be themselves. Furthermore, it strengthens their connection to the organization’s growth and goals.
• Responsibility with independence: Having the freedom of choice in how one completes a task imparts a feeling of ownership. This enhances the drive to deliver creatively and effectively with enthusiasm. Likewise, freedom of action encourages ownership of business decisions and outcomes, which leads to feelings of being involved and appreciated.
• Being social: Humans are a social species. Employees give importance to feeling a sense of belonging to their team and organization. It helps them to bring out their best and productive selves at work. This also converges with working on a shared organizational vision that encourages one to function in tandem towards the greater good.
• A balancing act: Creating a personal workspace where one can take a break, design a personalized routine, and give the required attention to their family is another aspect important to employees. For instance, the right to choose WFH or hybrid, wherever possible, is a highly touted example of employee-centric work culture.

Even with these fundamental aspects, leaders must understand that the feeling of happiness is uniquely individualized. Team leads should adopt a culture of checking in with each employee separately. Case in point, The Qualtrics 2022 Employee Experience Trends report suggests that despite respondents from India reporting some of the highest levels of engagement (85%) and wellbeing (89%) at work, only 62% plan to stay with their current employer for the next 12 months.

This reflects that surface-level wellbeing checks or initiatives are not enough. Instead, cultivating a happy work environment entails a more profound and unbiased review of the current culture followed by mindful execution of the required transformation. Changing the organizational culture is also a paradigm shift that follows a trickle-down pattern. It must start from the top with leaders setting the tone of a work culture that nurtures employee happiness.