International Debate

Happiness and productivity at work

May 16, 2011 1113

Last week I chaired the Business in the Community WorkWell Summit in London, which was attended by over 250 senior people from the FTSE 100, government and other organisations.

There was overwhelming evidence provided of the link between enhanced wellbeing and increases in job satisfaction and productivity, as well as decreases in sickness absence. The evidence is that lack of workplace wellbeing costs the UK economy roughly £26b in terms absenteeism, presenteeism and labour turnover – and that doesn’t even take into account lost productive value in terms of products and services or the costs to the NHS to treat people who have been stressed by the workplace. (You can find out more about these in my recent book with Prof. Ivan Robertson, Wellbeing: Productivity and Happiness at Work).

We know from the volume of evidence in the field of wellbeing and workplace stress (see my three-volume research set, Organizational Health and Wellbeing, to be published in June 2011), that the main sources of workplace stress are working consistently long hours, a bullying line manager, lack of control over various aspects of the job, lack of engagement by managers in decision-making, lack of communications, poor management of change and a lack of work-life balance, with the job frequently interfering with family life.

The conference focused on what could be done to enhance wellbeing, with presentations by the HR Director of Marks & Spencer, the Group Director of Health and Safety of Centrica, Chief Medical Officers of BT & Nestle, CEO of Boots Alliance, Director of Health & Safety of the Royal Mail Group and many others.  They each highlighted what their organisation was doing to promote wellbeing, but more importantly, the impact of their interventions in terms of the specific business benefits (including sickness absence, productivity and customer perception of service).

This Summit, and more of these in the future, will make wellbeing a business necessity, as we move toward a culture of ‘more with less’. As John Ruskin wrote in 1851: “In order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: they must be fit for it, they must not do too much of it, and they must have a sense of success in it.”

Cary L. Cooper, CBE, is Distinguished Professor of Organizational Psychology and Health at Lancaster University Management School and Chair of the Academy of Social Sciences.

Sir Cary Cooper CBE is the 50th Anniversary Professor of Organizational Psychology & Health at the Alliance Manchester Business School, University of Manchester.

View all posts by Cary L. Cooper

Related Articles

Emerson College Pollsters Explain How Pollsters Do What They Do
Communication
October 23, 2024

Emerson College Pollsters Explain How Pollsters Do What They Do

Read Now
All Change! 2024 – A Year of Elections: Campaign for Social Science Annual Sage Lecture
Event
October 10, 2024

All Change! 2024 – A Year of Elections: Campaign for Social Science Annual Sage Lecture

Read Now
‘Settler Colonialism’ and the Promised Land
International Debate
September 27, 2024

‘Settler Colonialism’ and the Promised Land

Read Now
Webinar: Banned Books Week 2024
Event
September 24, 2024

Webinar: Banned Books Week 2024

Read Now
Research Assessment, Scientometrics, and Qualitative v. Quantitative Measures

Research Assessment, Scientometrics, and Qualitative v. Quantitative Measures

The creation of the Coalition for Advancing Research Assessment (CoARA) has led to a heated debate on the balance between peer review and evaluative metrics in research assessment regimes. Luciana Balboa, Elizabeth Gadd, Eva Mendez, Janne Pölönen, Karen Stroobants, Erzsebet Toth Cithra and the CoARA Steering Board address these arguments and state CoARA’s commitment to finding ways in which peer review and bibliometrics can be used together responsibly.

Read Now
Revisiting the ‘Research Parasite’ Debate in the Age of AI

Revisiting the ‘Research Parasite’ Debate in the Age of AI

The large language models, or LLMs, that underlie generative AI tools such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, have an ethical challenge in how they parasitize freely available data.

Read Now
Trippin’ Forward: Management Research and the Development of Psychedelics

Trippin’ Forward: Management Research and the Development of Psychedelics

Charlie Smith reflects on his interest in psychedelic research, the topic of his research article, “Psychedelics, Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy and Employees’ Wellbeing,” published in Journal of Management Inquiry.

Read Now
0 0 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

0 Comments
Newest
Oldest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments