Posts from the ‘Research’ Category
Your emotions count!
“If you experience a healthy dose of positivity and you can sustain it, it can also empower and energize you to deal with adversity in a more constructive way. In that sense, resilience and a positive outlook are highly intertwined. If we cultivate our ability to sustain positivity, we are simultaneously cultivating our ability to bounce back from negativity.”
-Pelin Kesebir ( Centre for Healthy minds)
Latest research from the centre of healthy minds run by Richard Davidson builds on his fascinating book the emotional life of your brain. In the book he talks about the links between our emotions (our affect) and our wellbeing. Much of mainstream mindfulness focuses more towards the focus element of mindfulness and our ability to manage our attention. What I love about Richie Davidson’s work is that it focuses on our emotions too and importantly the study of what sustains psychological wellbeing rather than purely focusing on disorders and when things go wrong.
More and more attention is beginning to be paid to wellbeing initiatives at work. Moving from just focusing on ad hoc events to looking at wellbeing as a strategic foundation to build a business up from. Taking key policies, processes and initiatives and putting them through a wellbeing lens.
Typically people then will ask what about ROI, productivity and economic and profitability impact. However I would advocate that as we move into the 2020s the imperative will and should be more around humanity and humane business practices. Building businesses that make a difference and don’t cause untold suffering to human lives.
So it is also good to see a new research report that also is beginning to build the economic case – particularly if you work in finance and retail.
It also shows a strong correlation between employee satisfaction, customer loyalty, productivity and profitability. What’s not to like?
Interested in undertaking a strategic wellbeing health check in your workplace? Do get in touch hello@mindtrip.co.uk 07801 246113
I have been tracking informally over the year participants feedback at the end of the course as to how they feel different as a result of taking the course…While not hugely scientific it is useful to hear what past participants have said. All feedback was collected anonymously as a tick box questionnaire !
100% of people feel more aware
92% of people feel more in touch with themselves
84% felt less anxious
81% felt less stressed
76% of people felt better about themselves and
75% felt more contented
other stats included 66% of people reporting feeling less hijacked by negative moods, 64% appreciate life more and 66% felt their relationships had improved with others
So what are you waiting for? Next course starts 21st April 2017 ! Taster session 10th March 2017. Find out more here
Wellbeing at Work Survey for both Individuals, Teams and Organisations
January 15th, 2013
Heather Johnston
Update: This survey has now been phased out. I do have a number of other surveys I use please do contact me to find out more.
At the end of last year, to further develop my services to sustain wellbeing within organisations in these current tough times, I attended a Masterclass with Nic Marks on a new Wellbeing at Work survey. Nic is known for his great work on wellbeing and developing the happy planet index
The survey is available to individuals and small teams (up to 5) and for a small cost of £6 per head (plus VAT) an organisation/team can survey its staff and gets results broken down by their own chosen demographics. Larger organisations will be able to take advantage of lowering marginal costs per user if they choose to survey the whole organisation. Small organisations can for the first time have a state of the art staff survey at an exceptionally reasonable cost.
The survey is based on a dynamic model of wellbeing developed with leading experts and is uniquely grounded in the latest psychological findings around wellbeing and happiness. Each question has been carefully selected to reflect what the evidence says impacts well-being at work and has been tested with thousands of respondents.
The wellbeing survey results give a more complete picture of employees’ experience than standard engagement surveys as it includes engagement and stress but also employees’ positive emotional experiences. For Chief Executives, Directors and HR departments the results can be compared between teams or by other demographics and the results act as a “mirror” reflecting back what is happening within the organisation and help people to have insights on how work could be happier.
What I like about the survey is that it provides instant individual as well as organisational results for real-time feedback, provides a simple interface presenting results in traffic light colours and has National benchmarks automatically built into the questions, providing individuals, teams and organisations with an anchor point to understand and compare scores. The survey can also be repeated over time to measure any change. To find out more have a look at the survey website
If you are interested in taking a temperature check of your organisation or team and are committed to some follow up action I believe this is a great tool to open up some very important discussions around sustaining and improving happiness at work. As research shows happier employees are more productive, healthier and creative and are more loyal and provide better customer service to clients. A win-win!
Please get in touch if you would like to find out more!
Central to my positive psychology approach to Organisational Development and Coaching, is looking at whether an individual is flourishing in their work and their wider life. By focusing on helping an individual explore their strengths and helping align these with their work there can be a win/win in terms of an individual’s happiness and wellbeing as well as an increase in individual and organisational productivity.
An interesting article, written by Dr Bridget Juniper and promoted by Action for Happiness, about the downfalls of traditional productivity orientated employee engagement measurement, argues the case for employee wellbeing becoming more central in workplace productivity measures and quotes
…the top 10 drivers of employee engagement, identified by Towers Watson – ISR, show that, of 75 possible areas, the one that was rated the most important was the extent to which employees believed that their senior management had a sincere interest in their wellbeing.
The research goes on to ask employees whether or not they think their senior management actually exhibit this behaviour, with only 39% believing this to be the case. By contrast, the second driver relates to employee development, which is more often associated with conventional engagement measures.
In these times of uncertainty and strain, even more consideration needs to be given to employee wellbeing both for the benefit of the individual but also for organisations and society as a whole. By creating leadership strategies and working practices that help to enhance wellbeing, we will be helping all of us to remain resourceful, happy, healthy and productive.