Here you can find all of Happy’s blog posts, covering our Excel hints and tips, ideas for creating happy workplaces, and ways to be more productive at work — and more.
Many leaders and managers will continually delegate tasks to the person they know will get it right every time, or else give things to a new recruit who’s full of beans and eager to please. But Happy's Cathy Busani knows this practice is flawed and has instead started delegating to the team and allowing them to decide who does what. In this two-minute video from the 2018 Happy Workplaces Conference, Cathy explains how to delegate tasks successfully.
During her presentation at the 2018 Happy Workplaces conference, Woohoo inc’s Arlette Bentzen underlined how random acts of kindness can be effective in enhancing total workplace happiness. In this short video, Arlette explains the principle is very simple: do something nice for your colleagues and they’ll become happier.
WorldBlu CEO Traci Fenton believes we’re all meant to live our fullest potential. Through WorldBlu, Traci’s spent the last two decades working with clients in 80 countries, teaching them freedom at work. In this short video from the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference Traci explains that a freedom-centred mindset is essential for building a freedom-centred culture. "The root issue that stops world-class cultures from happening is fear. It’s the number one thing," she says.
Over the last couple of years, Happy has undergone a transformation. Happy was losing a lot of money a couple of years ago, but thanks to the transformation the London training company went from £185k loss to £166k profit in the space of one year. In this short video from the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference, Chief Happiness Officer Henry Stewart explains that he took inspiration from David Marquet, a leadership expert and former commander of the nuclear-powered submarine, USS Santa Fe. Marquet says, “If you want your people to think, don’t give instructions, give intent.” Henry followed suit. “It isn’t enough to not be the tyrant; you have to step out,” he says.
Sarah Metcalfe is Head of Customer Service at Sure Petcare and she knows that a happy workplace is essential for enhancing the customer experience. When she asked her team, “what makes you happy at work?” what stood out was that it’s really more about what leadership doesn’t do. For example, they don’t impose SLAs or metrics. They don’t get mad if staff are late because they’re stuck in traffic. They don’t measure people and don’t ask them how long they’re going to be on the phone for. In this short video from the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference, Sarah explains what gives her team the ability to do whatever it takes to make the customer happy.
This year at Advanced Technology Services UK Limited, Derek Hill and his team have focused on increasing transparency and job ownership. This is particularly important as ATS has 185 locations across the globe, primarily in the US, Mexico and UK, and need ways to maintain and strengthen their company culture across borders. In this short video from the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference, Derek explains what ATS has done to increase transparency and job ownership across the business.
At Sky UK, they have embraced Design Thinking to tackle common HR issues. Design Thinking is a methodology that provides a solution-based, human approach to problems. It aims to create multiple ideas during brainstorming, which can then be prototyped and tested in a empathetic way that people can easily understand. For Sky, in the final stage, they test people's reactions and gauge if it 'wows'. In this short video from the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference, Tracey Waters explains how they applied Design Thinking to the question 'how might we help people at Sky have a fulfilling career?'
At Happy, we use the Strengths Finder by Marcus Buckingham to find out what each team member's strengths are. In each team, everyone shares their strengths and the tasks that they enjoy doing the most to ensure that everyone can work to their strengths as much as possible. What would your team be like if everyone was working to their strengths? How much more productive would they be? In this short video from the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference, Cathy Busani, Happy's Managing Director, explains the benefits of working to your strengths.
In 2013, Mayden decided to become a self-managing organisation, comprised of autonomous teams. Their three line managers had left the organisation, gone on maternity leave or moved to a new role within the organisation, so it seemed like the perfect time. But it wasn't without some teething problems at the start. In this short video from the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference, Alison Sturgess-Durden explains how they created the structures and processes to enable this system to be a success.
At COOK, they believe that the key components of good working relationships at work are having a common purpose, clarity for staff on where they fit within the organisation, and finally by showing their staff that they are appreciated. At the 2019 Happy Workplaces Conference, Rosie Brown of COOK explained how they manage this at an organisational level in this short 2.44 minute video.