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Employee happiness and business success are linked

economist.com

31–40 of 228 posts

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#31

I've seen these arguments repeatedly, yet I only see this mattering to those companies where employees have a relative level of power and choice (e.g. non-game industry programmers, etc). Elsewhere, the attitude appears to have remained: "use them as much as possible". Consider assistant managers at your local chain store. Pick a chain! Outside of a handful of companies that are well noted for their bucking of the tr…

Anything customer oriented tends to benefit

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#32
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Warehouse work sucks. Amazon's warehouse work is above average for warehouse work.

By what metric? I have friends that have been working warehouses in Ohio since the early 2000s and they have vented frustrations to me about how Amazon is causing a race to the bottom for warehouse labor. I've heard a lot of horror stories about Amazon warehouses. I'm sure a lot of it is FUD or whatever, but it seems that even Walmart has better conditions.

Have you ever been in a real warehouse? One that's baking in the sun in the summer, no AC because it's too costly, probably 100 degrees inside, no ventilation, pallet dust everywhere and you get a nice inhale when something is moved on the floor, not being in a technologically present company where machines break constantly and you need to do a lot of manual work in these conditions lifting a 35lb box every 8-12 seconds for 12 hours....

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#33
People are joking in this thread but I think the REALLY BIG problem is that a lot of American workers are increasingly internalizing their compensation needs above other needs like health, happiness, or social well being. When we should be concentrating on a lot of our personal issues, we kick the ball down the road saying "oh when I have more money" or "oh when my career progresses" when we would be much better served by acting on them immediately and with highest priority.

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#34
post #13

They did look at causation: "the authors cite studies of changes within individual firms and organisations which seem to show that improvements in employee morale precede gains in productivity, rather than the other way round." Many of us understand the other causation arrow (corporate unsuccess leads to unhappiness!)

Yes, this! "Be happy first", per "The Happiness Equation" by Paschra.

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it go something like: when the company tanks due to mismanagement > shareholder value suffers > employees feel vindicated?

I've seen it in the form of an employee desiring a negative outcome for the business because that outcome is tied to vengeance for another employee's perceived professional mistake. E.g., "I'm not going to help that team because they need to feel the pain of the decision I didn't like."

Sometimes you just don't have ability to help. You are only observer and fail makes you happy, because you predicted it and you tried to stop it. But no one was listening.

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#38

People are joking in this thread but I think the REALLY BIG problem is that a lot of American workers are increasingly internalizing their compensation needs above other needs like health, happiness, or social well being. When we should be concentrating on a lot of our personal issues, we kick the ball down the road saying "oh when I have more money" or "oh when my career progresses" when we would be much better serv…

Perhaps because so many Americans are financially insecure, and long-term health, happiness, and social concerns take a backseat to simply surviving the next month?

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#39

People are joking in this thread but I think the REALLY BIG problem is that a lot of American workers are increasingly internalizing their compensation needs above other needs like health, happiness, or social well being. When we should be concentrating on a lot of our personal issues, we kick the ball down the road saying "oh when I have more money" or "oh when my career progresses" when we would be much better serv…

It is a LONG standing dominant philosophy in US business that "morale" is pretty much the last thing to be concerned with. Someone not working well? Get rid of them and replace them with someone better. This has been going on for generations, and I wouldn't be surprised if it's taught all day long, every day, in every business school in the nation.

Re: Employee happiness and business success are linked

#40

I've seen these arguments repeatedly, yet I only see this mattering to those companies where employees have a relative level of power and choice (e.g. non-game industry programmers, etc). Elsewhere, the attitude appears to have remained: "use them as much as possible". Consider assistant managers at your local chain store. Pick a chain! Outside of a handful of companies that are well noted for their bucking of the tr…

Why, this makes sense.

In every industry, there are employees whose influence on the company success is outsized, and who are hard to hire or train. In software industry, they are experienced engineers and product managers. In a fashionable restaurant, they are experienced cooks. In an airforce, they are experienced pilots and repairmen. Etc.

When these people are happy with their work, they achieve great results. When they are unhappy, they look for ways to conveniently jump ship, because they have a number of opportunities elsewhere waiting for them to become available. They are in short supply. Every boss has an incentive to keep these people content and loyal.

OTOH every industry has positions for which supply is plentiful, compared to demand. Aspiring game developers without experience, dish washers, burger flippers, etc, can be readily hired, paid little, and easily fired, too. There is no incentive for their bosses to walk an extra mile to keep them happ, especially when pressing them a bit more yields an extra bit of performance, so they mostly aren't happy about their jobs.

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