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Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

sloanreview.mit.edu

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Re: Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

#111

Post by allisdust »

montebicyclelo wrote: post #60

> we suggest that leaders follow the science and take a structured approach to hiring for, promoting, and developing employee happiness > Measure happiness in both employees and job candidates. > we conservatively advocate using measures of happiness and optimism as discriminators, or tiebreakers, because the risks are low and the benefits could be important. Good luck getting a job, unhappy people… I don’t think the…

Soon to be launched on leet code : Coaching sessions on how to convey (fake) happiness effectively.

How do the authors separate out the causation part? May be the top performers are happy because they are performing well? Will they retain their happiness if lets say, they are thrown in something with stack ranking like Amazon. How about something like on calls? How happy are they going to be if their nights are continously ruined by production issues. What about personal stuff like divorces and family issues.

Re: Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

#112

Post by benreesman »

JetAlone wrote: post #109
andrelaszlo wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious about Christianity, what does 33/66 mean specifically?

I'm something of an otaku about religion, and I've never heard of it. I'd like to know what he means by it too.

I replied to the sibling in some detail. It’s not my ambition to tell anyone what to believe about God: I’m quite unsure myself.

But my little primer-as-Internet comment is based on not only reading but memorizing these documents at a young age, it’s likely a reasonable place to formulate some Google search terms.

Re: Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

#113

Post by benreesman »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #87
benreesman wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m surrounded by a certain type of Christian that I’ve taken to calling an “Ayn Rand Christian”. The MO is: “New Testament for me, Old Testament for thee”. IMHO when someone needs something concrete from you, and quotes one verse from the 33, but when you’re in trouble they’re happy to “pray for you” if you’re lucky, if not break out the weak faith routine you alluded to, what you’re really dealing with is the same…

There's a lot of cherry picking and hypocrisy in organized religion, even with Jesus himself making a tl;dr of the bible by going "love thy neighbour".

Agreed.

Re: Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

#114

Post by allie1 »

hathym wrote: post #89
montebicyclelo wrote: post #60

> we suggest that leaders follow the science and take a structured approach to hiring for, promoting, and developing employee happiness > Measure happiness in both employees and job candidates. > we conservatively advocate using measures of happiness and optimism as discriminators, or tiebreakers, because the risks are low and the benefits could be important. Good luck getting a job, unhappy people… I don’t think the…

even if they recruit only happe people, what guarantee they will stay happy? should they fire them once they are not?

This ties into the most consistent mistake EVERY manager makes - people don't change. I know of maybe 5% of people who do change, but that is so inconsistent and unpredictable that it can't be relied upon.

Managers hire "almost great" candidates and think they can affect change and get a good deal, and this NEVER works out. Any red flags on the interviews/trial period will and do persist forever. In the end, it's always the reason the person gets fired, and the company loses the time they invested into the person.

based on my experience of 10 years leading tech and marketing teams. Curious if anyone has conflicting experiences to share.

Re: Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

#118

Post by cloutchaser »

jevgeni wrote: post #66
cloutchaser wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? This is your take on this? The happiest country I’ve ever been to is Cuba. How do you explain that in your racism context?

Any racial minority outside of Cuba, maybe?

How about extremely poor white people, from terrible backgrounds? Are they intrinsically happier because they are white? And so they get better jobs?

How about asians and indian backgrounds who are richer than whites despite being minorities? Should we make them unhappier in your opinion or just discriminate against them?

Really? That is your point? From this article, you got... racism. Congrats.

Re: Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

#119

Post by jka »

jesseendahl wrote: post #13
drewcoo wrote: post #5

Happy people don't change the world. They maintain the status quo. "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - Shaw https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/536961-the-reasonable-man-a...

I think you are conflating “unreasonable” with “unhappy”. It’s absolutely possible to have unreasonably high standards/expectations for “how things should be” and fight super hard for change/progress, while still being a happy person.

I like Shaw's quote, and it probably summarises much of his life experience at the time.

I'd also like to argue that I think it should be possible to be happy, reasonable, and change the world for the better. Not easy perhaps, and persistence is still required, but doable.

Re: Top Performers Have a Superpower: Happiness

#120

Post by bryanrasmussen »

montebicyclelo wrote: post #60

> we suggest that leaders follow the science and take a structured approach to hiring for, promoting, and developing employee happiness > Measure happiness in both employees and job candidates. > we conservatively advocate using measures of happiness and optimism as discriminators, or tiebreakers, because the risks are low and the benefits could be important. Good luck getting a job, unhappy people… I don’t think the…

>Good luck getting a job, unhappy people…

Since employment is one of the main sources of unhappiness I assume this will create an oscillating state of happy unemployed - unhappy employed people perpectually in and out of jobs as their happiness dips below a certain threshold.

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