Member Article

Does happiness equal brilliance in the workplace?

Co-Founders of BrightHR, CEO Paul Tooth and CMO Paul Harris, discuss how the changing office environment could be the trigger for the slump in ‘happiness’ among the over 40s and how managing ‘on-all-the-time’ work places could be the key to success.

This month, findings released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) reveal those aged between 40 and 59 are the least likely to feel satisfied in life and experience the lowest levels of happiness of any age group.

Statisticians analysed personal wellbeing data of more than 300,000 adults in the UK, collected over three years from 2012 to 2015, and found that happiness and life satisfaction plummeted among respondents aged 35 and over.

Times are changing

Looking at the wider cultural and personal shifts in the work environment, Paul Harris argues times are changing and believes the tier of people feeling unsettled has grown older.

“This restless and dissatisfied age bracket seems like it has gotten older, it used to be your 30s. This was when career and families all sort of collide — certainly in the experience of my life and my friends.

“But it would look like people are having families and getting married later and so the pressure is drifting. People are working later so it makes sense that stats would show this shift in life pressures.”

Length of service

But Paul Tooth believes the changes in how we work today could be more likely to have a knock-on effect for people in this age category, more so than the given life pressures.He believes the younger generations share a different view of the work place, and argues it would be interesting to investigate further into what is happening to this older age group professionally.

“I wonder if there is a stress that comes from being in the job too long and worrying about changing roles. Worrying about being over the hill professionally,” he said.

Today many people working in their 30s have changed roles several times already in their professional careers, so they don’t have the same concerns as perhaps the baby boomer generation who still sees long service as loyalty — and fears change.

“It would be interesting to see,” Paul Tooth argues, “if there was a length of service link with those stats. For those wanting to break into something new, peer career goals, the chasing younger generation, and the new 24/7 workplace, it can be a lot to get your head around.”

If we look at BrightHR’s “It Pays to Play” report we see that millennials expect to work longer hours, and they want more from work as a result. For the baby boomer or generation X this could be a very daunting environment to be starting a new role, surrounded by younger peers who just do it, the older generation are left thinking ‘I did that when I was 20’.

Always being ’on’

Paul Harris argues workplace culture could be stressful for the over forties because it’s not the world they grew up in.

“In my first job nobody had mobile phones and people barely used computers at their desk. When you weren’t at work you weren’t at work. I’ve gone through a period of having that in my life where I left at 5:30pm and that was it for the day, to being ‘on’ all the time.”

That culture, that change in the workplace could have a real impact on the happiness of an employee. Growing up in the modern world, multi-tasking and being ‘on’ all the time is a way of life and an understanding within most business ethos and workplace culture.

Paul Harris added, however, that in a culture where everyone is striving for success, it is important to acknowledge the different needs of employees from multiple generations in the office.

“Having three or four generations in the workforce for the first time means managers must adapt to these individual needs and differing skill sets, for example not all employees will have the same experience of technology, social connectivity, workplace culture etc.

“This requires flexibility in procedures and policies so that managers can get the best out of each unique individual in the team, regardless of which generation they belong to.”

Workplace technology

In today’s workplace young new starters are born into technology, in many cases the youngest employee has never known life before smartphones.

The Pauls argue, for those at the older end of the work force, having to understand Twitter, LinkedIn, or even employee communication tools such as Yammer, could result in them feeling stressed, but also that daunting feeling could be a trigger for unhappiness.

“For employers they have to notice this shift, and it comes down to the responsibility of the leadership within the business to ensure they are getting the best from the team they have working for them.

“Jobs need to suit their strengths, but also a younger workforce won’t have the experience and the maturity of an older employee,” added Paul Tooth, “Ultimately a reduction in stress, boosts happiness and with that we see the best in people - happiness breeds brilliance because people are charged and positive in their roles.”

Understanding your workforce takes time. Leaders have to identify the skills and strengths of each employee and remove the agism, because ultimately employees don’t want to sit in competition with each other because of biology. Essentially, everyone, no matter which generation they belong to, wants to achieve brilliance in their lives and be happy.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Paul Harris .