Applying the Seven Habits of Happiness to Your Organization

 See Pursuit-of-Happiness.org for more info.

Happiness is understandable, obtainable, and teachable.

In the book Connected, Christakis and Fowler explain that you can influence as much as 15% of your friend’s happiness, and as much as 10% of your friend’s friends’ happiness.  So, one effective way to spread happiness is by applying the 7 Habits of Happiness to your organization, or work. Here are a few ideas related to each habit to help you get started:

1. Build close relationships:

• Go to lunch with a friend; invite them to bring along someone you don’t know.
• Go to lunch with a peer and let them know how much you appreciate their work.
• Once a day, send a group email recognizing someone in your organization.

2. Volunteer or care for others:

• Organize a charity outing – help a local school, plant trees, or do work for a local shelter.
• Conduct a food drive or toy drive at the office.
• Work with HR to see if the company will match donations to a local charity; then, run a drive.

3. Engage in a healthy, active lifestyle that promotes physical vitality:

• Organize a walking group at lunch.
• Organize a company sports team like Soccer, Volleyball, or Softball.
• Organize a weekly Yoga class.

4. Find meaning and purpose:

• Start a Dream Manager program (see The Dream Manager by Matthew Kelley).
• Find out the company vision and values and share them with your team.
• Conduct a team meeting and discuss each team member’s purpose or dreams.

5. Practice mindfulness and positive thinking like optimism and gratitude:

• Send an email to your team around 3 pm everyday listing 3 things that were positive today.  Encourage them to do the same.
• Start every meeting with 3 things “we are doing right.”
• Encourage team members to take short breaks throughout the day to breathe, meditate, or take a short walk.

6. Find Flow:

• Work with your team identify the tasks that they truly enjoy and find challenging.
• Work with team members to delegate work that aligns best with their flow activities.
• Identify new challenges you or your team members can take on that you especially enjoy doing.

7. Identify your unique strengths and use them for a purpose that is greater than yourself.

• Encourage team members to post a list of their strengths outside their office doors or cubicles.

• Identify the strengths of each team member and assign roles and tasks to match those strengths.
• Identify your own strengths and volunteer for roles or opportunities to assist that leverage those strengths.