Wellbeing at work (Part 3): Helping your employer be less of an arsehole…

OK, looks like life has conspired to answer my own question – a blog every two weeks seems to be doable, so from now on (unless I get extra excited), expect fortnightly entries.

Today, I want to finish the trilogy of wellbeing at work articles. The first two were about understanding that there’s a lot more to employee wellbeing (and, consequently, productivity) than token gestures like subsidised gym memberships. It turns out that the people who need intervention the most won’t use these ‘perks’ and those that do use them don’t need them! We also looked at what you can do to take control of your own wellbeing, paying attention to the areas outside of work that will increase your ability to work effectively. Sadly, most employers just don’t get wellbeing and see it as a benefit (on top of basic working conditions), rather than an essential core aspect of working.

In this entry, I want to tackle the workplace, the bit you spend most of your time in, and the bit that can either be pretty great or absolutely horrible. Unlike other ‘workability’ dimensions, like health, skills, values and community, what happens in the workplace (at least from a wellbeing viewpoint) is often outside of your control. So, today, let’s look at how you can make your workplace more workable by helping your boss to understand wellbeing (and, in the process, be less of an arsehole).

Young businessman standing over a young businesswoman sleeping on a couch

First of all, let’s look at why your employers should give a shit about your wellbeing. After all, they pay you for your time, right? Surely a salary or wage is adequate compensation for your presence? Well, it comes down to how useful you are during that time – if you don’t produce anything 37.5 hours a week, you’re not effective to your employer. Thus, often, employers attempt to enforce effectiveness using metaphorical sticks and carrots. This amazes me – I mean, have you ever been motivated by someone shouting at you, threatening to dock your pay, or demanding more from you? Same goes for promises of bonuses – if you give up more of your time, you might get a small bonus (unless you’re a banker) at some stage in the future, at least half of which will be taxed. Motivating? Hmmm…

So even your employers would agree that it’s in their interest for you to be effective in the workplace (even if their idea of motivation is 100 years out of date). Effectiveness is highly correlated with wellbeing, and healthy, satisfied people are more likely to turn up to work on time, and to produce more during the time that they’re there. They’re also less likely to take sick days, and will (if allowed) stay with the organisation longer. Win, win. So let’s look at some things that can be done in the workplace to enhance wellbeing.

Let’s start with naps. Most of you will probably get the 2pm nods. I know that, around early to mid-afternoon, my productivity drops to close  to zero. I’ll stare at my screen and, assuming anything actually gets done, it will be crap. On the other hand, if I can get a half-hour snooze, or head out of the office for some exercise, I’m good for the rest of the afternoon. In fact, a nap or some exercise will increase productivity by up to five times (or 500% for those of you who believe that it’s possible to have more than 100% of something). Think about that. Thirty minutes away from my desk can mean the difference between high or low productivity for the next three hours. Even the most statistically challenged employer should be able to get this.

I tried this in my last office job. It was a large consultancy, and had a rather fucked-up culture of working until you bleed but, when I presented supporting evidence to the partner, she gave permission to task a breakout room (and grab some beanbags) for afternoon snoozes. It worked, at least for me. I took my snoozes and worked better for it. But I couldn’t get my colleagues to do the same. Even the ones who really struggled with afternoon fatigue were too afraid of the consequences – they truly believed that it would be bad for their career (such was the fucked-upedness of the organisational culture). We’ll address this issue a bit later.

In fact, let’s go a bit further and talk about time. Archaic leftovers from the industrial revolution have resulted in set working hours. During early industry, employers expected their ’employees’ to work 12+ hour shifts. Over time, a combination of factors led to the wider realisation that people aren’t very effective past a certain working time. Henry Ford realised that after eight hours, his employees made too many mistakes and it actually cost more money to keep them at work than to send them home. So he instituted an eight-hour day. In the modern, information-laden world, it’s more like six productive hours, followed by low productivity, high-error chair warming. Again, amazingly, most employers honestly believe that people can pull all-nighters, or work weekends on top of their regular hours and still produce quality work. This is called the ‘fundamental attribution error’: most people truly expect that others are motivated by and operate differently to the way they do – so even if your boss knows he can’t be productive on two-hours sleep he really believes that you can be. Yes, people (no matter how clever) are pretty dumb.

So, time. Unless you work in customer service, most organisations don’t really need you to turn up at 9 (or 8) and leave at 5 (or 6 or 7). In fact, in organisations that let their employees turn up when they like, work where they like, and set their own (realistic) goals, productivity invariably goes up. Turns out that adults are, well, grown-up, and don’t need to be treated like children. Amazingly, they respond well when treated like adults, and (for the most part) get on with their work without someone looking over their shoulders. When people are given the option to exercise when they want to, leave if they need to, come in early if they feel like it, take a nap when they’re tired, or work late if they need to finish something, wellbeing and productivity almost always increase.

And the list goes on, simple ergonomics, better lighting, plants, giving people offices instead of the evil open plan or ‘hotdesking’ shite that exists on most planes of hell… Again, wellbeing improves when people are treated as people (with human needs), not as replaceable cogs. And this logic extends beyond the office (again, amazing right?) – as we’ve seen (last two blogs here, and here), organisations that encourage wellbeing in their employees lives (i.e., by paying attention to developing people’s health, skills, values, and wider community) do better.

So this is all very nice, but what can you do, as the title suggests, to help your boss to get over his or her chronic arsholitis? Well, as with most things, it comes down to making an economic argument. If you can convince your employers that (for instance) letting you take a 30-minute nap in the afternoons will make them more money, it’ll probably work. So…

1) Start by getting your facts straight. If you know anyone who’s an academic, ask them to do a literature search for articles that support your argument – preferably meta-analyses that examine a range of studies. Once you have some decent empirical support, collate it in a way that distills the argument to a simple pitch: something along the lines of x = $y. Many employers are fuzzy over concepts like productivity so see if there are any direct relationships between the activity you want and making them more money.

2) Start small. OK, Google have high-tech napping chairs that play white noise and diffuse light. But they also have free, chef-created food, fire poles, and doggy daycare (i.e., really expensive) so, if it’s naps you’re after, find a disused room, and ask for permission to use that – you might even want to go to Kmart and get some cheap beanbags. Bottom line – if it doesn’t cost anything at first, it’s more likely to happen. Ask your employer to treat it like an experiment – small input for a potentially large output and, if it doesn’t work, no hard feelings.

3) Get support from your colleagues. You don’t want to be the odd one out when it comes to changing company culture (my mistake in my last position), so make sure you’ve got buy in from a decent number of people before attempting anything. Once it’s in place, make sure you stick to your guns and help others do the same – you need to be the advocate or it’ll fold (and there’ll be little chance of getting anything else later).

4) Show a return in a reasonable timeframe. Make sure that your naps result in greater productivity, so your boss can get excited and see that it works. If you’re skiving off for an hour every afternoon and then still producing crap work your change program is doomed.

5) Keep going. From napping, try flexible hours or exercise time, or campaign for active desks (the ones where you can work while standing up or walking on a treadmill), or better light or, holy of holies, a return to offices. Give your boss lots of positive feedback, and make it seem that it was his or her idea (an oldie but a goodie) – once your employers are on board, everything gets easier.

6) Start to expand beyond the direct workplace. Focus on support for skills development, get your employer interested in your long-term physical and psychological health (including making sure you have a life outside of work), and work hard on values – can the office culture be shifted to encourage a greater alignment between employee and employer values? (Wow, that sounded like the biggest bunch of consultant-speak BS…)

7) Most importantly (in order for your employer to see value), keep quantitative records where possible in order to calculate real economic gains. Any organisation that can see actual financial reward from sustaining change will usually come around. Eventually (and this isn’t the case universally, sadly), organisations can change so that the practise becomes more important than the outcome. But I’m also told that there have been sightings of flying pigs…

It’d be lovely if the world wasn’t run by arseholes. It’d be even nicer if those arseholes weren’t motivated by power and money (we’d certainly have a greater chance of surviving as a species). But, it’s arseholes all round I’m afraid. When dealing with arseholes, it’s necessary to speak their language. If they can make money by treating you like a human being, then it’s more likely they will. Ford didn’t improve worker pay and conditions because he was a humanist; he did it because it made him more money. Your wellbeing, therefore, needs to make money for others. Luckily, it does. The healthier you are, the greater your satisfaction and wellbeing, the more likely you’ll work long and hard. OK, your employer reaps the benefit, but so will you. Humans thrive on meaningful, effective, purposeful work – if you can change your work environment to increase the likelihood of feeling a sense of meaning in what you do, everyone wins. And, personally, if I have to work (yup, I do), I’d rather actually enjoy it rather than desperately waiting for the weekend.

Fight the arseholes with stealth. It’s the only way…

P.S. I wrote a book on this topic a few years back and I think it’s pretty good. You can buy it from Amazon here. Makes a great Xmas present for your boss!

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