blog

24 Jun 2008

arbejdsglæde

Posted by: Henry Hicks

The Engage team love the Danes from Hamlet to my friend Peter to Tommy Seebach, good old Tommy Seebach…


We recently spotted this great little piece on positivesharing.com comparing happiness at work in Denmark and Britain. Alexander Kjerulf points out that the Danes have a term for happiness at work – arbejdsglæde – whereas we Brits don’t.


Alex goes on to explain there’s a Danish tradition of making employees happy at work and with good reason. To quote Alex:

“First reason: time. We spend more of our waking hours at work than on anything else. We spend more time at work than with our friends, families and children combined. If you’re unhappy at work, you’ll spend a large part of your life being miserable.


Second reason: health. Hating your job can make you sick. Worst case, it can kill you. Studies show that people who hate their jobs run a much higher risk of contracting serious diseases like cancer, heart disease and diabetes.


Third reason: money! Happy companies make more money, because their employees are more creative, productive, service-minded and innovative.”


The article doesn’t go into how to achieve a happy workplace but luckily Alex has written a book that you can read online here


From our own experience of working in employee engagement on sustainability issues we know one thing that makes employees happy is feeling like they’re making a difference to their organisation and the world.


Most people want to be good, they want to help, and they want to be useful. Faced with the doom and gloom and sense of impending apocalypse that often surrounds the environmental debate it can be pretty darn difficult to feel good and useful. Taking sustainability seriously as a business and effectively engaging employees on sustainability by empowering them and giving them agency to act can reinvigorate employees and the business.


Unhappiness is unsustainable. Turning up to work knowing you’re making a difference and loving your job is awesome. So Hamlet may not be the best example of happiness but if you need positive proof of arbejdsglæde I leave you with this clip of Danish legend Tommy Seebach – look how happy he is!

Comments (1)
  1. ed Gillespie said on 24 Jun 2008 09:34:21

    I can see a new slide on arbejdsglaede popping up in Engage presentations...: )

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