What went well?
A leading national engineering school offered online coaching support to its employees during the pandemic, when the boundaries between private and professional life were lessened due to extended home office and everyone had to pivot in a massive way.
A major commodity trading company put a similar support in place to take care of employees’ well-being when isolation and disconnection of the teams impacted most of the players on the market.
Could we have imagined these initiatives only two years ago? Probably not. Today we all witness the importance of mental health and well-being in the workplace.
This raising level of awareness is fantastic news!
Companies, managers, boards are moving forward and are proposing concrete actions to support employees who feel the need!
It’s a general awareness of the necessity for building sustainable workplaces with healthier and happier co-workers. Just like we all got aware of the need for a sustainable climate with a healthier environment decades ago.
More and more companies understand that success and sustainability of their organization are correlated with the level of employees’ well-being.
AND we dare to talk about mental health more than before, which fosters even greater awareness. This year, an athlete showed her vulnerability and expressed her suffering at the Olympic games and then withdrew from the competition. Doing it in such circumstances was an immense act of courage when we know what the Olympic games represent in a sporting career… and what pressure it puts on the athlete’s shoulders.
What went wrong?
This year our company experienced some lack of support in the admin and accounting tasks and also some health problems in the team. Life happens to all of us and these events led us to open our tool box of Happy at Work and « walk our talk ».
We increased the cohesion of the team by supporting each other even more and focused on our strengths and successes – there are always plenty of things that work well, even in complicated situations. And energy flows where your attention goes! We also concentrated our efforts on what we could influence and worked on letting go of what was out of our control.
Was it challenging? Of course! Have we grown in the process? Without a shadow of a doubt.
So, what exactly did we learn?
The first obvious lesson was that RESILIENCE is more important than ever in our constantly shifting world! And the good news is that it can be developed by training our emotional and mental muscles with concrete practices and mindset! It’s an ongoing learning and development process where we grow as human beings and professionals.
The second crucial lesson was that psychological safety in the workplace is a must if we want to build more sustainable workplaces, and that this ingredient can also be learned and developed within teams.
What about you? And your team? How was your year? What went well? Wrong? And what did you learn?
We would like to invite you to take some time together and share your experiences in the team. It’s quality time and doesn’t have to last for hours: « press pause » in a short meeting (could be online too) and reflect on the core successes and lessons of the past 12 months with your co-workers. It has such an impact on a fresh and strong start of the new year, we promise!
We did that at Happy at Work last week. It has been inspiring for all of us and enhanced engagement and psychological safety in the team even more.
So, first reflection time… and then rest time!
We wish you a beautiful and restful holiday!