Back to the Workshop: How to create a positive workplace ?

Happy companies are usually more successful. The happier employees are, the more productive they will be! According to some research from the University of Warwick in the UK, people who are happy at work are about 12% more productive.

The author of the book "The Happiness Advantage", Shawn Anchor, has quantified the benefits of a happy company : sales increase by 37%, productivity 31%, and accuracy on tasks improves by 19%, not to mention the health and quality of life improvements for staff. Human Capital turns out to be the company's greatest asset and ensuring the well-being of the employees becomes a priority for managers. But what makes people happy in the workplace? How do you create a positive environment for your employees ? 

CCIFV’s CSR Committee organized in January a breakfast talk about "How to combine the quality of work life and productivity for both employees and the company?". Following the success of this first Workshop, participants asked for more concrete tools to promote Well-Being and Positivity within the company. 

For that reason we created our first Well-Being at Work Training. It was facilitated last Thursday, May 18th by My Holland, a certified coach in positive psychology, at ADEN SERVICES Office. My (pronounced “Me”) believes in ethical living, conscious capitalism, kindness and empathy on a daily basis: at work and on a personal level. She focused her management and lecturing skills towards helping corporates to be productive and efficient in a kind and caring environment. My’s interest in well-being, positive change and happiness as a learnt skill have led her to her current role as a certified assessor and coach in Happiness at Work and Positive Engagement and Emotional Intelligence (EQ). She is also a member of the International Positive Psychology Association and is the first World Kindness Ambassador in the Mid North Coast of NSW (Australia). Aden Services is a company that invested a lot in the Well-Being of their employees, their office in HCMC was the perfect venue to organize such a training.

Several factors are influencing happiness at work, such as the organization system, personal resources that employees bring to work, how well they are able to carry out their jobs and their experiences at work. Managers eager to create a positive workplace and to establish sustainable productivity are trying to understand the interconnections between these factors and how it will impact positively the overall happiness of the employees and the organizational performance.

During this full day training, our coach trained the motivated participants to understand how to apply Well Being methods within their company in order to enhance sustainable productivity. The participants have been taught essential topics to enhance happiness at work such as the role of positive emotions in well-being, how our mindset influences the way we respond, the role of mindfulness, what is resilience and our capacity to adapt to challenges and finally gratitude in life and in the workplace. All these concepts were explained through games, group exercices, and dynamic activities, carefully innovated by My Holland. By attending, participants were expecting to know more about "well-being at work" and to understand positive factors in order to motivate themselves, their team, or even the company as a whole. Challenge accepted by My Holland who performed a very fruitful training !

The next step for CCIFV CSR Committee is to create tailored Trainings for companies, in order to teach a whole team of co-workers how to implement well-being and to create a positive workplace adapted to specific cases.