6 ways to foster a happier, healthier digital workplace

November 5, 2021 11:47 am

Over the last year and a half, there’s been a decline in employee engagement in remote work environments. According to Beezy’s recent research report on digital workplace trends and insights:

Nearly one-third of employees say their happiness has decreased in the last year.

Beyond that, 51% of us struggle to feel connected and engaged with our work. Yet the right technology can connect co-workers and help them to collaborate more effectively.

45% of employees say that their workplaces aren’t effective at doing those things that help us feel part of the team and culture at work – like team building, acknowledging birthdays, or praising people for a job well done.

At Beezy, we think everyone should love their job. Back in the day when a ‘job for life’ was a thing, work was something to be endured, not something you could actually enjoy. Now, when employees are unhappy at work, they move on – the Great Resignation is evidence of that.

So organizations need to do more than ever to retain their best people. Most employers get that happy employees are more productive, more creative, and better problem solvers than their unhappy peers. And if they don’t get it, they should. Because happy employees lead to satisfied customers – and that spells business success.

A recent study shows that employees feeling negativity are 44 times less likely to recommend their company than energized employees, and 71 times less likely to say they feel pride in the organization.

Although the spotlight on employee happiness has shone brightly during the pandemic, the topic has featured prominently on business agendas for years.

Back in 2012, Harvard professor Shawn Achor recorded what’s since become one of the most successful TED talks of all time: The Happy Secret to Better Work. Achor argues that while conventional wisdom holds that once we succeed, we’ll be happy, the science reveals that actually happiness fuels success. Not the other way around.

“When we are happy—when our mindset and mood are positive—we are smarter, more motivated, and thus more successful. Happiness is the center, and success revolves around it.” – Shawn Achor

Keeping employees happy may be a noble goal, but when organizations and employees are under pressure to deliver against challenging targets, what practical steps can you take to spark happiness and build employee engagement?

A digital workplace can help, but leaders need to step up and do their part in building a culture everyone can feel positive about.

As the authors suggest in Nature of Work, an organization thrives through “relationships, adaptive structures, diverse networks of people, the spaces they occupy, the tools they use, the knowledge and intelligence they pulsate with – and so on.”

Here are 6 tips for a thriving workplace:

1. Give people the best tools to get the job done easily and effectively

Your digital workplace is a great way to integrate all the technologies that everyone uses into one single hub. From email and instant messaging to enterprise collaboration, crowdsourcing applications and sales tools, employees no longer need to struggle with multiple passwords and screens. When everything they need to do their job is accessible in one place, we achieve more and we’re more engaged.

2. Encourage and support an inclusive environment of collaboration and connection

Creating a sense of connection has a positive impact on the brain. Fundamentally, we’re deeply social creatures and want to fit in. In a hybrid working environment, providing the tools that encourage employees to collaborate builds trust and encourages mutual creativity.

3. Recognize employees for a job well done

Hearing the words ‘well done’ at work immediately makes people feel happy and valued. In a hybrid workplace, it’s important to consider public recognition and make the most of your company’s intranet to praise people for a job well done. With Beezy, we’ve built employee recognition features into our solution, so you can easily amplify your message within your team, and across all departments and locations.

4. Enable a better work/life balance

With fewer people commuting to the office, there’s an opportunity to create a better work/life balance. Giving people the tools and flexibility to be able to work at a time and in a place that suits them continues to unlock new ways of working. As we enter the ‘living age’, creating this balance will become more and more important.

5. Improve learning and development opportunities

Giving employees the opportunity to learn and grow helps to create a personal sense of purpose, satisfaction, and, ultimately, happiness.

Giving people access to the employee engagement platforms, resources and people that will help them develop their skills are good ways to promote employee engagement and happiness.

6. Encourage leaders to share their happiness

The way leaders feel and behave tends to influence the people around them. When leaders spread positive feelings, teams thrive.

In an office environment, happiness is easy to see – a smile, a laugh and even humming a song is a clear demonstration of someone’s mood. In a remote or hybrid work environment, you need to shift the focus to activities like blogs, comments on posts, success stories, and employee recognition.

By ‘giving away happiness’, leaders are able to share energy and become a positive force for employee and business success.

A great digital workplace can foster a happier, more connected employee experience

Today, we rely on technology for pretty much everything. Video calls, employee engagement tools, and the ability connect at the stroke of a key has become a way of life. Digital tools give us a way to tell stories, celebrate success, laugh together and deliver good, online employee and customer experiences.

While technology is rarely a substitute for face-to-face interaction, a healthy and vibrant digital workplace has fast become an essential ingredient to employee engagement and happiness at work.

Author and speaker Simon Sinek sums it up well: “Happy employees ensure happy customers. And happy customers ensure happy shareholders – in that order.”