When my mother was six, her sister was born, followed by another sister less than two years later. My grandmother anointed her mother’s helper at that young age. My mother fulfilled her duties as helper but had other ideas, too. She wanted to have fun! When she was old enough to run errands on her own, she did so on roller skates. She also negotiated how much she would help based on how much bicycle-riding time she could have. More than 30 years later, my mother, who worked full-time as a health-system executive, listened to the opera while she cooked dinners for the week on Sundays. In other words, she knew how to squeeze droplets of joy out of work time.
I took a cue from my mother and listen to music while I work. I also seek out droplets of joy, even on a busy workday. When I used to travel to Las Vegas for an annual conference, I made a point of setting aside an hour to take a walk on the strip to In-N-Out Burger and never missed an opportunity to sip cocktails with work friends.
Not everyone operates this way, I found. There are people who have a “live to work” rather than “work to live” mentality. At first thought, it may seem like you want employees who live to work, but if you think harder about it, you’ll find that these are not necessarily your star players.
Faux Passion—Everything’s a Grind
Most savvy employees present themselves as being passionate about their work. However, watch closely the things they duck out of or express reluctance to participate in. Do they act like events such as cocktail parties are chores to be dispensed with, taking a “divide-and-conquer” attitude and look on their colleagues with judgment? I had a co-worker once who had a beer- and wine-only policy they enforced on themself and would all but visibly shake their head as many of us indulged in cocktails. I say “divide and conquer” because, instead of going long on the joy of teaming up with one or more colleagues to attend events, their ideal was for each of us to attend an event alone so we could maximize our coverage. It makes sense and it’s practical, but how much fun is it for each of us to go our separate way?
They would speak in terms of “hustle” when referring to work. “Hustle?” I would say to myself, why am I hustling? I have my work planned out at least a few weeks in advance specifically to avoid hustle. They seemed to feel that unless there was suffering and sacrifice involved, you weren’t doing your job as well as you could.
Leaning Into Fun Means Long-Lasting Employees
Employees who want joy are more likely to create jobs they can live with for many years (at least until a joyless manager gets appointed over them!). They create work routines that maximize productivity, even with few resources and even less help, and they get that work done on time precisely because they don’t want the work to be their whole life. That results in employees you don’t have to work hard to retain. Their job serves its purpose of providing sustenance and snippets of enjoyment, so why look elsewhere?
Contrast that well-balanced approach with a manager who never stops working and doesn’t believe in finding tactics to make work balanced and manageable. “We can always do more work,” they tell executives. How fast will employees rush to leave that mentality, or get pushed out because they are not aligned well enough with it?
Genuinely Looking Forward to Hearing from You
Managers must make sure the company’s customers are well served, and the best way to do that is by making sure their employees have happy, manageable work lives with many joyful moments.
The best part of one of my jobs was working with contributing writers and advertisers. I enjoyed it enough that an e-mail to me rarely went unanswered for longer than a day. I looked forward to brainstorming ideas with writers and advertisers, and they knew I would never leave them hanging.
After I left that job, a joy-last, hustle-first manager took charge, and I heard that my reliable quick response and consistent on-time work delivery had been replaced by long wait times to hear back and work that was often of equal or worse quality and wasn’t necessarily delivered on the day promised.
It turns out it’s easier to keep your promises when doing so is a pleasure.
Does your organization’s culture emphasize the importance of finding joy in work?