Author Archives: Larry Janis

This is what makes people happy at work, according to science

BY ART MARKMAN

These things can make all the difference in whether you feel good about going to work each day.

In a time when so many workers are searching for greener pastures, many of us are giving more thought to what type of work feels meaningful. After all, if you have a full-time job, then you’re spending a significant fraction of your waking hours each week at work, thinking about work, and/or commuting to and from your office. As a result, it’s only natural you’d like to be happy and satisfied with the work that you’re doing.

There has been a lot of research on this topic.

HAPPINESS VERSUS SATISFACTION

To kick things off, it’s worth distinguishing between overall satisfaction with your work and your momentary happiness. You may love your job and feel completely satisfied with your career path and still have moments at work in which you’re not happy or enjoying what you do. Satisfaction is a long-term state, while happiness is something that happens in the moment. (more…)

Five Steps to Close More Deals

BY RITA PATEL JACKSON,

Employees With This 1 Quality Are High Performers. Here’s Why

By Maria Haggerty, CEO, Dotcom Distribution

When it comes to soft skills, this might be the most valuable employee asset there is.

Employees with This 1 Quality Are High Performers. Here’s Why, Plus How to Identify It

By Maria Haggerty

When it comes to soft skills, this might be the most valuable employee asset there is.

The purpose of “purpose”

by Adam Bryant

It’s the buzzword of the year, but discussions about purpose require rigor to make them meaningful.

If 2020 was all about crises—the pandemic and the outrage in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, to name two—and companies’ resilience and ability to navigate disruption, 2021 feels like it has been the year of “purpose.” Companies are issuing purpose statements with great fanfare, and the phrase purpose-driven company is so ubiquitous that it risks joining the ranks of strategic and going forward—words and phrases that are added almost reflexively to every sentence of corporate-speak.

There are plenty of reasons for the big push for purpose. As part of the shift from shareholder to stakeholder capitalism, employees are demanding that their work, and their employers, stand for something. The pandemic made many people reflect more on the “why” of their jobs, and their unsatisfying answers have led in part to the “great resignation.” To win the war for talent, companies are focusing their recruiting pitches on goals and ambitions that are loftier than simply making money for investors (more…)