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Monday is always a great time to ask this question:
Do you have fun at work?
No, no, I’ll let you grab your coffee first before you answer.
You want to know what the best part about this question is? HR people answer it in entirely different ways than any other employee.
HR people go “Yeah, we celebrate birthdays monthly, we have a game room and we have special activities every month.” That’s not the answer to the question though. That’s like asking me if I love my wife and saying “Yeah, I buy her a birthday present every year, cook dinner and suffer through a romantic movie once a month.”
Employees answer this question legitimately though. Do they have friends at work? Is there camaraderie? Are they allowed to interact without some micromanager hovering over them? Do the people they work with gossip? Do they joke? Do they laugh? Do they have fun? I can get the answer from your employee. Can you? Does it matter?
When I tell people my wife works in wine production, they always think the job must be really fun. Do they assume she’s just kicking back and drinking wine with the boys all day?
What I do know is that she often does have fun at work. It has to do more with the people and the culture than the work though. Honestly? Creating good wine is a lot of hard work (70+ hour weeks during the height of grape harvest). It takes patience (you might not see the results of your work for three years). You taste some wine as part of the job (but some of it smells or tastes like rotten eggs, bread or vinegar).
The great part about many jobs is that they can be very rewarding. HR can be rewarding. Making wine can be rewarding. But even with those rewards, having an environment that encourages fun can be the difference between an okay job and a great job. When budgets get tight and there’s no raise in the books, what kind of company do you think does better?
Can there be too much fun? Can there be too much ice cream? Of course. All things in moderation, right? I’ll eat the veggies of doing business and GSD (Getting Stuff Done) but I want dessert too.
Make mine a chocolate peanut butter too.
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Comments
09.16.09
There is an excellent book on this subject, "The Levity Effect" by Adrian Gostick and Scott Christopher. I'm often amazed that people can't see the correlation between fun, worker engagement and productivity.
10.01.09
Great post, something that I think is incredibly important (that's what my blog is all about).
@Chris--The Levity Effect is a great read with some actionable examples to go on.
10.01.09
Loved the video! I wish more people would "lighten up" at work. I was in the military for 20 years, and nearly every day, it was trudge to work, then go home and repeat cycle....... At my current job (Not military, but IT) I try to keep it light respectfully and that does make the day go by quicker.
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