How to Create Truly Engaging Online Conferences
Have you, like me, been to a number of online events where you just have to sit and listen while the speakers talk? There may be people that like this approach and feel they learn well from it, but to be honest, I doubt it. You would probably be better off listening to some TED Talks.
So, what’s the alternative? In this blog, Henry provides a step-by-step account of how to create a truly engaging online conference.
Let’s get rid of annual appraisals and replace them with snapshots
Around three years ago my colleague Cathy Busani organised a vote of all our employees on whether they wanted to keep the annual appraisal. As she expected, they didn’t – with 83% voting to scrap them.
Of course it still makes sense to carry out a regular review, so we replaced it with a four monthly happy@happy snapshot. Find out more in this blog.
The Curious Case of Teams and Unconscious Competence
As the year draws to a close, thoughts naturally turn to the word of the year. If we narrow our scope to the workplace, “Teams” has to be high on the list.
But while those of us who have been working on computers for years could adapt to MS Teams with very little difficulty, we shouldn’t neglect those whose roles previously required little or no IT knowledge.
In this blog, Darren looks at how a simple application like Teams is not always so simply explained to newcomers.
Overcoming the Fear to Lead
Kill Your Fear With Servant Leadership: How a 1970s essay can help you do this and become happier too.
Servant Leadership is an approach very close to what we at Happy believe to be the role of leaders in an organisation. Here is a guest blog from
Alex Holland
on the subject.
What I Do Well + What is Useful + What I Love = Happiness at Work
When Laurence Vanhee joined Belgium’s Ministry of Social Security, the department was struggling to recruit Belgian citizens to the civil service and simultaneously losing 40% of staff to retirement. Social Security is essential, especially in a country comprising two very distinct groups. So Laurence and her colleagues set out to change the laws in order to gain more flexibility, attract newbies and retain people.
In this two minute clip from the 2018 Happy Workplaces Conference, Laurence outlines how the Ministry circumvented traditional HR practices to focus on what staff did well, what was useful to the organisation and what they love to do.
What Do a Manager and an Underwater Photographer Have in Common?
The focus of Donna Reeves’ work is internal communication and engagement challenges. Although currently head of engagement at Fenwick, Donna previously worked at British multinational retailing company, Kingfisher, directing internal communication and engagement development.
Donna refers back to her time at Kingfisher in her talk at the 2018 Happy Workplaces conference. In this two-minute excerpt, Donna reflects on an expression that she used with the managers: “calm the fish.” Just like an underwater photographer has to move in a way that doesn’t scare the fish, when a manager enters a room, they shouldn’t cause anxiety or stress for their team.
How to Speed Up Searching Your Emails in Outlook
How often do you struggle to find an email that you need in Outlook? In this short 2 minute video, Nicky explains how you can use the search tools in Outlook to speed up finding emails in your inbox. These handy tools search all folders, and allow you to enter in as much information as you remember about the message.
How John Lewis Puts the Happiness of its Staff at the Core of its Business
John Lewis Partnership has been experimenting with how to make people happy for a century. Its founder, John Spedan Lewis, was driven to create a workplace that functioned so that all parts of the ecosystem were in balance and worked to improve the whole.
Sarah Gillard joined the employee-owned John Lewis Partnership in 2010 as Head of Merchandising for John Lewis Furniture. She then worked as Head of Strategy before taking on the role of Director, Insight and Assurance within the Personnel function in 2017. Speaking at the 2018 Happy Workplaces Conference, Sarah explains how the Partnership goes about achieving its ultimate purpose: securing the happiness of all its members.
How to Make 85,000 People Happy, According to John Lewis
Keeping 85,000 people happy at work is an imposing task. After experimenting with how to make people happy for 100 years, John Lewis has learnt that not everyone finds happiness in the same places. Sarah Gillard discovered how to navigate this challenge in her role as the Director, Insight and Assurance within the Personnel function at the employee-owned John Lewis Partnership.
In this two-minute video from the 2018 Happy Workplaces conference, Sarah offers three tips derived from the company’s decades of experimentation.
Creating More Inclusive Workplaces: Men & Women Working Together
Dr. Jill Armstrong and Jason Ghaboos are working together to create a more gender inclusive workplace. The simplest step is getting men and women to work together more often. The bigger picture is their Collaborating With Men project – a name Jill has reservations about – that aims to tackle everyday sexism in the workplace, partly by showing everyone their contribution is valued.
Speaking at the 2018 Happy Workplaces Conference, Jill and Jason, from the Murray Edwards College at Cambridge, explore some of our deep seated assumptions about men and women and how we apply those filters to our workplaces.
