“It’s really important to keep the staff happy!” Said a senior manager in a large organisation who I was coaching. Sounds people orientated right? In this era of focus on employee engagement this is what we want to hear from leaders. I have come across this idea from many leaders in different organisations. It’s a short-hand for strong culture and high employee engagement. We all know what we mean by it. After all, it’s just words in the end isn’t it?
The thing is that words really matter. In leadership they matter a lot. The words we speak create assumptions, encourage behaviour, support particular types of decision making and trigger patterns of relationship. Your words as a leader generate what is thought of as the normal way we do things.
But happiness doesn’t matter
So, what’s wrong with happiness? Well, nothing really. Happiness is a very enjoyable, subjective experience. It feels great when we feel happy. But it is an individual, subjective experience. Happiness is the result of a whole lot of things going on for us. This includes our physical state, how we are talking to ourselves about our lives and how much we think we can shape our lives. You can have really rich people that are unhappy and really poor people who are happy. So subjective is the experience of happiness that it’s actually impossible for another person to make us happy. If our partner gives us a thoughtful birthday present then we will enjoy a moment of happiness and the warm feeling of being loved. If someone at work yells at us in a meeting then it’s quite possible that we will feel unpleasant feelings for a time; including feeling ‘unhappy’. As leader I have no power to make another human being feel happy. Despite this, I have seen many leaders agonise over how to make their team happy. They spend hours of time and thousands of dollars trying really hard to ‘make the staff happy’.
The good news is that it doesn’t matter. That’s right, there is nothing you can do to induce lasting happiness in your team.
Trust matters
This elusive happiness has almost no impact on performance. But trust does. People can be unhappy and yet still trust you. If your team trust you, they will give you and their colleagues the benefit of the doubt. If they trust you they will spend less time second-guessing and making up stories about what’s going. If they trust you they will be more willing to move into the unknown of the future. Trust is effective and efficient.
Three things that build trust
Trying to ‘make the staff happy’ is a mysterious, complicated and time-consuming activity. Building trust is simple. Here are three things you can do to build trust:
- Tell the truth. Tell the truth whether people like the truth or not. They may not like it but the more you tell the truth the more people will believe what you say. The more they believe you, the more they will trust you.
- Do what you say you will do. Don’t talk management or consultant speak. If revenue is dropping then tell people that revenue is dropping. If a person is not doing their job as well as it needs to be done, then tell them that. They might be angry at you or even hate you but they will trust you.
- Be real. Be a normal, imperfect human being. Talk about your goals, your grand plans and your strengths. But also share things you are working on. Admit when you are not sure. Share that your kid or dog drives you crazy some time. Authenticity is an important type of truth.
Give up on trying to make people happy. That will save you hours of stress and pointless activity. The currency of leadership is trust, not happiness.
T
