It can’t be overstated: a happy employee equals higher productivity. These days companies can’t afford to ignore the importance of workplace happiness. The top tech companies like Google and Apple are going all out to keep their employees happy. The companies are becoming a leading example of best company culture.

As Larry Page and Sergey Brin said in their original founding letter 11 years ago, “Google is not a conventional company. We do not intend to become one. The company is promoting a freedom-centric culture that also lets employees handle the challenging and dynamic workplace with ease.”

Australian Workers Are Happier

When talking about Asian countries, Australia takes the cake with the highest number of happy employees. The country’s workplace happiness rating comes in at eight position in a new study published by Engaging Works, a service that helps companies create a better workplace.

Other countries like the Netherlands, United States and Germany are above Australia in the workplace happiness list. The study also highlighted the four areas that saw decline in the workplace: empowering staff to make decisions, listening to them, rewarding them appropriately and making them feel proud to work where they do. It also emphasized that the employers must resolve to focus on these issues in 2019.

The study also observed that the last year saw women move ahead of men for workplace happiness, although both sexes saw marked improvements on the previous year. Men felt more empowered and had more information to do their job well, while women were more positive about employers considering their wellbeing.

Building Frontline Leadership

It further pointed out that managers continue to be happier at work than non-managers, but results for both groups improved. It was more marked for non-managers, especially when it came to career development – an encouraging sign that businesses are focusing more on frontline colleagues (the leaders of tomorrow). Although both groups improved, millennials continued to feel less positive at work in 2018 than their older colleagues, with the overall happiness gap between the two growing even wider. In 2017, it was 60.6 per cent versus 60.9 per cent, respectively. In 2018, it was 63.2 per cent versus 66.4 per cent.

Focus on Problem Areas

Commenting on the findings, Mark Price, founder of Engaging Works said, “We can celebrate big jumps forward for millennials being better developed and having more information to do their job well, but scores went down for questions around feeling listen to, empowered, treated with respect, and fairly rewarded. As many resolve to quit drinking or exercise more this time of year, my wish is simply that more businesses leaders (and the Government) understand the link between a happy and engaged workforce, and greater productivity.”

He believes that building on the successes and addressing the problem areas of last year, individuals, the economy and society will benefit.