Interviewer: Mahmoud Mansi

ABOUT THE INTERVIEWEE

Silvia Garcia is the CEO of Happiest Places to Work. She writes and does consulting about using happiness as a force to live to the highest, fullest and truest expression of ourselves in our life and at work. She helps create cultures, products and brands that result in better economic outputs and higher happiness for employees, customers and communities. She measures each ingredient of happiness at work with the first science-based index valid for all cultures.

As International Director of The Happiness Institute for Coca-Cola she was highly acclaimed for applying the latest knowledge on happiness to employees, strategy and brands alike; creating communication campaigns that spoke both to the heart and the mind. She proved the impact of increasing employees happiness on the business results, and created new brands and products that gained immediate consumer love. Her speeches have been told to change “​lives and companies”.

Silvia is one of the top worldwide leaders on happiness and, as such, she is annually invited by United Nations to discuss the estate of happiness in the world.

She is a foresighted and humorous storyteller who enjoys simplifying big, complex ideas to make them actionable for a wide range of audiences. She is known for her keynotes that she had given in the 5 continents. She is described by clients from sectors like banking, consumer products, the sharing economy, media and various universities and business schools as a “standout favorite for audiences”, with a “rare and visionary intellect.”

THE INTERVIEW

1-HR Revolution Middle East: Happiness has been a global trend at the workplace, yet many organizations have a misperception or confusion regarding the essence of “employee happiness”. Why do you think is the cause behind that? And how could we define employee happiness?

Silvia Garcia: It may come from the word “happiness” itself. The word happiness comes (etymologically) from the root “happ”, like in the verb “to happen”, and means “something that occurs because of luck or fate”. Therefore, happiness, historically, was something that “happened” to a very few lucky ones or to “the selected ones”. Marketing has traditionally used this association. If you have this (if this happens), you will be happy. So many people mistakenly think that happiness comes after you have this thing or the other (the promotion, bonus, the car, the marriage, and so on).

But happiness is only 10% dependent on such events, while there is at least 50% of our happiness that can be greatly influenced.

Now, this confusion is the source of another mistake in companies. Organizations want to increase happiness and many try to do it by improving employees’ experiences. Experiences are only one of the tools they could use to improve happiness in a more lasting and effective way. In fact, employees experiences are only one of the eight ingredients of happiness at work. Each ingredient can be measured and there are proven actions to make happiness grow in a company, resulting in better business results All the eight ingredients of happiness at work can be grouped under the acronym HAPPIEST© (Healthy balance, Autonomy & Control, Purpose, Pleasure score, Inner & Outer Recognition, Employees Experiences, Social Support, Time to grow). At Happiest Places to Work, we use the Happiest index to help our clients measure happiness and detect the areas of strength and improvement. We train Chief Happiness Officers around the world on how to measure happiness at work, and on how to implement actions to improve each on the components that create thriving cultures and businesses.

2-HR Revolution Middle East: Silvia, as the Founder and CEO of Happiest Places to Work, can you please tell us the story behind your organization?

Silvia Garcia: I started working in marketing and communication. I got a dream job at the Coca-Cola Company with a dream salary. I was appreciated and successful. But I did not feel fulfilled. What I loved was to understand people and to help bring the best out of each person. I had seen that people behave differently depending on the culture that a company or a department has. I had lived through that myself with my first job. The same person can become tyrannical or compassionate. One of the five top regrets of the people who are about to die is to have lived a life they did not choose. So I was about to leave the Coca-Cola company, when the President on my division called me and told me he had thought about me for an experimental project called The Happiness Institute, aimed at bringing together the top thinkers and researchers from different fields to learn everything about happiness and help people thrive.

I think I was one of the first Chief Happiness Officers, before the term even existed.

I had the privilege to work with the best in each field, around the world, and to try with employees different programs and interventions to learn what worked.

After five years leading the Happiness Institute, I had opened sister institutions in several countries, I had been invited to the United Nations to discuss happiness, and happiness at work, and I was giving several keynote speeches a week. There was such a huge interest!

I then decided to leave The Coca-Cola Company to be able to help as many businesses and organizations as possible to create the conditions for their employees and business to thrive alike, by using the first scientific index of happiness at work, as well as all the techniques and interventions that I had tested.

3-HR Revolution Middle East: You offer a very unique and niche certification program; Chief Happiness Officer (CHO). Can you tell us more about the certification?

Silvia Garcia: It is the only certification that:

4-HR Revolution Middle East: What is the role of the Chief Happiness Officer in an organization?

Silvia Garcia: Chief Happiness Officers exist to make sure that the culture and management style in their organization promote the eight pillars of employees happiness at work. Their role has three key success factors that will allow Chief Happiness Officers to create alignment among management to support and invest on employees happiness The first one, is to make a compelling business case on employees happiness as a competitive advantage that will bring between 10 and 37% higher sales, + 10% client satisfaction, and reduce employee rotation by half. We offer an automatic ROI calculator to be used by our Chief Happiness Officer training alumni.

The second success factor lies in making leaders and managers aware that employees’ happiness can grow and that 50% of it depends directly on the company’s culture and on the behaviors, and management style that the organization promotes.

Finally the last success factor is to prove that happiness and its components are not a “fluffy concept” that varies from person to person. Chief Happiness Officers need to use a scientifically validated measure of happiness at work as a key business indicator, and as a base to create strategic programs to improve happiness at work and analyze the results.

5-HR Revolution Middle East: As a Happiness subject matter expert and a consultant who have worked with many global organizations. Can you please share with us some of the challenges your clients were facing and how you helped them overcome them?

Silvia Garcia: Most companies can probably recognize themselves in the three main challenges that I help organizations around the globe overcome.

In highly competitive environments, with high levels of stress, organizations see teams compete against each other, managers prioritize results to the point of taking unethical decisions that can greatly compromise the survival of the whole company, like it happened to Enron or to the companies involved in the recent “Dieselgate” scandal.  These clients call me to help their teams collaborate better and take better decisions when faced with complex choices and conflicting objectives. They have read articles about the key role of happiness in better decision making and collaboration. I remember this automobile client who was losing market share, their latest models were losing client preference versus other companies, their models were probably less innovative and their design was less creative. Their teams did not come together as one to solve problems, instead, they criticized each others’ decisions. Management was under pressure and employees were tired of working under permanent stress. When I first did our “culture audit” for this client, almost all the lights of employees’ happiness were red, and compared to the benchmark, their level of stress had skynrocked and the employees’ sense of autonomy and control over their work was top button. We started by engaging the whole workforce on training on how to manage stress and how to use it to your advantage when it can enhance performance, as well as how to disconnect and recover from it, when it appears in situations when it is compromising our decision making or performance. We also coached managers on how to have a growth mindset at work that reduces stress while increasing employees’ autonomy and control over their job. The change was huge, from 87% declaring to feel high stress and low energy, to 20% after the training. Then we focused on increasing the “Autonomy and Control” component of happiness at work, and a key competitive advantage for companies that wish to move forward quickly with innovation, design or other. We started by offering all employees a tool so they could find their unique and differentiating skills. Afterwards, we proceed to do workshops by department to help employees redesign the way they carried out their job and tasks so they could enrich it including their unique skills. Finally, we created some creative sessions to allow departments collaborate better. Our client was able to reduce by 15% the timing to design and launch their new car and recuperate their market share.

Another typical challenge that our clients face is that of maintaining a culture that they love but that they risk of losing when they grow very fast. Some of our clients are successful star-ups that see their original culture dilute and change as they hit the 150 employees bar. Curiously, human groups are sociologically adapted to collaborate and trust each other in groups up to 150 people. You need a clever culture design if you want to keep that type of culture as the organization grows. One of our clients, a successful European start-up was facing this challenge. We helped them to have a clear picture of each of the ingredients of their successful current culture. We used our HAPPIEST model, that measures each of the eight ingredients of happiness. Then we partnered with them to help them recruit based on employees’ values and on their cultural expectations; so there was a better fit. And finally we designed with them an on-board program to get new recruits aligned with the type of management, behaviors and culture that the company valued and expected from them. Our client’s employees are thriving while the business keeps growing at two digit numbers.

6-HR Revolution Middle East: Internal audit is essential for several reasons. You are specialized in “culture audit”, what you tell us more about this sort of auditing and why is it essential?

Silvia Garcia: This sort of auditing gives companies a unique look into each of the ingredients that scientists have found to be key to highly performing cultures where people and businesses thrive. Companies can also see the gaps and differences between them and the top performing companies for each component. Finally they get our expertise and recommendations to grow employees’ happiness.

7-HR Revolution Middle East: Many organizations deal with their employees’ stress by providing wellness programs after the problem appears. What is the role of the organization and specialists in order to mitigate stress in the first place?

Silvia Garcia: I work with many companies to train their employees to distinguish when stress can be enhancing, so they use it to their advantage, and when it is detrimental to their health and performance. Once they know the difference, there is half of the stress that is not worrisome or diminishing anymore. We then teach them ways to manage and recover from the undesired stress. At the same time, we work with the company in finding aspirational role models of the behaviors that encourage actions to recover from stress, like disconnecting from work, not multitasking, reducing the use of mobiles or computers during meetings, or taking a vacation.

8-HR Revolution Middle East: One of the very interesting models included in the CHO certification program is the HAPPIEST model. Can you tell us more about it?

Silvia Garcia: The HAPPIEST model is the first science-based index of happiness at work that can measure each of the ingredients necessary to facilitate employees and business to thrive alike in any culture. It is an acronym for each of these eight ingredients of happiness at work. Healthy engagement, Autonomy & Control, Purpose, Pleasure, Inner/Outer recognition, Experiences balance, Social relationships, Time for growth.

9-HR Revolution Middle East: Silvia, no doubt your success has an inspiring and grandeur impact on society. We are curious to know about your first job ever, and interested to know what did you learn most from it?

Silvia Garcia: Thank you so much for your kind words. I had a very particular first job experience. A company from a northern country (curiously a country on the top 5 on happiness at work) was looking for the next generation of leaders around the work. They were recruiting based on values, attitude, and desire to grow. I was extremely lucky to be selected to participate in this training program that was supposed to last for 3 years before being promoted into a high responsibility position within the company.  The program was incredible. I, together with other 20 people from around the world, were assigned and trusted with high functions, we rotated all departments in the company, from directing a factory to working on the production lines. We were empowered, trusted, trained to stretch to the maximum of our capacities. On the other hand, while I was not on training and doing assignments with my trainees’ group at the headquarters, I had to go back to integrate the offices that this company had in Spain. And there, the culture was a different one. It was hierarchical, and defensive. Managers just wanted to get a promotion and gave their team members the least interesting challenging tasks. So, while one month I was designing the next product to be launched and was trusted to lead and engage with teams and experienced leaders, the next month I was in Spain, in charge of making photocopies, and manually entering data on computers. I learned that giving the opportunity and under the right management and culture, people stretch and perform to their best selves, and are extremely happy to do so. But that under a different culture, talent can be completely hidden and never flourish, and employees will leave at the first chance to do so.

10-HR Revolution Middle East: Silvia, on an “individual” level, how can one sustain his/her own happiness at work?

Silvia Garcia: Happiness at work has eight ingredients. It is almost impossible to be very high in all of them all the time, but there are a lot of things we can do to make happiness at work grow. Accepting that happiness varies and that our happiness will be constantly challenged, but that we can grow it, is part of a positive attitude to our current level of happiness. Some of the things that we can do to grow our happiness at work are those that depend on us, and not on our managers or on our company’s culture. For example, discovering our unique skills, those things that everyone who knows us well say we do outstandingly well and almost without effort, and trying to use them in our job as much as possible. Also, making sure that we engage in projects or in new ways of doing things that allows us to grow, personally, technically or professionally. Finally, making sure that we create relationships of trust, even friendship, at work.

11-HR Revolution Middle East: We would love to leverage the opportunity that we are interviewing you and ask you to pass a piece of advice to leaders who work in Strategic Human Resources.

Silvia Garcia: Leaders who work in Strategic Human Resources have the power to shape their organization’s culture. That great power comes with a high responsibility; that of making sure leaders are aligned behind creating the necessary conditions for people and business to thrive alike. Leaders who work in Human Resources had few key business indicators and few research to prove the importance of creating a positive culture. But today, the importance of employees happiness has long been proved to be a key to better results, and employees’ happiness can at last be scientifically measured. Let me invite all leaders working in Strategic Human Resources to lead the change they want to see in their workplaces, measuring and improving the conditions of employees’ happiness.

THANK YOU

www.HappiestPlacesToWork.org