Thriving at Work: Beyond Wellness Programs
It’s time to rethink thriving. It’s a critical aspect of workplace success, sustainability, happiness, and productivity. But when it comes to thriving and what it takes to thrive, we may have it all wrong.
The word “thriving” can conjure up ideas of traditional wellness programs with activities like yoga, meditation, fitness, and mental health support. These practices can be critically important, particularly in occupations where the nature of the work itself is stressful such as for first responders or those in social services. This week a colleague and I are teaching a workshop on Workplace Stress Reduction for a city council. These are public servants who face very particular kinds of stress as part of the role and need tools to address it so that they can effectively serve. for most professionals, such practices can be offensive or only scratch the surface of the issues at play.
However, in many jobs, the stress and burnout employees experience are not because the work itself is stressful. Rather, workplace practices are stressful and are the cause of harm. In these cases, most professionals are offended by the suggestion that they should learn to breathe, meditate, or exercise more to relieve the stress of an abusive work environment. A 2022 study by the McKinsey Health Institute reinforces this by highlighting that addressing burnout and improving thriving requires significant changes to decrease toxicity, foster inclusion, provide growth opportunities, and offer sustainable work.
As leaders, we need to take this data seriously. It requires looking at how we are leading, the behaviors we are tolerating, the team practices we are allowing, and developing both a sense of new priorities and the practices and ways of working to live those priorities. If we want our team members to stop suffering and thrive in the team we lead, we need a nuts and bolts understanding of these practices that shape the work experience and lead to positive states of well-being. In short, we need to work on the workplace so it is good for people, which means it is good for us too!
The Six Factors of Thriving
Our research at A Human Workplace has identified six factors crucial to thriving at individual, team, and organizational levels. These factors are clarity, courage, wholeness, spaciousness, simplicity, and hope. While they may sound soft and esoteric, our case studies show that they are achieved through practical operational, team habits, and organizational practices.
Here’s a glimpse into some of what each factor entails:
Individual Clarity: knowing what's expected of me in my job.
Team Courage: creating an environment where every team member is safe enough to be brave to be an outlier to speak up to share ideas and opinions.
Team and Organizational Wholeness: based on trust and it means breaking down silos and working across teams toward having the training and resources to do that work.
Team Simplicity: eliminating unnecessary steps from a process.
Organizational Simplicity: focusing on just two or three goals this year instead of 10 or 12.
Individual Spaciousness: having a reasonable workload with room to think, plan, improve and take daily breaks as well as taking your vacations without fear.
Hope: framing and contextualizing the stories we tell to highlight our strengths and impact.
The Work of Thriving
You will hear a lot more about thriving from me in the months ahead! We think this shift from a focus on resilience to a focus on ways of working together is essential…and doable!
I’ll delve into each thrive factor, exploring the cultural and operational aspects that contribute to a thriving workplace. Thriving is not random – it requires intentional preparation and efforts to create a fertile soil for these factors to flourish.
If you're eager to assess how your team is doing on the six thrive factors, take our Thrive Assessment.
And remember: underneath all these practices is love, to truly show care by creating a work experience where people can thrive!
