What Do You Need to Feel Good at Work?
Five things to think about before you answer.
Question: what do you need to feel good at your workplace?
Many people could answer in a heartbeat, others need to think about it or already know the answer but probably most of them have no idea of what I’m talking about. Before giving my answer, I would like to list five points that might be interesting to consider, in order to answer this question:
- The “Boss”
- The Colleagues
- The Passion
- The Environment
- The Private Life
“The Boss”
Each of us has “a Boss” who must answer to (if you don’t have to answer to anyone, it means you are “the Boss” and also in that case you have a considerable amount of problems).
It can make us angry or it can be a leadership example, in any case, it’s always gonna be a reference point.
In my personal opinion, it’s necessary to create with him a relationship based on respect, collaboration, and empathy and it’s important to build mutual trust, demonstrating professionalism and complete our tasks independently of the final outcome.
One of my favorite quotes says:
“We don’t do our duty expecting a thank you… we do it to honor a principle, for ourselves, for our own dignity.” Oriana Fallaci
Well, I believe truer words have never been spoken. If we do our best, sooner or later someone will notice and reward us.
The Colleagues
This topic is really unopinionated because there are many different working environments. Thankfully (or unfortunately) we don’t work alone, so being able to establish friendly and cooperative relationships with colleagues is extremely important for our personal wellness at work.
We could talk about this for hours, but it’s better to resume analyzing the extremities: making your fellows as enemies is not a good strategy, because the risk is to lose the purpose of the work, decrease productivity, increase stress and lose all your energies behind tiring discussions and misunderstandings. On the other hand, if being close friends of your colleagues is positive, we must know how to remove ourselves from this role and maintain clear and direct the working relationship.
The Passion
“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” Confucius
If you ask someone: “Why do you love your job?”, probably he will just stay in front of you with his mouth half-open. I think that talking about why we love our job, is a concept (sometimes) hard to explain in words. The more you try to explain in words, the more difficult it becomes to explain. The more you try to get into the detail, the more we miss the words.
One thing is certain if I say: “That guy has passion for his job”. So, yes, the image becomes strong. Very strong. Each of us has perfectly clear in mind the image of a person who loves what he does, that puts the heart into his job and despite the effort, the anger, the difficulties, put passion and transmits it to those around him. Each of us exactly knows how to feel good doing his job, but it’s not easy to express this feeling through words. Probably because it is a concept that has more to do with our feelings, and you know, feelings and work don’t always get along.
Thinking about it for a moment and trying to find the right way to explain what I mean by “passion at work”, it means that even if at work it’s one of those days where nothing works, we still feel in the right place. Simply, it’s worth the effort we put in it, and we want to keep doing it.
The Environment
Everyone knows that a comfortable working environment has an impact on working and, consequently, on the productivity and wellness of each individual worker. We can define a comfortable working environment when, as well as providing technical tools, it is enriched by functional furniture. In this sense, ergonomy gives us a lot of useful information: for example, daylight and temperature around 20–25 degrees increase productivity and especially health.
The Private Life
The quality of office life heavily affects the quality of your private life, as does the vice versa.
However, private and working life have a different influence on ourselves. Personally, my private life is more influenced by my work life: if I’m nervous at work, it’s easier for me to be nervous at home, but not the other way around.
This happens because work allows me to disconnect. If I am sad or nervous for personal reasons, the work becomes my outlet. Focusing on the work, I cannot get distracted by what is outside and I’m feeling better, sometimes more productive. On the other hand, bringing home the job negativity is a point on which I still need to improve. It’s not useful for me, and it’s not useful for the people around me.
Finding the right balance is not always easy, worries are “part of the package”, it’s important to not be overwhelmed by negativity. When we get to the point where work stress surpasses the quiet of our private life we need to step back and clear the situation.
My own experience
For me, the last few months have been full of important changes and decisions, many of which concerned my work. For this reason, I asked myself the question “What do I need to feel good at work?” several times.
Starting to think in-depth about myself and my wellness at work, I realized that one of the most important things for me is the environment.
When I talk about the working environment I mean, obviously, the physical place where I work, but also the colleagues I deal with every day, those I talk to, over the people I get angry with and smile with every day. I realized that to feel satisfied with my job nothing could be more important than creating that feeling of complicity and knowledge of the place where I am every day.
Work wellness can be contagious.
Knowing what is important for us, helps us to work better and be happier, help us to understand what is good and, at the same time, help us to change what is wrong. If we do not like a situation, we do not have to stand it. In the same way, if a job is not for us, we mustn’t force ourselves to resist, but embrace new options.
I believe that the wellness we feel comes first from ourselves. The more we feel good at work, the more productive we are.
Comments, shares, and discussion about the topic are always accepted and I’ll be glad to answer any of your questions.
Thanks for reading the article! 🎉
