Research in the field of positive psychology shows that there is not constant correlation between happiness and success. Strange, you might think. But it does make sense if you consider how wide the range of “success” is. The definition for success, even though it may even differ from person to person in different situations, has a common attribute: it is something which is verifiable. If your definition for success in work is the amount of money you are making, or how much compliments you are getting, how fast you get promoted, or how many people you influence, etc. you can only know you are successful if you have a yard stick by which to measure you success.
What about happiness? Happiness is an internal judgment of subjective well-being, it is how you feel when you are feeling successful. As an internal judgment it may differ from the external criteria of success. People who are successful and they have something to show for their success (i.e. it is verifiable) might internally not be happy with their success. They might think that it is to long in coming; it should have been more; it should have been presented differently, etc. All the internal “qualifications” we give our external success may enhance of diminish our success. If the internal qualification is accepting or appreciating the success, we enhance it.
Another not so good feature of happiness is the fact that we get use to happiness very quickly. Again, research from the field of positive psychology demonstrate that people’s internal happiness last for a certain period and then one gets used to or adjust to that which made you happy. This adjustment means that you are now back to neutral and is waiting for your next shot of happiness.
Clearly, the challenge is to match the internal experience of success and the external event, and to even get more of it. Here are some hints how to enhance happiness at work:
- Set your goals in a way that your personal goals and work outcome becomes the same or overlap significantly. How I do my work and what I achieve becomes a goal I set for myself.
- Measure my progress towards my goal, daily if not more frequently. Measured progress becomes a source of internal happiness as it is based on the “mini-success” of approaching the “big one.”
- Acknowledge how I am contributing towards my own goal through the progress of my actions. This self-acknowledgement or self-affirmation becomes a valuable source of feeling good about oneself.
- Have more than one goal. In our work situation it is very possible to have more than one goal: goals for what you personally have to deliver and achieve; a goal for how you relate to your immediate colleagues at work on which you are dependant to deliver your results; the goal of relating to your managers and supervisors in a way that makes their job easier; a goal for improving yourself on the job, etc. More goals create the opportunity for more happiness.
Success in and of itself does not produce happiness also because sometimes it is hard to maintain one’s success. This price for sustaining success if it is high, and asks sacrifice, for some people becomes a source of unhappiness. To be happy, success must be good for me, I must have a stake in it, and it is like a reward for achieving things that are important to me.