Happiness Is a Warm Puppy

Posted under Career Management, Career Planning on September 7th, 2007

Puppy Charles Schultz, creator of the Peanuts cartoon strip, wrote a book called Happiness Is a Warm Puppy. I thought of that recently when I came across some articles on the subject of happiness at work. According to a Time Magazine blog, a Gallup Poll shows that 77% of Americans hate their jobs.

In a Boston Globe, article, author Penelope Trunk listed five factors that contribute to happiness on the job. Her factors were:

  1. A short, predictable commute
  2. A thermostat you can control
  3. Workflow you can manage
  4. Clear goals that are challenging
  5. Respect

Looking at matters from the opposite perspective, Patrick Lencioni has written a book called Three Signs of a Miserable Job, in which he offers three elements that contribute to unhappiness:

  1. Irrelevance
  2. Immeasurability
  3. Anonymity

Or maybe the secret to happiness lies in the solution a former client of mine came up with when she negotiated an unusual perk: the opportunity to bring her dog to work with her.

Posted by Wendy Gelberg

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