It seems like such a cliché: “Once you find your passion, working doesn’t take energy, it actually energizes you.” I admit; not everyone can turn their hobby into their profession. However, there is a source of truth in this statement. By removing the causes of work load and focusing more on what brings work pleasure, you automatically change people’s experiences, providing them with greater satisfaction and energy from their work. But how do you transition from stress caused by work to enjoying your work?
We find that the workload is extremely high in many organizations. At the same time, employers are looking for ways to:
- Retaining their people while the workload is high.
- Keeping people healthy and engaged.
- Keeping the work enjoyable.
- Continue to perform under pressure and deliver quality.
- Create and maintain team spirit even in this age of hybrid work.
In March, we gave the workshop “From Work Pressure to Work Enjoyment” at Synergio in which we spoke to clients and people in our network about this topic. We asked participants what, if anything, causes them to experience work pressure. Below we have presented the results to this question. The main causes in this diverse group were “Disruptions and changing priorities,” “inability to complete work,” and “lack of shared vision from management.
3 tips to turn work pressure into job satisfaction
To move from work load to job satisfaction, you need to address the causes of work load. You can eliminate the causes listed above by doing the following three things:
- Work with stable teams rather than ever-changing project teams. This allows you to work on trust and a shared vision.
- Put all the work on one backlog, prioritize it together and stick to it. New work or disruptions appear on the backlog, but are not picked up immediately during a sprint. This provides peace and focus within teams.
- Work with a set cadence and let your teams plan their own work in it. This creates ownership within the teams and reduces unrealistic deadlines that require re-planning.
Focus on what brings job satisfaction
At the same time as removing the main causes of workload, we also focus precisely on what gives job satisfaction. Following the motto: “What you pay attention to, will grow.” There are four aspects that influence work pleasure within teams, namely:
- Psychological safety
- Autonomy
- Mastery
- Purpose
All four are important for a team to grow and prosper. When you work with these aspects within teams, together you create a foundation of trust, ownership and a shared vision. In addition, it is good to know from each other what you go to work for every day, what energizes you and why you want to contribute to the team and the goals of the company.
People are the oil of the organization
So putting people at the center of product development is incredibly important. After all, people create innovation and a well-oiled machine. This mainly involves the combination of people, product, organization and process. At Synergio, we connect those very perspectives, making the change work for you. We at Synergio have developed a two-day in-company workshop where we take teams step by step to become a sustainable, energetic team that experiences job satisfaction above all else. A team in which people:
- Creating a safe and open culture
- Being resilient as a team
- experiencing flow (again). It is flowing again
- Experience focus and calm; regain an overview of their work
- All can contribute in their own way
- Have incorporated learning and improvement as an integral part of their work.
Want to know more?
Unique in our approach is that during this workshop we consider and include the process side as well as the organizational and human side of teams. Want to know more about the workshop “From Workload to Job Enjoyment”? Then call us. Or take a look at our website.
