You’re missing out if you’re not having fun!

At what point did we decide that we had to leave our joyful selves at the door? Is it just the corporate British sensibilities? Or being scarred by David Brent?

When I tell people they’re going to have some FUN as we start a Zoom session, I often get groans and eye rolls.

Why is it that people balk at the idea of having fun at work? Is it because they haven’t had any? They think you don’t know how? Not allowed? It’s just ‘childish’? Pray they haven’t forgotten what fun is!

I’m not saying that work isn’t a serious place, with serious objectives and responsibilities, or that we don’t sometimes love parking our personal issues for 8 straight hours, but I will question that we have to take it all on without enjoying ourselves. I challenge the idea that having fun at work is somehow cheating the system.

The practical case for fun at work

Life is short folks, very short when we take away the time spent at work being serious and possibly a bit dreary. Disconnected banter slowly draining the very essence of ourselves and our gifts to the workplace.

Fun is energising. It makes us happier in ourselves and nicer to others. More positive in the way we approach things and more resilient when we come across roadblocks. In fact, laughing at work can help us relax, think differently and more effectively about the challenges we face. It literally helps you “get out of the box”.

Picture this – a workplace full of busy people, somehow hiding for cover in the performative busy-ness of scrolling the internet for pseudo information, stealing a secret 15 mins to laugh at insta or NSFW content… (you know that scene). Does it have to be like this? If fun is inexorably twinned with illicit behaviour at work, then our workplace cultures are inevitably going to end up toxic and isolating.

Alternatively, imagine a place where someone excitedly shares a win or discovery “Look what we can do with this!” Or the moment you get caught up in a client brief or assignment and find yourself actually solving a problem? Or a conversation that generated a couple of ah-ha’s that enable you to move on. Surely there is pleasure and satisfaction in that?

Now if that joy of yours is seen as unwelcome, countercultural, or even taboo, you will find yourself fighting a battle on two fronts: One internally, where you have to keep a lid on your own energy (and that is rarely healthy if done for prolonged periods of time). Two, externally, where you have to either handle the backlash of rocking the boat of workplace acceptability or choose to keep a lid on your victories. All options are a double-drain on your energy – and make work harder than it needs to be. In fact, making work less effective for everyone, particularly when one person’s unhappiness is shown to negatively impact colleagues at work.

The neurological case for fun at work.

For those who need an unfun way of making fun acceptable, take these recent studies from brain science on why fun matters, not just for our health, but for our workplace impact. See these links from:

• Warwick University – revealing the correlation between happiness and productivity increases
• Gallup – showing how “employee engagement is an even stronger predictor of performance”
• National Library of Medicine – for those of you who feel like reading more about the neuroscience of how increased dopamine increases learning plasticity in the brain.

Now you can dive into the links above, but to save you time before you dive into this, ask yourself which kind of workplace you’d rather:

One where colleagues are excited about what they do and keen to get things done?

OR

One where people are head down, often working in isolation where celebration is seen as distraction?

Now of course, there are those times where we want to be left alone – some of us might need more of that than others. But my experience is that most people actually enjoy the comradeship they have with their work colleagues. In fact, many studies reveal that companionship at work is one of their key motivators to staying at work.

Like to get your joyful self out more?

Ask me about my Performance Coaching Journey, 7 sessions that will help you take the lid off your current performance and start working at more of your potential.

After all the world needs more joy!

P.S. Those of you who have done my toilet paper exercise, you know that my fun can happen in the confines of your own home…!