How to Measure the Happy-Productive Worker Thesis

Abstract

Globalisation and intensifying competition force organisations to create distinctive competitive advantages, transforming classic management models and seeking effective responses to the mutability and dynamics of markets. People management plays a central role in achieving differentiating capacities, forcing more effective management of human resources. In an environment marked by high absenteeism and turnover, followed by the growing difficulty in retaining talent, organisations have been seeking to increase the satisfaction of internal customer needs (employees), working on issues such as well-being and happiness at work. The increasing concern with employee well-being and their association with job performance have been the basis for many research studies aimed at understanding the impact of the concept of happiness on employee behaviour and performance. This chapter seeks to summarise the main ways of operationalising the constructs inherent to the thesis of the happy-productive worker (happiness and performance). This chapter is structured as follows: introduction, exploration of the happy-productive worker thesis (concept and origin and main theoretical frameworks related to the idea), measuring the constructs (happiness and performance), and conclusion.