in-business YBL Program
Issue No. 62 - December/January 2011
Businesslike way to positive thinking
Jo Saies, of PB Performance Coaching, presented on positive and resilient leadership in the first professional development seminar for the 2011-12 Young Business Leaders cohort. Jo specialises in applying positive psychology to personal and professional development.
As a leader, it’s important to recognise that your own performance is directly impacted by your level of resilience and well-being.
But equally importantly, leaders have a responsibility to get the best out of their people and that means creating a positive, healthy, engaging workplace that allows employees to thrive and flourish.
Since the time of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, happiness has been the subject of philosophical and religious inquiry. Just about all of us want a happier, more meaningful and satisfying life, but we keep looking for it in all the wrong places.
Positive psychology is the scientific study of the conditions that enable individuals, organisations and communities to flourish and thrive. There is considerable interest worldwide in positive psychology and its application to optimum human functioning in workplace, professional, educational and personal settings. Positive psychology tools and strategies are grounded in empirical and replicable scientific study.
Here are some things we know about happiness from positive psychology:
• Differences in circumstances, such as where we live, what we earn or how we look, account for very little of the difference in levels of happiness
• We spend so much time longing for something in the future in order to be happy, we forget to enjoy the here and now
• We are notoriously bad at predicting what will actually make us happy, how happy it will make us, and for how long
• Sensory pleasures, while important, do not bring us lasting and authentic happiness (we get used to them too quickly!).
True happiness — happiness that is ...
