The humanist workplace
Tags: watercooler, career, philosophy
Published: 2023-07-14 20:25:57

With my "the normalized abnormal" series I wanted to tell you stories about how widespread are malicious practices at workplaces and also how prevalent is gas-lighting employees.

From the side of management the fear is that employees start wasting resources, including time and materials, which I totally get.

From the side of the employees we want to have decent working conditions; we want to have family life, we want to have a wage that under normal circumstances eliminates the stress and also we want time to recharge our batteries.

There are a lot of common in these, and I can't emphasize them enough to everybody: for instance tired employees are going to make mistakes, mistakes that are costly, that tired employees are less likely to fix well, costing the company again.

In short, there are things where no one wins.

Now, I have had the idea to lay down 3 principles, 3 rules to what I consider a humanist, modern workplace.

They seem obvious but the more I read about "quiet quitters", "loud quitters" and all that jargon, it came to me, that we better write down the obvious.

## #1: Company Health
My number one principle is **Company Health** is above everything: a company with murky legal situation, a company where departments fail regularly, where resources are bleeding is a company that might fail everybody: its owners, its customers and its employees.

Clearly there is no winner if the health of a company is compromised. So this is the most important rule here, as the other two can't come to life without this.

## #2: Customer Happiness
This is where I think I will deviate from certain personalities: I think it is _not_ good to scam people or give them low-quality almost-products.

On the other hand given the constraints of rule #1, we must give our best to provide decent products to people, to research their needs, to constantly think of what can be made better for them.

Quality - I think - also breeds loyalty to a company, which I think would benefit "Company Health".

## #3: Employee Happiness
I want to say it out loud: there is nothing wrong with doing what's written in your employment contract. If more resources are required from the employees they should be compensated fairly.

In my opinion, it is the employer's responsibility to find motivation for the employees. Motivation is a psychological phenomenon, you can't expect it. It is created by external factors and also it is taken by external factors. No one employee wakes up and will say _"You know what, I'm going to procrastinate my entire day!"_.

On the other hand, happy, motivated people are less likely to leave the job and more likely to provide more than what's written in their contracts.

For this to happen they need a company that prioritizes their happiness. They should be able to measure if their employees are tired - and if their exhaustion is related to how the company works.

## Summary
My point is: help us help you. We are not lazy folks trying to trick their employers. By simply understanding human biology and psychology we can optimize the workplace for everyone's interest.