Search This Blog

Monday, February 22, 2010

No Fun at Work?

Back in 1940 a man by the name of John Gallo, an assembly worker at Ford Motor Company, was fired after being "caught in the act of smiling".  He had been warned on a previous occasion for "laughing with others".  At that time Ford's workers weren't allowed to hum, whistle, or talk with other workers, even during lunch.  Henry Ford believed that work was for work and play was for outside of work.  He believed the two should never be mixed. 

Southwest Airlines has a completely different philosophy.  They believe that "people rarely succeed at anything unless they are having fun doing it".  If you review their website you see comments like “our people are our single greatest strength and most enduring longterm competitive advantage.”

Part of Southwest Airline's mantra is to:

Have FUN

Don’t take yourself too seriously

Maintain perspective (balance)

Celebrate successes

Enjoy your work

Be a passionate team player

What is the culture look like at your company?  Are the employees excited to come to work or do they dread coming to work?  Remember, if you and your team aren't having fun at work you aren't doing your best work. 

1 comment:

doc said...

Hi I am doc_usui Japanese engineering manager. I luckily come to this site and found this funny but meaningful article.

It is widely talked that member’s motivation, enthusiasm and desire to get it done is very important in the collaborative management. But we can not see significant change in the real world.

But this article remind me how bad in the past, and the change was made by numerous peoples talk, challenge, experimental work. etc, etc.

So must be same change happen again and this time, change will come shorter interval by the power of internet.