What Happy Companies Know: How the New Science of Happiness Can Change Your Company for the Better

Chapter 13. Engage with People

Waggener Edstrom’s CEO, Melissa Waggener Zorkin, has a unique way of describing the accountability she expects from her associates at the public relations firm. “Sign your own work,” she says. She wants the quality of work to be so high that employees will proudly affix their signatures to what they produce the way artists attest to their responsibility by signing their paintings with a flourish. Signing your own work requires employees to be highly engaged; yet highly engaged employees are the exception. According to the Gallup organization, only 29 percent of employees are “actively engaged” in their occupation. The rest are getting by, painting by number rather than producing originals. Such employees are highly ...