OPINION
Glass
Special Issue HEALTH & WELL-BEING
HALF FULL or HALF EMPTY?
Special Issue
COVID-19 has brought the topic of health and well-being to the forefront like never before. But rather than distinguishing between work and play or young and old, the notion of wellness is all about striking a balance, says Lyreco Germany’s Falko Köhler
T
he origin of happiness is one of the most personal and individual things to contemplate and discover. And often, there is a deep interdependency between the personal, social and work setting. Over the past ten years, I’ve had the opportunity to experience a couple of entirely diverse working universes and cultures. I started my career in professional sports and then joined Lyreco. All the while, my social environment remained pretty much the same. For me, and with this background in mind, there are two major points when it comes to well-being:
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• There is no silver bullet to achieving a mindset of true ‘well-being’. • Even though it is most definitely a balancing exercise, it’s not about private versus working life, mental versus physical health, etc. Instead, it’s more about deciding what you like to do and what you don’t like to do. The aim should be to reach a state of mind where there’s more on the “I like” than on the “I don’t like” side, and to build up resilience to overcome negative events more easily and focus on the good stuff in life.
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My current remit is to establish a new dimension of the customer experience for Lyreco Germany and set a benchmark for the industry. The team around me is vital in this task and I see it as part of my job to make this team successful. After all, it’s much easier to succeed when you’re happy.
LEADERSHIP RESPONSIBILITIES Broadly speaking, it is up to an organisation’s leadership to create the framework for a positive working culture. Two key elements are crucial here in my opinion – among a long list of other things to work on. First, leaders should enable everybody to have a true sense of value creation – for themselves, the team and the company as a whole. Goals are as important as the specific tasks you allocate to individuals to achieve them. Employees need to have a good perception of what they’re doing and strive to achieve goals – it’s absolutely vital. Coming from professional sports, I can guarantee that hours and hours of practice and doing what you love doing are not nearly as satisfying as the tantalising promise of success when you train for long-awaited competitions. At Lyreco specifically, I learned this during the implementation of our global digital transformation initiative. It’s not enough to have people working on cool projects with many fun tasks. At some point, they will start to get tired and frustrated. Devising a clear, long-term strategy with desirable goals and then establishing a connection between individuals and their daily jobs will ensure a positive perception and also generate a lot of resilience for the hurdles ahead. Second, there needs to be a lot of room for personality and emotion, and less focus on some arbitrary distinction between ‘business’ and ‘pleasure’. Again, it’s about likes and dislikes
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