Why Work Sucks. The Zero Creativity Zone - Workology

Why Work Sucks. The Zero Creativity Zone Creativity, Innovation, Productivity at Work Creativity, Innovation, Productivity at Work When it comes to the workplace, people dont often associate creativity or happiness with work, and thats a shame. A growing number of employees are unengaged and consider their work time a soul-sucking nightmare.  Well, I for one dont want to spend my time in any type of soul-sucking nightmare.  Its just no fun.  Research tells us that creativity as well as happiness in the workplace are important.  Its also key to our future success in this global economy.  A 2012 workplace happiness study in the UK by Mercer, shows that 50% of employees are unhappy at work. So how do we make our work not suck so much? Less suckage at work is important and leads to economic growth and an economy where jobs are added and people have money to spend.  And when it comes to job creation and returning to pre-recession levels we have a long way to go.  And by long way, I mean that if we continue the current jobs growth in the US, we will return to pre-recession levels by the year 2020.  In the US, 85% of Americans believe that creativity is the key to drive economic growth.  Adobe released their creativity study this month, and some interesting insights came to the surface: 1 in 4 people believe that they are living up to their creative potential. 6 in 10 consider themselves to be someone who creates. Globally, 75% of adults say that companies are more concerned about employee productivity than creativity. And yet, 55% of adults surveyed believe that they are being expected to be more creative at work. Best Practices for Creative Work Environments For me, the findings are  intriguing but not surprising.  Peoples happiness at work is at an all time low.  So what do we need to do about it?  Im looking for ideas here folks so leave a comment below.  How are you making work suck less and embracing work environments?  What works?  Looking forward to your insights. . . Todays blog post topic seems to be appropriate today considering that the Oklahoma HR Conference kicks off this afternoon.  The theme for the conference is Art of HR.  You might be surprised that HR seeks to be creative, innovative, and artistic, but they do.  As a member of the  OKHR State Council Board and conference blog squad member, Im proud to be a part of this organization.