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December 2001 - Lighten Up
Lighten
Up - Ways to Relieve Stress
This year, we have many, many reasons to feel stressed and serious. Because of this, we may be more in need of some lightening up than usual.
It may be just what we need to free our minds and allow ourselves to find some inner happiness in the midst of whatever is going on in the outer world. Having fun opens us up to creative ideas that can increase productivity and opens up new ways of improving our work life and our home life.
December in many companies is the most stressful month of the entire year. Why? Because people have less working time yet the same production deadlines. Winter is present in the northern hemisphere so the weather is colder, darker and wetter. Many employees are feeling pressure to attend to family or holiday projects at the same time their company is demanding more from them.
Because of this, most of our December newsletters have been devoted to having fun to help deal with the stress.
Since time is precious this month, we have a shorter article than usual, so spend your time thinking up fun things to do instead of reading this article.
- Use these suggestions to get people to loosen up and not take things so seriously.
- Make a rule that no one will be teased for their ideas.
- The only point of any suggestion is to have fun.
- Give everyone a prize just for participating. For example, lotto tickets, candy, office supplies or small stocking-stuffer type items. You could even have "no cash value" prizes like a joke or a poem.
A few suggestions to encourage silliness and creativity:
Write a new book
- Have your staff write a new book called "Our Company for Dummies" explaining in child-like language what your company culture is like.
- Ask them to think up goofy names for the various chapters.
- You might give out the assignment and ask people to bring their ideas to the next staff meeting so they have time to be creative. Allow them to have their families participate if they want.
Turn the organization chart upside down
- Ask people to come up with a better org chart — something that is not hierarchal.
- They might come up with a circle or a triangle or a polygon.
- Again, the point is to encourage creativity and silliness.
Have a potluck lunch where everyone brings dessert
- Bring (or order) sandwiches or a pizza and splurge on shared desserts.
Add jokes to staff meetings
- For the month of December, start every meeting with at least one joke -or- ask everyone to bring their favorite jokes to share.
- Ask everyone on the staff to contribute their favorites for an office collection.
- Be sure to set guidelines that the jokes refrain from any offensive or derogatory language. These should be "silly" jokes not put-down jokes.
Ask for fun ideas
- Start a collection of fun ideas for your company, department or unit.
- Ask the staff to suggest ideas for bringing more fun to their work.
- At least once a week this month, try out one of the ideas contributed.
- If this is successful, you might want to continue it once a month next year or include it in your company culture as an ongoing tradition.
Celebrate
- Find reasons to celebrate this month.
- Celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, dentist appointments, on-time deliveries, new sales, a project milestone, something in the news or whatever you can come up with.
- This is no limit what might qualify as a reason to celebrate.
- The celebration can be elaborate a party, lunch or dinner. Or, it can be as simple as ringing a bell, making an announcement or sending an e-mail.
Send this article to anyone that you think might need or want more fun in their workplace.
Internet Resources
- Humor University - http://www.humoru.com/ Articles, free weekly newsletter
- Jokes for/about programmers http://delphi.about.com/cs/humorandfun/
- Weaseling Your Way Through Work - Career Development and Work Humor For Those Who Admit They Would Rather Be At The Beach - http://www.workwrites.com/ (lots of articles and resources)
- Small Business Humor http://entrepreneurs.about.com/cs/businesshumor/
- Dilbert http://www.dilbert.com/
- Fun & Work http://www.deepfun.com/colab.htm
- Delightful downloadable animated holiday cards by Jacquie Lawson.
- International Christmas and New Year Greetings - http://www.itstime.com/christmas.htm
Books - Disclosure:
We get a small commission for purchases made via links to Amazon.
- 301 Ways to Have Fun at Work, Dave Hemsath, Leslie Yerkes, Daniel McQuillen. Berrett-Koehler Publishers 1997. ISBN 1-576-75019-1
- Fun Works: Creating Places Where People Love to Work, Leslie Yerkes. Berrett-Koehler 2001. ISBN: 1-576-75154-6
- The Joy of Not Working: A Book for the Retired, Unemployed and Overworked, Ernie J. Zelinski. Ten Speed Press 1997.ISBN 0-898-15914-8
- The Fun Factor: Games, Sales Contests and Activities that Make Work Fun and Get Results, Carolyn Greenwich. McGraw-Hill Professional Publishing 1997. ISBN: 0-0747-0434-6
Articles- Fun Things to do on an Elevator http://www.womentodaymagazine.com/humor/funthings.html
- When Work is Fun: Case Studies http://www.deepfun.com/case.htm
- How Can We Loosen Up At Work? http://www.west2k.com/wpdocs/q364.htm
- How to Inject Fun at Work to Retain Employees http://jamesharrisgroup.com/Article-Fun.htm
- 2 Minutes of Fun at Work http://www.junecline.com/funatwork.htm
- Companies offer fun at work http://houston.webpoint.com/job/yj65.htm
- Serious Fun at Work http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/columnist/0,1886,136-4514,00.html
- Employers Use Fun to Fight Turnover: It's Serious Business! http://www.chartcourse.com/articlefun.htm
- Encouraging fun at work produces positive results for employees and employershttp://www.employerhelp.org/jimcollison/stories/naysayer.htm
- Just having fun at work can boost productivity http://austin.bcentral.com/austin/stories/2001/06/04/smallb4.html
- More firms mix fun and work to increase retention http://seattle.bcentral.com/seattle/stories/2001/02/12/focus4.html
- Games for Groups http://www.xs4all.nl/~chayes/games.htm
- Fun & Work http://www.tempe.gov/tlc/FunAtWork.htm
- Making Work Fun http://www.womensfun.com/makingworkfun1.html
- Fun Linked to Productivity at Work, Study Says http://www.sfu.ca/mediapr/Releases/Features/1996/November96/productivity.html
- Making work more fun with positive reinforcement ... http://www.p-management.com/funwork.htm
- Fun at Work Tips http://www.fundamentalsevents.com/funatworktip.htm
Past newsletter articles
- December 1996 - the Spirit of the Season
- December 1997 - Humor at Work
- December 1998 - Take a Mental Health Break
- December 1999 - Fun at Work
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Page updated: October 16, 2023
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