‘Director of Happiness’ reveals how she arranges ball pits, yoga and office puppies to motivate millennial staff (and they get unlimited holidays too)
- Kiera Lawlor, 27, is Director of Happiness at Social Chain in Manchester
- Workplace perks include an in-house bar, chill out rooms and office dogs
- Staff, with average age of 23, can take extended periods off work to go travelling
- Kiera says initiatives make the young workforce ‘naturally productive’Â
A woman who works as a Director of Happiness in a company where the average age is 23 has revealed how the ‘traditional’ workplace is dying out in favour of incentives such as unlimited holiday and daily yoga classes.
Birmingham-born Kiera Lawlor, 27, works for marketing agency Social Chain in Manchester where her role is to push the millennial workforce to reach their full potential with morale-boosting initiatives and promoting work-life balance.
In addition to workplace treats such as a bar, office puppies, a chill out room and yoga classes, perks include unlimited holidays and sabbaticals so workers can go travelling.
They also receive help that extends beyond the workplace, such as the services of mortgage advisors, mentors for business and life skills and confidence coaches
‘At Social Chain we have no hierarchy, we make sure that everybody has a say in the things that we do,’ Kiera told Femail.
‘Everyone wants the best for the business, so people are naturally productive. Plus, they can have breaks whenever they want to play table tennis, PlayStation, break out in our chill out room and watch TV or work from the subway train pods we created or our log cabin, or our zen room with plants and waterfalls.’
Kiera’s personal background is in music, having turned down a record deal as she realised it wasn’t going to make her happy.
While she was taking a few months to figure out her next move, a friend alerted her to the Head of Happiness job at Social Chain, which works with the likes of Spotify, ASOS, the BBC and Puma.’As a person who genuinely cares about people, I knew it would be my dream job, a job I never even knew would exist,’ she said.
‘I’ll never forget the feeling I got when I walked through the door – it was absolutely atmosphere buzzing and I left my interview via a slide.’
People often think Kiera is really a HR Director, but her role is in fact focused on ‘developing and maintaining the specialness of our culture’, which she does in the company offices in Manchester, London, Berlin and New York.
‘We have a lot of great incentives most of which we introduce by paying close attention and listening to the team,’ she explained.
‘We have a company therapist and hold weekly “Okay to Talk” sessions where a group of us get together and discuss how our weeks going and offer advice for anyone struggling with mental health issues.’
For those who wants to socialise outside of work, there are lots of activities such as running club, book club, film club, football, netball.
‘We celebrate pretty much everything so there is always something going on, if it’s national chocolate brownie day – we get brownies for everyone.
Workers at social chain have unlimited holidays as the company doesn’t believe in ‘restricting people’s time’.
‘We have a young team with an average age of 23 and we know that people will want to travel, so we introduced a travel policy where people can take extended periods of time off work to travel,’ Kiera said.
Despite the opportunities to be away from work, Kiera insists it boosts productivity.
‘ I believe the ‘traditional workplace’ will die out. People can see there are places to work where they can be their true self, enjoy what they do, enjoy where they spend their time,’ she said.
‘Going to work doesn’t have to feel like “going to work”
‘I see workplace culture like a piece of art, a film, music or a book – imagine creating one of those things and everything disliking it and thinking it’s boring.
‘They aren’t going to engage with it and eventually, you are going to have to change the way you create it otherwise people will stop coming to you.
From: The Daily Mail
