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The Wonders of Contemplation and 10 Minute Meditations

The Wonders of Contemplation and 10 Minute Meditations
Over the recent years, the need for creativity in several jobs have increased. No matter the industry or task – whether you are trying to pacify conflicting stakeholder priorities, looking for solutions to a client’s complaints, or launching a new product, your answers won’t probably be found in textbooks or academic papers.

But the thing is, it’s not easy to generate diverse ideas day by day. Chances are, creative blocks come in the way or worse, we actually run out of them. So what do we do once this happens? How do we move forward when our mind have seemingly hit a wall?

Mindfulness meditation have become an increasingly popular solution to curing mental blocks. Not only are researchers advertising its benefit but even leading firms such as Google, Goldman Sachs, and Medtronic are introducing this method of contemplation, as well as other mindfulness practices to their employees. Their executives and those from other organizations are saying that not only is it useful for stress-reduction, but it can also enhance creativity, opening a door in the wall blocking us from going forward.

But encouraging such acts would take a lot of convincing. These unorthodox ways of increasing productivity is often frowned upon, so in order to open up one’s mind to this approach, it’s important to gain a deeper understanding of its affectivity.

The Science of Musings and Contemplation

Administrators who gave contemplation a try, said that it actually helps them switch gears when things are becoming too stressful. In addition to this, there’s a large number of existing literature on the other benefits that it brings to the workplace. If one is to do it regularly, it can boost their resilience – allowing them to mitigate stress, regulate emotions, and develop a much more positive outlook. Moreover, it helps them switch off their innate reactive fight-or-flight response and engage in a more thoughtful mode needed in making balanced decisions.

Danny Penman argues in his book, Mindfulness for Creativity, that meditation and other similar practices amplify three essential skills for creative problem solving. First, mindfulness that switches on divergent thinking, opening our minds to new ideas. Second, it improves attention and makes registering ideas much easier. Lastly, it nurtures courage and pliancy against skepticism and other setbacks – a quality much needed for various innovation processes.

To further strengthen the claims that creativity is one of its first benefits, an experiment was conducted at the Erasmus University of Rotterdam, Netherlands. One hundred twenty-nine students participated in the test to see whether a minimum of ten minute meditation would be sufficient to boost creativity. The results showed that the short contemplation activities given to them rendered the participants in a more positive and relaxed frame of mind. Moreover, it decreased the participants’ feelings of restlessness by at least twenty-three percent, nervousness by seventeen percent, and irritation by twenty-four percent. Google’s Mindfulness Program Advisor, Mirabai Bush, said in a conference that the activity will make your life work better and your work life better – a win-win situation.

Step-by-Step Process

At the end of the day, the only way you’ll find out whether or not meditation and contemplation works for you, is for you to actually try it yourself. You can download apps such as Headspace, Calm, or Buddhify. You can also try following instructions from short courses that can be found online.

And for us to actually experience it to the fullest, it’s important that our work environments would provide us with enough freedom to do it. Traditional offices would usually disapprove of such activities but the growing presence of coworking spaces are giving today’s professionals room for mindfulness activities. The global phenomenon of shared spaces allows its members full autonomy of their workday and provides them with a wide variety of work areas that they can use any time they please. So in case you want to give ten minute meditations a try, you can easily pick a quiet area for a quick break.

Better ideas and a better mood can easily be achieved in approximately just about the same time that it takes for you to enjoy a cup of coffee. And if you want to give it a try, we can introduce you to a working environment that encourages mindfulness.

A Breath of Fresh Air: Diversifying K-pop Groups

A Breath of Fresh Air: Diversifying K-pop Groups

2017 played quite the significant role for South Korean pop or K-pop culture. In the aforementioned year, what once was a hidden safe haven became a major driver of global culture.

The Korean wave – commonly known as Hallyu – became a full-blown global phenomenon as it made its prominence known. Starting from the entertainment field – filling the streaming platform Netflix with unique Korean dramas, down to the cosmetics industry with its intricate skincare regimen. But at the heart of its growing presence in the global community is its music – the well-acclaimed Korean pop music or K-pop.

A Hidden Safe Haven

Hallyu has been around for almost two decades now but K-pop in particular, have accumulated a global audience in the past five to ten years.  With several second generation artists hitting the Billboard Hot 100 chart, its exports have spearheaded its growth into a $5 billion industry.

Their distinctive blend of melodies, well-choreographed dances, dazzling productions and eye-catching performers, have allowed them to become a global phenomenon. Surpassing language barriers and cultural differences, their music have helped them connect with the rest of the world.

As their audience grows larger, talks of diversity and inclusivity come in. With the country’s conservative nature, their following couldn’t help but wonder just how open the industry is to other cultures.

Transnationality

Though experts admit that prejudice towards foreigners remain to be rampant in the country due to its traditional customs, it can’t be denied that the country is going through its multicultural phase and in response to this, they have become more accommodating to its neighbors.

Not only are we seeing large numbers of different races within South Korea’s current population, the same diversity is now being seen in the K-pop industry as several multinational groups emerge.

The popular girl-group Momoland that made breakthrough success earlier this year with their third mini album “Great!” and its title track “Bboom Bboom” is proof that with inclusivity comes success. The band’s youngest member, Nancy Jewel McDonie, is a half-American, half-Korean, 18 year old who grew up in the province of Daegu. Though her father is American, she grew up to be more fluent in her mother’s dialect. Nancy and the rest of the members of the band is well-received by the local audience as well as their global fan base.

But Momoland wasn’t the first group to introduce non-Korean idols. JYP Entertainment’s GOT7, introduced 3 of its foreign members hailing from Hong Kong, Taiwan and Thailand during their debut. The boys garnered global success 4 years since their debut and is well-loved by the Korean public.

Admittedly, the bigotry is still there but compared to the earlier generations, today’s Korean public have grown to be more open to diversity.

K-pop Diversity and Creativity

The advantages brought upon by inclusivity and creativity can be observed not just in today’s global music industry.

Simply take a good look at today’s workforce. The changing way of working has opened the general public’s mind to the different ways of efficient working. The movement of shared offices or coworking spaces taught us to embrace the unique workings of productivity. Though several experts would suggest that there seems to be a pattern or a way to hack utmost efficiency, it may not be effective for each one of us. Some might need flexibility or creative freedom to produce innovative ideas. Hence, these open layout offices aims to cater to those with peculiar ways of harnessing productivity.

Its success shows that it’s not bad to open up ourselves to the unusual. Just as how the rest of the world warmly embraced the Hallyu wave.

Talk to us today and we’ll show you a different way of being productive.

Saving a Coworker: How Managers Can Help People Who Lost Motivation

Saving a Coworker: How Managers Can Help People Who Lost Motivation

At some point in our career, we meet individuals – sometimes, even groups of people – who lost motivation towards their work. Though we understand the struggle of losing interest, we can’t help but feel frustrated. We find it hard to sympathize with coworkers who become unproductive due to how disengaged they are. We tend to forget what it felt like when we were there and we would often end up being unkind to them, wishing they would just suck it up and snap out of it.

Leaders are prone to falling into this mindset. But what most managers don’t know is that these kinds of approach are usually counterproductive. It’s a band aid solution that ignores the underlying reasons as to why people lose passion for what they do.

The reality is, in order for managements to find the root of the problem, they have to know that it’s crucial to understand the need of humans to feel motivated and to find meaning in the things that they do. It’s simply part of our biology. As a matter of fact, there’s a certain part of our brain commonly known as the seeking system. This specific section creates natural impulses to learn new things and to take challenging yet very meaningful tasks. And whenever this urge is satisfied, we receive a jolt of dopamine – the neurotransmitter responsible for motivation and pleasure – making us want more engagement to these kinds of activities. And, whenever our seeking systems are stimulated, we become more motivated and feel purposeful as well as zestful. We feel even more alive.

In an ideal circumstance, we should be able to freely explore, experiment, and learn – this should be our way of living and working. But the harsh reality is that a majority of us are members of organizations who each have their respective restrictions that prevents us from doing so.

When we’re left in a box with no room for growth and learning, we tend to shut down – a reaction we are engineered to have. It’s our body’s way of saying “we’re meant for better things”. Our brains are basically telling us that we’re wasting our potential.

Activating your employee’s seeking system is one of the biggest keys in bringing back their motivation. The question now is how should managers do it? Surely there are road blocks in the way – many of which are beyond control. Admittedly, it’s almost impossible to ignore these metrics and other bureaucratic red tapes but despite of this, there are ways in which we can stimulate the aforementioned structure without creating too much of a change in the organization.

With three small but significant steps to triggering employee’s seeking systems: encouraging them to play around their strengths, creating opportunities for experiments, and helping them personalize the purpose of their work.

Promoting Self Expression

Philosophers through the decades have emphasized the human mind’s innate drive to showcase their true selves to those around them. Yet despite of this notion, the working industry have ignored our desire for self-expression.

Regardless of the progress we’ve made in our way of working – the rise of remote workers, the growing population of coworking spaces and how the industry is now lauding creativity and innovations – there’s still administrative positions, inflexible roles and standard evaluation systems that creates anxiety instead of excitement.

Allowing talents to think for themselves and utilize their respective unique skills, their seeking systems are activated. They feel more alive when they feel that they have a larger role to play in the company.

Experimenting

Another way of activating the aforementioned system is creating “safe zones” wherein they can experiment, play, and have supportive social bonding.

Not only to these zones elicit positive emotions, it also creates intrinsic motivations that can unleash creativity. Organizations become more agile when they encourage employees to look for new approaches and allow them to test it out as well as letting them learn through feedback sharing.

Research have said that framing change and innovation as an opportunity for experimentation and learning instead of viewing it as a performance situation is actually better.

Greater Purpose and Motivation

The sense of a greater purpose doesn’t just revolve around solving global problems like curing epidemics or changing the world. It can also start with seeing how our input contributes something greater. We find our jobs purposeful when we learn how we affect the team’s progress.

Sales Rain Acquires New Office in Exxa Tower, Bridgetowne IT Park

Sales Rain Acquires New Office in Exxa Tower, Bridgetowne IT Park

Expanding its reach further, Sales Rain adds another location to its arsenal as it takes full acquisition of the twenty-first floor of the newly opened Exxa Tower.

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Sales Rain Opens Cafe Lluvia, a Coffee Shop Inside a Coworking Space

Sales Rain Opens Cafe Lluvia, A Coffee Shop Inside a Coworking Space
After the successful launch of its very first coworking space, Sales Rain follows up with another milestone as they open Cafe Lluvia – the very first local cashless coffee shop inside a shared office located at the 41st floor of Pioneer Highlands Tower 2 in Mandaluyong City.

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Why Encouraging Conflict is Needed in Fostering Collaboration

Why Encouraging Conflict is Needed in Fostering Collaboration

In an ideal world, each one of us would agree with one another. We wouldn’t have painful arguments or conflicts that would later create more damaging issues. We would be in harmonious circumstances, happily going on our own ways.

Realistically speaking, this ideology is impossible to achieve. Whenever we force each other to agree with one another, the more we grow farther apart.

This idyllic expectation of sunshine and rainbows is crushing collaboration. Instead of being the messy back-and-forth process it naturally is, we force it to become harmonious. We expect everyone to concur and be supportive towards everyone yet this constant desire hinders partnerships in fulfilling its promises of greater innovation and improved risk moderation. At its universal form, collaboration coincides with healthy conflict.

Conflict and Collaboration

A large majority of us have been taught to see collaboration and conflict as two different things.  The common narrative for teams include perfect synchronization and tight formation. As players gathered in one team, you should “all be in the same boat” and to be a good member, you must “row in the same direction” but contrary to popular belief, these dreamy visions of what a team should be is what weakens them.

Nothing is perfect. In collaboration, tension, disagreement and conflict is needed in order to improve the value of an idea. It helps expose the risk of a plan and leads to an enriched trust among the participants.

It’s high time that managements change their mindsets towards conflict. They should start letting go of the idea that it is destructive and embrace its potential to be productive. Moving beyond clichés and daydreams, the activity of collaboration becomes excessive if you only resort to agreeing. American writer and political commentator Walter Lippmann did say, “Where all think alike, no one thinks very much.” In order to make the most out of it, divergence is needed before convergence.

But much to our dismay, our antipathy towards discords is embedded so deep into our thoughts that it takes a great deal of effort to encourage even the most modest disagreements. Though there are certain steps that teams can take in order to develop productive friction when it’s needed.

Encouraging Conflict

First, it’s important for teams to discuss and recognize the different roles of each member and emphasize what each position brings to the project.  Explain how they each contribute to different agendas. Having good composition allows groups to normalize the tension collaboration naturally brings. Fighting for the best solution possible becomes a norm and gives people a new perspective on disagreement with colleagues.

Secondly, the use of personality or style assessment tools helps figure out the differences in each individual. Other than that of stemming from their respective jobs, each member will have a different view on things depending on their personalities. This would help you foresee any personality related conflict that could arise.

Lastly, in order to normalize and encourage productive conflict, teams should establish sets of ground rules around discord. Figure out behaviors that create positive contributions and separate those that detract from it. It’s important to paint a clear picture of what is, and is not, acceptable behavior to the rest of the team.

It also helps to define processes so that you will have a more-frequent or more-effective conflict.

Admittedly, it’s not enough to simply just follow the aforementioned techniques. Changing people’s mindset towards conflict and disagreement goes beyond. Some teams even go as far as joining coworking spaces to gain brand new perspective. These shared offices take pride in the great communities they create. Its open layout encourages open communication and the diversity of its members shows that there is beauty in each one’s differences.

Little Dreamer, Stop Wasting Time and Start Giving Yourself a Try

Why You Should Stop Wasting Time and Give Yourself a Try

I am twenty-six days away from being officially, truly, a twenty-one year old.

It doesn’t sound weird to other people, but boy, does it seem bizarre to me.

See, six years ago, I firmly believed I would never make it to nineteen – much less, sixteen, if I’m frankly speaking – but here I am, a twenty-year old girl who once believed that the end of the line lingers near. Now I am sitting in front of  a computer – with a regular job.

Somehow, I’m still anticipating the moment when everything is full and it’s finally the time to cut it all out. Yet unlike my younger counter part, I can confidently say that I’m relatively smarter than her. With a braver heart, a clearer perspective and a deeper comprehension of what truly matters in life, I’d say that I’ve learned a couple of things when I got to this age.

Like, true friends don’t lie and not everything that they think important isn’t actually important.

And, time, really, is of the essence.

As cheesy as it may sound, it is true.

Over cups of coffee and late night sessions of breakdowns, I’ve come to realize just how important it is to have a deep understanding of one’s existence. Hate to be the one to break the bad news, but we humans are only here for an ample amount of time and the bitter reality we oh so love to ignore is that anytime – and I mean, anytime – everything around us could disappear.

In the grand scheme of things, our lives are simply drops of water in the ocean. And because of the relatively limited time we have, shouldn’t we squeeze the most joy out if it? Why are we wasting time over things that make us unhappy and overworked? Why can’t we simply choose what fulfills us and be truly happy?

This is the one thing that a majority of us fears – choosing our career.

Some of us choose to follow the degree we worked so hard on, while some chose to stay away. Where do I belong between the two? Right in the middle.

I didn’t exactly stuck by my degree but I didn’t veer too away from it. Did everyone agree to it? Of course not.

To them, the idea seemed preposterous. Higher education has the tendency to scare us away from doing something courageous. And we, too, get easily anxious with the idea of putting ourselves at the mercy of other people’s opinions – it gives them a power over us that isn’t easy to reclaim.

So instead of simply doing what makes them happy, majority of my folks simply settle.

Unlike most of them, I’ve already made up my mind before I even got up that stage to get my certificate – I cannot, and will not, let myself be glued to a job that I despise.

Yes, not everyone agreed with the decisions I’ve made and yes, I was terrified of handing my creative sanity to another person’s hand but I’ve made the conscious choice of not putting myself through years and years of possible misery.

It wasn’t easy – but then again, nothing is ever easy.

I stopped wasting time and gave myself a try. Because, truthfully, we can never ever tell what would happen next. Our fears and anxieties are most definitely there but sometimes, they’re just vague foresights of what the future might hold.

Whenever I talk to close friends – or anyone close to my age, to be honest – I always try and remind them that their future lies in their hands. That everyone has strong opinions but it doesn’t necessarily make them true.

So why not just do what truly makes you happy? If sticking with your Law degree and slowly making your way to that sweet position of a judge fills your heart with warmth, go do it. And if making content for Youtube makes you smile, do it.

What they say don’t matter; because for one, it’s your life and two, there’s plenty of opinions around but it’s not always right.

Our generation is pretty lucky. Lucky in a sense that, the mindset towards work is changing. Digital nomads are ruling the workforce and traditions such as nine-to-five jobs and ordinary offices are now replaced by flexible time and coworking spaces that inspire people to be themselves. A community lies within these shared offices whose sole purpose for existing is to become a support group to everyone who made the brave choice of doing what they love. We’re not alone anymore. You and I, have become part of something larger than ourselves.

The older generation have managed to give us the freedom that they never have. And though the stigma to these non-traditional trends still remains, everything seems possible – that is, of course, if you put your mind into it.

Go, give yourself a try.

Who knows what the future entails for you, little dreamer. And if it still scares you, talk to us today and we’ll give you a few words of encouragement.

Questions To Ask Your New Found Friend: Making Conversations

Questions To Ask Your New Found Friend: Making Conversations

So you’ve recently joined your very first coworking space! You’ve gotten to know the work area – where the private offices are, the café and snack bar, as well as the usual schedule of the daily pool tournament. Despite of this, there’s one more thing left to do now that you’ve settled down; making friends.

We’ve all been in the awkward situation of being the new person – a fish out of water to simply put. Usually taking place at networking events, industry conferences, charity events, dinner parties, and other social-professional circumstances, we are often forced to build our rapport quickly. Like any other human being, we attempt breaking the silence by asking:

“So, what do you do?”

It’s a pretty standard question, we think to ourselves. A large majority of us – if not, I think almost everyone – believes that talking about one’s respective work is one of the best way to build a connection with someone we recently met. But in reality, it’s actually the opposite – in fact, it’s best to avoid this exact topic.

Multiplex Ties

According to experts from network science and psychology, humans tend to seek out relationships that has more than one context for connecting with another person. Known as multiplex ties among sociologist, these are connections that has overlapping roles or affiliations from different social contexts. For example, if a coworker happens to live in the same condominium as you or you both go to the same gyms, it means that you share a multiplex tie.

Experts believe that the reason we prefer these kinds of connections is because of the ideology that relationships built on multiplex ties tend to be richer, more trustworthy, and longer lasting. This can be observed in our daily lives: those coworkers who also happen to be actual friends is far more likely to be with you should one of you decide to change careers. This goes the other way too, those who have at least one actual friend at work are prone to liking their jobs more.

Analysis of Common Questions

Going back to the question “What do you do?” why shouldn’t we use this as an opener?

Say you’re already attending a work-related gathering or simply meeting a new individual under the context of work, it quickly sets a boundary in the conversation that he or she is simply a “work” contact. Though yes, there’s a possibility of discovering another commonality between the two of you but the chance of the conversation heading towards the aforementioned direction is slim to none.

So instead, consider starting with questions that are deliberately non-work related. Trust that the context of the conversation will eventually go back to work-related topics.

Here are some questions that you can use to start conversations with and will hopefully help you discover more commonalties and even gain you a new friend:

• What excites you right now?

This question opens up a wide range of possible answers. In addition to this, it gives the person the freedom to talk about work, kids, or simply anything that excites them.

• What are you looking forward to?

This works for the same reason mentioned earlier but is far more forward-looking than backward looking. This gives the person a bigger set of possible answers.

• What’s the best thing that happened to you this year?

Similar to the aforementioned two questions but is more backward-looking than forward. Regardless, it’s once again an open-ended question that gives others plentiful of answers to choose from.

• Where did you grow up?

Though this question dives into one’s backgrounds, it’s a much less assertive than asking where they came from. It allows them to answer with simple details of their childhood or engage the story of how they got where they are and what they’re doing.

• What do you do for fun?

As expected, this steers the discussion from work – unless of course they are lucky enough land a job that they’d be doing for fun. Yet in the end, it’s the type of question that will stir non-work answers.

 

These examples of open-ended questions help create multiplex ties in relationship – a concept that coworking spaces often cultivate. These shared offices are designed to create new connections in different circumstances and environments.

Looking Through Rose-Colored Glasses: Forced Workplace Positivity

Looking Through Rose-Colored Glasses: Forced Workplace Positivity

Over the recent years, much emphasis have been given to the importance of keeping one’s employees happy. With several literatures on how it affects their work performance and tenure, it got organizations in a frenzy to turn their working environments upside down. Tech conglomerate Google has installed slides in its Zurich office while online retailer Zappos have encouraged some of its workers to dress up as their favorite animal on certain days. Fussball as well as pool tables and other gaming facilities can now be found in several contemporary offices – proof that organizations are going great lengths just to make their talents happier in order for them to work longer hours and be more productive.

The aforementioned ideology roots way back during the 1930s. Little do managements know that you can’t force everything to be rose-colored. The moment that you start coercing, it creates a crack in the system that could cause a greater gap in the long run.

You Can’t Always Be Rose-Colored, In General

From inspirational Instagram accounts to self-help books teaching us how to harness perpetual positivity, everyone – literally, everyone­ – is berating us to “look on the brighter side”. Though statements of the same nature are usually said in with good intent, there is a truth that is hard to accept for a majority of us; that not everyone wears their rose-colored glasses everywhere.

In fact, science says that in order for us to actually be happy, we need to take them off once in a while

Danish psychology professor Svend Brinkmann says that forcing ourselves – and other people – to be consistently cheerful creates more damage than good.

Of course, he takes into consideration that there are individuals who carry a brighter outlook in life than most. Yet at the same time, he acknowledges the dangers of forcing other people to be rose-colored.

When happiness becomes a constant necessity, it hinders us from the ability to cope during or after bad situations. Brinkmann adds we should be able to feel what we feel whenever unfortunate events happen. Fear, anxiety, sadness, and all the other similar negative feelings are the necessary evil that life comes with. We need to be open to dark times so that when they happen – and they will, as he says – it won’t strike us as intense as it would if we’re accustomed to nothing but pure positivity.

Forcing Happiness at Work

Brinkmann adds that when a company turns their employees’ happiness into commodities, they are exploiting them as humans who carry emotions. Hence, it’s not safe to simply settle on a one-size-fits-all solution.

If managements want to really increase the engagement of their talents and keep them upbeat, they shouldn’t just settle on bandaid solutions. It’s detrimental that companies view their workforce as complex human beings instead of oversimplifying their emotions. This means creating a proper dialogue with them in order to consider their individual needs.

When you enforce employees to “smile their worries away”, we are banning the negative emotions they need to truly deal with difficult circumstances. Therefore, creating a deeper emotional damage.

Authenticity

As mentioned earlier, organizations are encouraged to take a deeper look on what would make their employees happier. Each workforce would have a different view on what can cheer them up and some would simply be downbeat interventions. Overall, organizations shouldn’t force feed happiness. Instead, they should focus on looking for different ways of reaching the needs of each talent.

For one, allowing some employees to work from their respective homes can be a good start. And if your management is feeling a bit generous, maybe you can give certain teams access to coworking spaces for all the hard work they have been doing.

These shared offices gives members the chance to work in a much more lax environment and allows them to concentrate and work on projects on their own pace – a perk that satisfies a majority of workers.

The reality that not everyone can – or should – be always positive or happy is quite hard to accept for most people but a person’s happiness is more than just vodka shots or slides. Don’t reconstruct so easily, talk to us today and we’ll help you find a desk for your unhappy employee.

How Anxiety Becomes The Root Cause To Excessive Working

How Anxiety Becomes The Root Cause To Excessive Working

An average person’s ideal career life would kick start from getting that job they have been dreaming of. After that, they would work hard enough to keep it – or even, master it – so that in the future, they can relax and take the much needed break they deserve. Yet as the time passes by, instead of flying in business-class airplanes to luxurious cities, those who have “made it” seem to be working more and more hours than they did before. Missing meals, coming in early and staying in late.

It makes people wonder, shouldn’t successful people be enjoying the fruit of all the hard work and labor they have invested instead of working even more? University of London Professor of Management of Professional Service Firms, Laura Empson, helps us understand the factors that drive employees to overwork themselves.

A Recent Trend

The stories of managers and other administrative positions working long hours have become common recently. It has become a norm for a majority of us to overwork ourselves despite of the knowledge that it’s bad for both our mental and physical health.

Truthfully speaking, things weren’t like this before. Way back, white-collar workers would work as hard as they could at the beginning of their career in order for them to earn the right to be receive rewards later on. All of their perseverance would result to a secured tenure and what could possibly be a series of senior positions.

Once you’ve won first place in the competition, you would become a partner. And partnerships would mean autonomy and flexibility in when to work as well as what to work on.

But contrary to popular belief, this tradition has long been erased in the culture of organizations. Seniors are working harder than ever and the rest of the firm simply follows.

Anxiety, Overworking and Other Contributing Factors

Empson said in a statement from a Harvard Business Review article that the tendency of overworking one’s self is framed by a compound combination of factors such as profession, organization and themselves. According to her research, at the heart of it is a professional’s insecurity. Employees in general, have anxiety peaks whenever contemplating about when work is actually done, how their respective management perceives its people, and most importantly, what counts as hard work. This indefinite knowledge regarding work delivery causes anxiety attacks since there’s no concrete way of telling when the aforementioned tasks is actually completed.

Professionals are constantly out to reassure their employers that they are worth the high salary they are being paid for and that they are far more valuable than their closest colleague. And when working outside the regular hours and staying late a few days a week starts to become so familiar its normal. Overworking goes unnoticed and we find ourselves taking more responsibilities in order to fulfill the need to “contribute efficiently” to the company.

But it’s not just the inherent self-doubt of employees causing this phenomenon. Organizational pressures also contributes to it so much so that even the most established members of the workforce feel the need to stay in late.

Empson’s research revealed that some firms actually hire insecure overachievers on purpose for their incredible ambitiousness and motivation. These are the kind of self-disciplined people pursuing elite positions. The constant need for validation is what drives them work harder in order to prove themselves worthy.

She notes that though it can be rewarding and exhilarating, it’s important to consider how this work related anxiety affects your daily living. It’s vital that we acknowledge how we are driving ourselves – as well as our staff – too hard. Empson emphasizes that there is a  need to learn how to help your team and that it’s important to take a step back when things are getting out of hand.

A Perfect Balance

Slowly but surely, administrators and other heads of organizations are recognizing the said phenomenon. Small steps are being implemented to slowly incorporate wellness breaks into their respective cultures.

And one of the most common solutions is transferring teams into coworking spaces.

The promise of a better work-life balance and a supportive community is just a sampler of what the shared offices can offer. Freelancers, startups, and now, large companies are joining the movement in hopes of finding that spark in doing what they love. With a diverse group of people all aiming to collaborate and support one another, individuals start to feel less and less insecure about their work. Moreover, it provides them a brand new security that the hours they are already putting in is enough to be classified as hard work.

Learn more about how a change in surrounding can lessen over working by booking a tour with us today!