The Top Ten Most Read Articles in 2022 (So Far)

The Top Ten Most Read Articles in 2022 (So Far)

In order to increase employee happiness and promote a pleasant workplace culture, managers are seeking ways. the third year of a global pandemic. War rages throughout Ukraine. United States inflation is at a 40-year high. Small talk at the water cooler feels heavier than it used to, especially in today's internet-based environment.

According to recent Gallup statistics, organizations and managers will still face the difficulty of increasing employee engagement to pre-pandemic levels in 2022. Nearly half of global workers (44 percent) reported feeling "a lot" of stress the day before. The Great Resignation highlighted the ability of employees to vote with their feet, and a renaissance of the labor movement in the United States has put pressure on even the most powerful corporations to improve working conditions.

Companies that have prospered in the face of the epidemic and staff reshuffling have prioritized employee well-being from the outset. Unfortunately, this may be the exception rather than the rule for many employees throughout the world. "Improving work life isn't rocket science," says Gallup's Jon Clifton, "yet the world is closer to conquering Mars than it is to addressing the world's problematic workplaces."

Managers must focus on two areas, in particular, to begin to address these issues: leadership and culture. During the first several months of the year, many MIT SMR readers focused on stories about workplace culture, talent management, and employee retention.

With many businesses now implementing permanent remote and hybrid work practices, other popular topics include data-driven methods to manage well-being on virtual teams – from arranging meeting-free days to developing tools to assist mental health.

The ten most popular articles of the year so far are shown below. We hope that they will continue to assist managers who want to increase employee engagement and create successful workplaces.

1. The Great Resignation Is Being Driven by Toxic Culture

Charles Sull, Ben Zweig, and Donald Sull

The authors of this article outline four measures that managers can do immediately to increase employee satisfaction and examine the top five predictors of employee turnover that they identified from their examination of attrition data collected during the Great Resignation.

2. Top Performers Have Happiness as a Superpower

Martin Seligman, Ed Diener, and Paul B. Lester

According to research, an employee's level of pleasure, sense of well-being, and outlook are strong indicators of how well they will work. The advantages go to managers that actively support worker's well-being and take measures to eradicate toxic leadership in their business divisions.

3. The Unexpected Benefits of Meeting-Free Days Ashish Malik, Vijay Pereira, Pawan Budhwar, and Ben Laker Too much time spent in meetings can hinder constructive teamwork, distract employees during their peak productivity, and stymie people's thoughts. No-meeting rules allow teams to perform well without losing momentum, but to reap the advantages, customized plans must be made for each distinct organizational situation. The authors offer numerous options for implementing a no-meeting policy or modifying an already-existing one.

4. Coordinating Workforce Ecosystems David Kiron, Jeff Schwartz, Jeff Jones, Elizabeth J. Altman, and Robin Jones MIT SMR and Deloitte's research looks at the difficulties businesses and managers encounter when managing teams of workers that depend more and more on outside help.

5. The Importance of Toxic Culture for Leaders William Cipolli, Caio Brighenti, Caio Sull, Donald Sull, and Charles Sull Research has shown that the five most typical characteristics of toxic workplace cultures—respectful, noninclusive, unethical, competitive, and abusive—contribute the most to employee attrition and can harm a company's reputation. Employers can prevent and solve these issues by being aware of these components and comprehending how they spread.

6. Setting Up Your Cognitive Budget for Maximum Mindfulness Michael Birnbaum It's crucial that we make sensible and deliberate use of the limited mental energy we have each day. The methods of behavioral economics, cognitive behavioral therapy, and positive psychology are used in this article to describe how to create a cognitive budget.

7. Quit Advising workers to be Resilient Mollie West Duffy as well as Liz Foslien When it comes to leadership, there is a distinction between requiring mental toughness from your team members and genuinely assisting them in maintaining their mental health. According to the authors, there are five things that leaders can do to make their workplaces more supportive and resilient.

8. Effective Leaders make Decisions that they later Regret Deborah Duarte Organizing decisions according to risk and urgency makes it clearer when staff members should act independently and when they should involve leaders in the process.

9. Changing the way you Lead is Necessary while Leading Change B. Tom Hunsaker as well as Jonathan Knowles Your organization needs change, and you must adapt your leadership style to bring about that change. The writers talk about three activities that are crucial to being a contextually effective leader: creating the map, cultivating the mentality, and conveying the message.

10 . How Design Can Improve Our Intelligence Gwenith G. Fisher as well as Sharon K. Parker Employees' cognitive abilities and continuous learning can be improved by jobs that allow for autonomy and require problem-solving. This article examines how businesses and managers can improve their workforce's capacity for adjusting to new procedures, devices, and responsibilities by implementing sound work design principles.