Enjoy What You Do

Hope you, your family and loved ones are well and safe!

It has been approx. 90 days that we are all working remotely across the globe.

Despite the challenges, I am also very glad to see positive energy and our commitment towards taking care of oneself and their family.

We at APCER, are transforming the Work and Fun quotient from Physical world to Digital world seamlessly.

I am a firm believer that Happy People make Happy Organizations that result in Happy Customers.

We understand that “Do what you Enjoy” maybe it’s unreal, but “Enjoy what you Do” can be made real.

Since earliest writings from the world’s most prolific thought leaders, the notion of doing what you love has been discussed at length.

But at times we see people who don’t enjoy their work. Then we wonder, is it possible to flip the words — is it possible to simply love what you do — your current assignment, your current tasks? Is it possible, to enjoy what you do and have lots of fun?

We have heard “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life”, “Take a job that you love.” And let’s not forget the prolific thoughts of Maya Angelou who said “…pursue the things you love doing and then do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off of you.”

Does anyone advocate the opposite approach, that is telling people to love what they do? We did not have to look far to find the advice of Steve Jobs who said, “The only way to do great work is to love what you do.”

Well now that we established, that the only way to deliver excellence and success, is to be happy and enjoy what you do.

The question is, how we can create enjoyment and happiness around us, and ensure extraordinary results.

I will share extracts from case studies, research and a few personal examples.

Research shows that great work (award-winning work) is produced when people focus on doing something others love. The Great Work Study showed that 88% of projects that earned awards began with an employee asking their own version of the question, “What difference could I make that other people would love?”

Love Your Work: It’s All About Them, Not You

Let me share my personal experience. I was promoted and transferred from Calcutta to Mumbai as Regional Sales Manager, Western India for Voltas, a Tata Company.

The task at hand was to grow the business and ensure that the retailers pushed the Voltas Brand of Refrigerators especially during the prime buying season which is Diwali. In 1990, we held a contest for all the retailers in Western India and called it the ‘Thousand Club’ which was first of its kind. The incentive was a trip to Europe, if the retailer bought a thousand refrigerators during the festival buying season.

This was a daunting task for most of the retailers and well beyond their capabilities at that time. The sales team in the respective territories did everything in their power to help drive each of the retailers to reach the aspirational club level. This contest came out to be a roaring success and for most of the retailers it was their first trip to Europe. The determination of the sales team to make each of their retailers successful in winning the contest, resulted in collective teamwork and alignment that was established during the contest, created a mega success. I vividly recall the excitement and the experiences shared by the retailers after they returned from their trip.

The fact that dozens of retailers who qualified for the Thousand Club, in each of the four states of western India, spoke so highly of this contest for many years, that it became a default standard for the industry. Most companies then started offering similar incentives to promote their products. I must acknowledge the leaders and colleagues who helped make this a historic success - J. C. Chopra, S. N. Tripathi, Monish Gupta, Kamalesh Kulkarni, Sunil Gondhali and Venkat Narayanan.

The point is, loving your job is one thing — the activities and responsibilities you have on a day-to day basis is important, but loving the impact your job has on someone else is the biggest thing.

If you are not that happy with what you are doing, try this one little simple activity: Go and see how your work being received. See how it impacts someone else, another co-worker, a customer, another team, or whosoever benefits from your work. This is the concept of enjoying and appreciating co-dependency.

In APCER, this is akin to our Pharmacovigilance, Medical Information, Medical Writing, QA, and Regulatory teams ensuring that every case, every call and every submission is meeting the SLAs and Regulatory Compliance where applicable.

Our achievement of a near 100% compliance is possible because of the culture of helping our team members and in turn making sure our customers are successful.

I want to go down the memory lane and discover some of the examples / moments of Fun / Enjoyment, Caring, Collaboration that we enjoyed in the physical world.

Physical world

1) State of the art facility

• We created world class global delivery center at Ahmedabad. Minute details for employee safety, well-being was ensured, and the facility has fun elements to bring employees and organization closer.
• Our Employees and Customers appreciated the environment, work and sense of joy.

2) Leadership Connects and Employee recognition

• These forums brought global employees together. We shared with everyone the work we are doing, challenges we are facing, helped each other with ideas, best practices...
• What we saw emerge from these forums was achieving the common objective together.
• And of course, there were recognition for individual employees, teams, functions for their extraordinary results and accomplishments.
• All these elements brought in joy, inclusiveness, collaboration and effectiveness.
• This started impacting the work positively.

3) Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs) with customers

• We started QBRs to bring teams and customers closer.
• Proactive communication, sharing what we are doing, what we can do better etc. This not only strengthened relationship with our customers but also brought in a sense of openness, confidence and appreciation of our engagement. We were able to make our customers realize the value we add that helps them achieve their goals.

4) Recognizing and appreciating our Employees Parents at the company event

• Inviting employees’ family members to the Ahmedabad facility launch created an empathic connect between the Employees and Organization.
• This increased the sense of pride and respect for the organization.

5) Diwali / New Year / Christmas Party

• Who can forget these fun parties with singing, dance, plays, talent competitions that brings our employees and organization closer?
• At many occasions we merged the customer visit. they enjoyed, danced, had fun with all of us.
• This increased the bonding between customers, employees and the organization.

6) Other get-togethers and parties at office, games, competitions, painting, music etc.

• Frequent fun activities at office, laughing with colleagues, screaming with joy, music at 3 p.m. had been instrumental in getting engagement & enjoyment at work.
• These joyful moments increased the happiness quotient with the employees. 

7) Team outings, Trainings outside

•  Team lunches / dinners and outing to develop bonding- bringing people closer.
• Leadership trainings that were hosted at external locations. People had fun, they learnt through different exercises, collaborated,. discovered new potential within them and made new friends.
• These programs strengthen team connect and increased collaboration. 

Now we are in the Digital world

While we all are now working from homes and are away from each other, we know we can create similar level of Fun, Joyful moments in this new Digital world and continue to be connected, smile, care and inspire.

We are aware that the personal and professional boundaries are blurred, but we are sure to find the right balance, hone our skills (kitchen / household work 😊) maintain and spread positivity in thoughts & actions, collaborate.

We are sure we will make this New Normal more engaging, enriching and rewarding for all of us. We have done this earlier (in physical world), and we will do it now do it in the digital world. 

• Competition with Fun activities created excellent response and participation on Yammer. MyMaskMySafety Photographs, IamAChef Cooking, Painting, Music – Singing and Dancing, playing a musical instrument evoked great enthusiasm amongst the team and appreciated by our clients.
• Morning meditation sessions, Yoga sessions – are attended by large number of our staff members and received lot of appreciation.
• Periodic communication by Administration, HR, IT teams - on awareness content on COVID 19; safety tips, preventive measures to be followed while we work from home.
• Regular content posts on our social media is getting recognized and liked by our employees, customers and prospect community.

Hence, my personal message “Work is love made visible by those who enjoy helping others succeed.”

Besides this, in order to determine what you would enjoy, you could ask yourself a few questions.

What would your friends or family say that you are good at?

Sometimes, talking to the people closest to you helps make more informed decisions. Ask your loved ones what they think your strengths are, and what work would allow you to use those skills. When you ask other people, you can gain additional perspective and insight that you might not have considered. What you think your strengths are, might not be what your friends and family think of first.

Let me share my personal thoughts. When I work for an organisation, I consider it my family. This brings me closer to my team members, partners and customers. This feeling of being part of a larger family automatically creates an ecosystem of togetherness, support and collective success.

Who was your biggest role model growing up?

Similarly, you might think about who you idolized growing up. Did you love this person because they helped people? Did they have special skills that you wanted? Did you find similarities in their abilities with your own? By thinking about why you looked up to this person, you might find reasons to direct yourself do new things. Even if you did not consider, it might help uncover your true goals and desires.

My family role models who helped me grow are my mother Mrs. Shashi Brij Kishore Arora, Alka Misra and Santrupt Misra.

Hence, I would like to summarize, how I have enjoyed what I do. Make the organisation that I work for become part of extended family. Build a set of role models from my family and professional network. Create a sense of fun which makes our daily, weekly and monthly work output pleasurable. Think of what I do and how to make my colleagues, my team, my company and my customers successful.

Over the last few years APCER has significantly improved as an organisation and we built a culture that enables “Enjoy what You do” while we continue delivering extraordinary results.

Please continue to be strong, protect yourselves, your parents and other family members and enjoy what you are doing.