Eudaimonic Well-Being and Factors in Happiness

Happiness and Employee Ownership discusses factors in happiness to an entrepreneur, focusing on eudaimonic well-being:

This comes from the Greek eu for "good" and daimon for "spirit." It means always striving toward excellence based on our unique talent and potential and always working toward achieving worthwhile purposes.

Richard Davidson, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor, says that eudaimonic well-being results in "the positive emotion accompanying thoughts that are directed toward meaningful goals."

The article discusses three participants in the opening segment of the NCEO/Beyster Institute 2008 Employee Ownership Conference and how they have "increased happiness – through eudaimonic well-being for themselves and their employee owners."

• Cecil Ursprung of Reflexite Corporation – "Cecil helped build the company by using employee ownership to shift from control to commitment in shaping the culture of the organization. He linked an innovative quality improvement process to broad-based employee ownership. Consequently, the company almost never loses a customer! Those results are a huge source of pride and satisfaction, i.e. increased happiness among those who work there."
  
  
• Martin Babinec of TriNet – "Martin used equity incentives to identify and develop "critical performers" at all levels of the organization. Utilizing techniques like open-book management, he has promoted financial literacy in the organization, rewarded employees with a stake in the company, and built a tenured management team…leading to higher levels of happiness for those who help the company to grow."
  
  
• Frieda Takaki of Chart Rehabilitation – "She had helped build the company and did not want it sold to an outside party. More important for her was maintaining the close family culture that she had worked to develop. Her 60 employees now show their commitment in a variety of ways from participation in ownership committees to saving money by turning off the lights and shampooing the carpets themselves. The result is a prosperous enterprise, nearly 100 percent retention of staff, and happier people."