It's Friday morning and the weekend is just a few hours away. So are you feeling happy? Probably not. The Fulfilment@Work report from Randstad says that while women enjoy their jobs a tiny bit more than men, only 17% would say they were very fulfilled.
But fear not, there might be a way to make your working week better. Reports from the OECD and the UN suggest that Switzerland's citizens regularly rank amongst some of the happiest in the world. So could we all be happier at work if we were a bit more Swiss?
According to the OECD world happiness rankings, the average Swiss citizen works 1,632 hours a year, 144 less than the world average. Add to this an average wage $7,000 more than the world average (although a complicated tax system and very expensive Starbucks might mean you don't end up better off) and it seems the first rule of working more Swiss is do less for more. Which sounds good to me.
Nicola Mendelsohn famously became Facebook vice-president for EMEA on a four-day week, but can it work for the rest of us?
In a recent article, Andrew Simms argued that a four-day week increases happiness and could cut carbon emissions. But apart from the banker Simms found, who does 50% less work for just 20% less pay, the dream of a better work-life balance looks unlikely.
Especially when you discover that part-time workers earn less and the UK has some of the longest hours in Europe.
So given that our first option is as likely as being able to find a tuneful cuckoo clock, we need to turn to another Swiss staple, neutrality. Could adopting a neutral approach to office politics help you get ahead? It would certainly be more peaceful and give you more time to actually get on with your job. Win/win, right? Wrong.
In an article for the Harvard Business Review, the authors of Break Your Own Rules are clear: "The bottom line is that it's just not possible to opt out of the political game at work and still win in your career." So far being Switzerland isn't really working out as a career strategy.
But there is hope. As well as earning more and working less, the OECD also ranks Switzerland highly for the connectivity of its citizens, with 94% of them stating that they know someone they could rely on in a time of crisis. Feeling connected to each other doesn't just bring happiness in our social lives, but in our working lives too.
In his book, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, author Alain de Botton explains that a job feels meaningful "whenever it allows us to generate delight or alleviate suffering in others." Unless you're working in healthcare or as Lindt chocolatier, this might not seem like a daily occurrence, but by bringing a little joy to your colleagues you could also push your own happiness level up to Swiss proportions.
Consulting firm DHW (Delivering Happiness at Work) claims you can bring a smile to your team's faces by making sure that everyone knows your company's core values, having an open and accessible CEO and by making sure you tell people when they're doing a good job.
While shorter hours and a politics-free world might be the dream, if you're looking to find a little more fulfilment in your workplace you could do worse than just handing out a compliment or two, noticing when a colleague is having a bad day, or simply putting the Swiss into chocolate and sharing it round the office. Who knew being happy was so easy?
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