Whistle while you work.

Snow White wasn't the best CEO in the forest. In fact she slept most of the time and when she was awake her workers were in constant mortal danger from hostile mergers. Her employees worked hard but only one in 7 could be called Happy while the others were the usual collection of workers known for being Dopey, Sleepy and of course Grumpy. As a group they were disengaged, unproductive and constantly getting into trouble, until Snow White merged with the right party to provide a better place to work and they lived happily ever after.

For many workers the dream of happiness at the "coal face" is a fairy tale, with specialists at the Conference Board and Gallup calculating over half the U.S. population hate their career, noting fewer than 3 in 10 had their hearts are in their job, resulting in productivity loss upwards of $350 billion. The things that could have kept the dwarves happy, ability to move within their group, praise for a job well done, having a direct impact on the direction of the group and recognising individuality along with a work life balance, would have seen the evil witch vanquished by the middle of chapter 4.

Each year research mounts showing the positive affects happiness has on the company bottom line. Something recognised by the leading lights as pointed out by CareerBliss, who asked "what exactly makes staff whistle while they work?". The innovative technology companies with their bean bags and ping pong tables long ruled the roost when it came to staff happiness and engagement but they knew it was more than just the perks. Today chemical giants like Pfizer, government bodies like the US department of defence and NASA have all learned an amalgam of recognition, constant movement, clarity of company and career direction, life balance and having the ability to contribute and influence beyond the work place shoots them up the list of best places to work. The companies climbing the list have worked out "it's always personal" and people above everything adds up to the places people seek out, providing these companies with the choice of the best people in a tight employment market.

SAS, head quartered in Cary North Carolina, was named by several global bodies as the world's best multinational work place and they point at their 37 year streak of record earnings as a testament to their employee engagement and satisfaction. Valuing people above all, especially during the GFC when owner Jim Goodnight guaranteed no one of the 13,000 employees would lose their job and asked only they remained vigilant in their spending habits, SAS stayed true to the four pillars of happiness. Four pillars, that along with "people above all", include "trust above all things", "to give is to get" and "employees understanding the significance of their work".

It's easy to pin up such mission statements but if it was that easy, the question remains why don't other corporations lead like this? It requires leaders willing to open up and learn from people like Goodnight. Google, amongst the current crop of global technology giants has constantly looked to such models giving them a perennial spot at the top of the best places to work but other industries are embarking on the challenge to provide happiness, accepting it's not just about bean bags and ping pong tables.

Something the handsome Prince knew all along, giving the dwarves new direction, a new start, a new work place and saving Snow White from a career as CEO to a bunch of miners, constantly reliant on the coal index for future company profits.

"Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselves great". —Emerson

Is it just me?

Is it just me, or is Michael O'Leary of Ryan Air a mad genius? While legacy carriers acquiesce and stumble over each other to passenger requests for better service, high quality engagement and seats Neil Armstrong would have loved in space, Ryan Air continue to gouge passengers for every conceivable service fee and get away with it. From discussions on fat tax, toilet tax, in flight porn, charging exorbitant fees, calling his clients "idiots and consideration for standing room only air carriage, Ryan Air has managed to stay in the news, in the social media and in people's minds, for all the wrong reasons. So you would think senior management concerns would look to rectify the above, but 20 million online searches per month ( compare 1.5 million for Virgin Atlantic ), have Ryan Air laughing all the way to the marketing department. Which in a million years could not replicate such a profile by mere campaigns for on board entertainment or food services.

Is it just me, or do brand experts not always know what they are talking about when they discuss Ryan Air's reputation suicide? The negativity encountered in blogs, chat rooms, reviews and website scrutiny, has people in a search frenzy and though experts would say this is all blood in the water, attracting nothing but sharks, the telling indicator for Ryan Air has always been about top of mind advertising. Top of mind advertising done for free by passengers and pundits with opinions that would turn your Grandma's hair white. Yet this brand awareness, free of charge, certainly qualifies Michael O'Leary as a marketing genius who has engaged and enraged the flying public in a deliberate campaign of hostility, looking to the airline you love to hate to be the first one you think of when you want to fly.

Is it just me, or is the head of PR for Ryan Air the worst job in the airline industry? Ten people are now on the short list for the vacant position of Stephen McNamarra, who for four years, took a beating and was bludgeoned about the head for the deliberate negativity used by the airline to increase profile along with sales. Mr McNamarra will be heading up the PR for the Irish Rugby Football Union, where no doubt sticking your head into a scrum is an eminent advance to sticking your head out for Ryan Air. The successful candidate will no doubt have the personality of traits of Gengis Khan, the Grand Wizard of the KKK, along with the guillotine mentality of the people who didn't want to eat cake, while always keying an eye out for the next best negative campaign to keep Ryan Air in the media.

Is it just me, or is Ryan Air the most interesting airline in the world to talk about? Seems no matter what the experts say, cheap shots and bad publicity combined with O'Leary's cynical approach to paying customers seems to be paying off at the bank. Instead of trying to emulate Richard Branson, maybe the local boys should take a more feisty approach to running an airline, as O'Leary points out, "the customer is not always right".

Marathon.

I should have run one by now. I've had the time. I like to run. What have I been doing? It's one of those iconic list items that has surely been overlooked. How come it hasn't been ticked off yet? Am I under achieving by letting this one slip? Better get my skates on or the pressure to accomplish the run will be too much to bear.

Lists, the defining element of our workaday world, encroach on every day life creating pressure where we had none before and occasionally throwing an albatross around our neck. To do lists, email lists, things to do before the boss fires me lists, lists for groceries on the way home, bucket lists of holiday destinations, work projects stuck on the drawing board lists and all manner of lists put pressure on us to perform. Is that what's holding you back? Are the lists too long? Are they unachievable? Do you want a new page and another go at it? The New Year is always a good starting point to re prioritise, re align, and re everything to do with the lists that drive you crazy, hold you back, put you under pressure and get in the way of you accomplishing what's important, the list.

Yes life gets in the way, it distracts, it bewilders, confuses and worst of all gives us reasons not to do things and before you know it, list items have passed their use by dates and pressure is applied appropriately. Pressure we don't want, pressure that accumulates and pressure that eventually causes us to blame list items for our deficiency to achieve. Commitment and responsibility come with lists and too often the list gets long by virtue of the lack of both.

Take back the initiative, become the list master once again. No more someday, maybe if all the planets align and I wake up a super hero I can accomplish that lists. No more lists filled with celebrity master chef ideas for the next time the boss visits, no more self help guru inspired career change lists and no more goal setting lists requiring a masters degree along with a Phd in aeronautical design. Do yourself a favour and don't listen to anyone else when making those lists or else you will end up with undue pressure provided by external input.

There is enough technology out there with APPs and time management programs to manage even the most unruly list but the final arbitration on what to include and when to do it remains with you. Instead of adding another New Years's resolution to last years's list, consider two options, prune the list or just go all Nike on that list and "just do it". Don't let that list keep you treading water, don't let that list keep you from moving forward, find the one sweet spot, the doable item right now and accomplish an absolute decision.

I have cut the marathon from my life list and replaced it with an ultra marathon for sometime in the future. Nothing like putting a little pressure on yourself!

Socially Kind.

Nine year old Dalton Dingus, received over 700,000 Christmas cards this year, not on Facebook, not via email but real honest to goodness cards the post office had to deliver. Dalton living in Kentucky with stage-4 cystic fibrosis wanted to break the Guinness world record for the number of Christmas cards received and show the Christmas spirit was still alive. In the same state, Lane Goodwin, who had been battling a rare form of cancer called Alveolar Rhabdomyosarcoma since 2010, wanted to receive more than 100,000 likes on his Facebook page, to show there was more kindness in the world than we think. Lane was known for his thumbs up pictures and before long he had thumbs up from Johnny Depp, the US Marine Corp, assorted state police, the 49ers NFL team and a host of celebrities globally. When Lane passed away a month after starting the campaign, 369,000 likes had hit his favourite online site. Both of these campaigns were accomplished by small acts of mobilisation that could only have happened with a worldwide web connected socially by people wanting to show acts of kindness.

Our capacity to do good has expanded exponentially via the web, to such an extent social responsibility means more than just sorting your recyclables and not being mean in business. Today it means much more because we have all become social hubs, with followers, connections and influence over many more people than we could ever have envisaged. We belong to tribes, we belong to communities and we belong to associations that ten years ago you would have had to travel the world to meet. Those relationships can be strong, regardless of whether we have met face to face and with each relationship comes a responsibility, accountability for our actions, a duty of trust and what the Dalai Lama calls his religion, "kindness".

Globally we have seen the formation of "caring groups" who's initiatives are based around kindness and changing the way we look at the world with big Internet eyes. They all use the community model favoured by the Facebook generation enabling small hubs to connect globally as long as the ambition to further the message is altruistically worthy. Groups such as UK based "The Kindness Offensive", known for its large scale random acts of kindness, "Random Hacks of Kindness" a joint initiative between Microsoft, Google,Yahoo!, NASA, and the World Bank working on disaster management and crisis response with volunteer software, the "Singapore Kindness Movement" using public education programs aimed at cultivating kindness and graciousness, "Conscious Acts of Kindness" aiming to empower and inspire people and their communities to kindness and "The One Million Random Acts of Kindness" encouraging people to carrying out a Random Act of Kindness and pass on a RAK Card to the recipient who is then instructed to pass forward their own act of kindness to someone else, are examples of what is achievable on a global platform.

On a singular amplitude, individuals are capable, as noted by Dalton and Lane, to capture the attention of many and make them cognisant of rudimentary movements and bring out the best in people. Celebrities have long been the target for responsibility when it comes to giving and many use the social networks to do their best work via their social media presence. Yet it is the conviction of unknown individuals, such as Jono Fisher, building an online community looking to make Sydney the "Kindness Capital of the World" via the "Wake Up Sydney" site that shows what is possible in the new connection generation. This ability behoves all to give more, become more and grow more.

So from the safety of your PC, "Don't just be yourself - be someone a little nicer".

Back to work.

"Every day I get up and look through the Forbes list of the richest people. If I'm not there, I go to work".

Sometime this month, if not already, you have to go back to work. The festivities are a hazy memory, the egg nog has added inches to your waist, the sunburn is but flaking skin and worst of all, you didn't spend those couple of hours cleaning out your email. You've returned the ab exerciser from Aunt May, you've exchanged those skinny jeans for one size up and you've already broken two of your New Year's resolutions.

So why not go back to work? Things are more black and white at work, it's results driven and not emotional warfare over who gets the last piece of Gran's fruit cake and most importantly you need to pay off the credit card.

There are advantages to going back to the salt mines, you are no longer the boss having to make all the household decisions, you get back to having adult conversations, your keyboard won't be filled with Christmas cake by angry bird playing juveniles, no one will ask for lunch money and your best friend wont be a bottle of Chardonnay at 10pm when you finally get time to yourself.

With so many reasons to go back to work, it will quickly dawn on you, holidays are the firm's way of showing you how much you miss it, the meetings, the late night conference calls, the guy in procurement always on about the toilet rolls, wrestling with the printer and the Sunday night stress attack when you realise how little you achieved over the weekend.

Still it occurs to you, some of the household rules would make for a more gratifying work environment. Surely sending an unruly, uncooperative co-worker to his room, brings with it a satisfaction not normally encountered in the office. The afternoon nap, chips and trifle for lunch, beers on the balcony, working in your tracky pants, not to mention having the last say while not wearing underpants all day, are ways to make the lines blur to create a homely feel at work.

What better way to engender staff satisfaction than making everyone sit together at the lunch table, laugh over the most inappropriate Christmas present, help clean up and spend time with people who may not be your family but who are part of your work family. Both families deserve your best.

So instead of heading out with anxieties about the email avalanche awaiting, worrying whether the boss had a good break or if the printer guy finally fixed that monster, bring some left over fruit cake, show the Christmas pictures to all and sundry, tell the funniest Uncle Kevin story and generally delight those around you.

The decision between fighting with the printer guy or bringing your best from home is yours, not your boss or your manager. So bring your smile and all those lessons learnt at the beach, at the dinner table, at the mall.

You could be surprised how much fun work can be?