Organizations and Happiness at Work: An Integrated Perspective

Abstract

Despite the large number of studies on happiness at work in organizations, they are disperse and divergent and thus inconclusive. This makes the evolution of research on this topic and practicioners’ decision-making regarding the happiness at work difficult. Based on a comprehensive literature review, this article proposes a perspective that encompasses the knowledge developed so far. To do so, it explores three issues: how happiness at work has been defined; the impact of happiness at work on organizational performance; and, what makes people happy at work. The integrated perspective this paper advances draws on the principles from Kahneman and Riis (2005), mainly focusing on antecedents of happiness at work and their impact on individual behavior in the organization.

Key words:
happiness at work; job satisfaction; motivation; well-being; antecedents