Fun at Work … a Big Predictor of Job Satisfaction

Over the past five years, we’ve had almost 100,000 people complete the short version of the Full Engagement Profile, a work/life balance and stress management measurement. Lately, we’ve been looking for trends in the data gathered from this popular assessment, which is based on the widely read 2003 book, The Power of Full Engagement, coauthored by our associate, Dr. Jim Loehr. He is also the author of the 2007 book, The Power of Story.

One of the single biggest predictors of a high score on job satisfaction for both men and women, we’ve learned, is a high score on the statement, “I have fun at work.” Two items were of even greater importance: “I feel a sense of purpose and meaning in my work.” and “I feel more challenge and opportunity than frustration and aggravation at work.”

Employers take note: A few opportunities for a good chuckle may go a long way towards increasing employee job satisfaction.

In a separate inquiry, we looked at the scores that predict a high score on the question: “I feel fully engaged at work.” We found that high scores on the following predict a sense of full engagement:

“I have a high level of positive emotional energy at work.”


“I feel my work is personally fulfilling.”


“I am mentally alert and sharp at work.”

The question of personal fulfillment showed up on both lists, an item that many employers feel challenged to address. But it may be of use to look at the elements of personal fulfillment and find ways to address them. The word “personal” means what it says: specific to the person. Praise, recognition, and a consistent attention to the work of individuals may go a long way towards increasing an employee’s sense of being valued at work. The word “fulfillment” speaks of completion, something that can be gained when people have a sense of the whole work product. These are both old principles in workplace psychology, but apparently still the ones that make a difference.

As we learn more about the results of this fascinating survey, we’ll keep you posted.

Our company, Performance Programs, is a coauthor of the Full Engagement Profile, along with Dr. Jim Loehr’s company, Human Performance Institute of Orlando, FL, and the Wenroth Group, New York City.

Lack of Sleep Is the Culprit, Say Survey Respondents

Lack of sleep raids our energy stores, robs us of peak performance and destroys work/life balance, according to almost 100,000 individuals who completed the short version of the Full Engagement Self Profile, which provides a customized view of a person’s energy management strengths and challenges. Lack of exercise and lack of time management skills also earned a spot among the top three energy bandits. The Full Engagement Profile is based on a bestselling 2003 book, The Power of Full Engagement, coauthored by our associate Dr. Jim Loehr. The book shows how to achieve optimal performance by managing energy, not time. Loehr is also author of the 2007 book, The Power of Story.

“The sleep, exercise, and time management scores in this large group are, on average, about 60% of what we consider optimal,” says Dr. Loehr. “By any measure, that is a serious deficit.”

Loehr is a performance psychologist who has worked with world class athletes and top performers from the high stress occupations of military special forces, law enforcement, medicine, and commerce for more than 30 years. The Full Engagement Profile is used with all Human Performance Institute programs.

To find out how you score, visit the free trial. The trial offers a short customized report. There is an upgrade version available at the end of the trial for $49. The upgrade provides a 16-page report with a full set of norms on 15 areas of energy management plus a variety of other measures. In addition to sleep and physical fitness, the report covers nutrition, interpersonal relationships, self-esteem, management of adversity, creativity and curiosity, focus and concentration, solution-based thinking, mental preparation, self-awareness, commitment and passion, principle-centered ethics, vision, and the ability to recover. For more information about Energy for Performance Training, contact Human Performance Institute.

Work-Life Survey Shows Only Six Percent Reach Peak Personal Energy

Since March 2003, the Human Performance Institute, Orlando, FL, has sponsored the Full Engagement Self Profile , an online survey that helps individuals assess how well they are managing life energy for performance and productivity. Nearly 100,000 thousand people have completed the core questionnaire free of charge, resulting in an unprecedented look at the practices and concerns of adults who seek to understand why their energy is depleted and what they can do about it. Performance Programs hosts the survey and provides data analysis.

The survey is based on the bestselling 2003 book, The Power of Full Engagement, coauthored by our associate, Dr. Jim Loehr. He is also author of the 2007 book, The Power of Story.

Only six percent of all survey respondents achieve what Dr. Loehr terms “full engagement,” a balanced state of physical, mental, emotional and spiritual energy. Furthermore, he classifies 20 percent as “toxically disengaged,” and about 45 percent as “disengaged.”

"These people are running dangerously low on fuel,” he explains. “They have a personal energy crisis that undermines their participation in their workplaces and in society.” The survey results show that caring for oneself physically and spiritually make an enormous difference in all areas of life. “When people add physical fitness, rest and recovery to their lives, they report much lower stress, greater job satisfaction, and higher effectiveness,” says Dr. Loehr. “Yet the overwhelming number of comments people leave on these surveys tell us they feel blocked from the very practices that would support their efforts at work, at home, and in the community.”

Toxically disengaged people are characterized by low scores on the physical, emotional, and mental categories, but especially on the spiritual dimension. “They’re telling us their lives lack vision and purpose, their emotions are stunted, they never feel fully rested, and they don’t feel they have the resources to improve their lot. In many cases, they have simply given up,” says Loehr.

On the other end of the scale, people who report high levels of engagement invest in physical fitness, get more sleep and recovery time, and have high scores on the spiritual dimension. “These people report self-confidence and vision,” Loehr concludes. “One of the areas where they really exceed the average is in their ritual of taking some reflective time each day.” The most engaged group scores 33 percent higher than the average respondent on the following statement: ‘I set aside time every day to link my activities to my personal or professional mission.’” (There are an additional six statements where the most engaged score over 30 percent higher than the norm. All are statistically significant beyond the 99 percent confidence level.)

The core Full Engagement questionnaire and a short personalized report are free of charge. Visitors can receive an in-depth report by upgrading to the full energy management questionnaire at the completion of the trial for $49. To learn more about Energy for Performance Training, visit the Human Performance Institute.

New Research: Employee Job Satisfaction Related to Individual Energy Management

Attention employers: want to increase employee job satisfaction? Free cafeteria food and flex time aren’t it. An employee’s job satisfaction may depend as much on the positive mental, spiritual, physical, and emotional resources the employee brings to the workplace, according to data gathered from nearly 100,000 working adults in a five-year study of personal energy management and work-life balance.

“The people who score in the top 10 percent of job satisfaction report they are also taking care of themselves in the mental, emotional, spiritual and physical realms,” says Dr. Jim Loehr, CEO of the Human Performance Institute in Orlando, FL. The source of Dr. Loehr’s data, the Full Engagement Self Profile, is based on the 2003 bestselling book titled The Power of Full Engagement. Loehr is also author of the 2007 book, The Power of Story.

“Furthermore, people who report the highest job satisfaction are highly self-confident individuals,” adds Loehr, who notes an 85 percent correlation between high job satisfaction and self-confidence. “They are not only satisfied with their jobs; they also feel competent in work and life. These two are mutually reinforcing.”

Loehr's organization identified these highly satisfied individuals by their response to the statement: “I am happy and satisfied in my job.” Then they learned that people in the top 10 percent of job satisfaction also exhibit positive motivational and energy management habits to a far greater degree than people in the bottom 10 percent.

Most dramatic are the differences in the management of “spiritual” energy, as illustrated by practices related to beliefs about the meaning of life. Those with the highest job satisfaction score about 250 percent higher on commitment, passion, self-confidence, vision, and purpose than those in the lowest 10 percent of job satisfaction.

The top 10 percent's average exercise and fitness score is 170 percent of those in the bottom 10 percent of job satisfaction. Their nighttime sleep score is 154 percent of those in the bottom 10 percent. Their overall rest and recovery, which includes daytime rest breaks and constructive diversions from work, is 149 percent of those with the lowest job satisfaction. Their nutrition is 126 percent of those in the lowest group.

“These are individuals who have somehow found a way to harness their own sources of physical energy and motivation, in spite of the distracting environment in which most of us live today,” Loehr says. “It is tempting, based on these numbers, to think that job satisfaction can be addressed through good candidate selection,” Loehr adds. “And to some extent, it can. But employers get only one chance at good selection with each opening they fill, while they have a daily opportunity to encourage people towards practices that renew physical energy, and as well as the opportunity to encourage employees’ self-confidence through training and recognition. If the tensions of the job take away energy, enthusiasm and time for self-renewal, the individual with high job satisfaction is at risk for becoming less engaged.”

Employee Engagement Study: Quality of Leadership as Important as Pay

by Kathleen Groll Connolly

Leaders with a high versatility index have employee teams with high job commitment and engagement according to a unique industry-university collaborative study at the North Carolina State University. The research was conducted by Dr. Beth Coberly under the supervision of Dr. Denis Gray, Professor, Department of Psychology, to improve the hit-rate of breakthrough innovations by faculty members who are involved in research for private business. They sought the key workplace factors that promote the job satisfaction, commitment, and engagement of highly creative knowledge workers. The study included faculty from nearly thirty cooperative research centers from around the U.S. “We found that leaders who were flexible at adjusting their styles and behaviors to the leadership situation also had the most satisfied and committed research teams,” says Dr. Gray.

Rob Kaiser, a partner with the executive development consultancy, Kaplan DeVries Inc., which also supported the research, points out that the number one motivator of commitment for the researchers in this study was personally meaningful work on compelling projects. “This is not a surprising result, in itself,” he says. “But it does underscore the importance of matching creative people to the right job and playing to their natural interests and talents.”

Kaiser continues, “What surprised us was that versatile leadership tied for second place with rewards as the next most important factor.” Kaiser concludes, “In other words, compensation is no substitute for weak leadership"

The study employed the Leadership Versatility Index® (LVI). The LVI measures the extent to which leaders have a well-rounded style and vary their approach with the situation, as opposed to over-relying on one way of leading or another. The LVI and its decade-long development are described in a 2006 book, "The Versatile Leader" (Pfeiffer/Wiley), coauthored by Bob Kaplan, Ph.D., and Rob Kaiser.

More information?

Research Shows Many Feel Blocked from Full Engagement by Outside Factors

What is the biggest obstacle to having more energy and being fully engaged at work? According to comments from the Full Engagement 360 Profile, nearly 30% of 5500 respondents believe the answer to that question lies outside their control (see "Read More" section for details). For instance, 170 people name their office facilities as the biggest obstacle to increased energy and engagement. Over 100 name their bosses as the greatest obstacles, and another 100 cite meetings as their biggest obstacle.


“This is a fascinating insight into the nature of personal storytelling,” says Dr. Jim Loehr, a performance psychologist and CEO of the Human Performance Institute. The Institute offers training that puts executives on a path towards sustained energy and full engagement. The Full Engagement 360 Profile is a part of their training. “As long as external objects such as the office and the boss have a key role in someone’s personal story, they will be blocked from more useful self-messages,” he says. “Until employees shift the locus of control in their stories from external to internal, little progress can be made to deepen levels of engagement at work.”

The table below details some of the external “obstacles” cited by respondents:


Table 1

External Obstacles Cited by
28% of Respondents to the
Full Engagement 360 Profile

Office/facility 170
More help/assistance 140
Boss/Supervisor 109
Meetings 106
Empowerment/Control 107
Projects 105
More challenging work 89
Decisions by management 88
Not enough time 88
Business (nature of) 84
Better training/skills 65
Company 56
Email 55
Colleagues 54
Better teamwork 50
More responsibility 48
Vision 48
Environment 43
Career 41
Position 39
Interruptions 36
Clients/Customers 35
Direction 33
Phones (calls, cell, voicemail) 30
More supportive work environment 29
Office politics 23
School 23
Employees 19
House 19
Deadlines 17
Current job/new job 16
Lack of feedback 11
Single parent 9
Divorce 8
Accountability 6
Market 6
Relocation 5

For more information on Full Engagement Training or the Full Engagement 360 Profile, contact Jackie Bick at the Human Performance Institute, 407-438-9911.

Fortune Magazine Reporter Asks: Does Employee Wellness Lead to Employee Productivity?

Does wellness lead to productivity? Cait Murphy of Fortune Magazine asked that question as she participated recently in the full engagement training for executives at the Human Performance Institute in Orlando, FL. (Performance Programs operates the Full Engagement Self Profile for the Institute.) Murphy’s independent report, titled “The CEO Workout,” appears in the July 10, 2006 edition of Fortune. Murphy spent two-and-one-half days immersed in this mind-body approach to energy management for business people, during which she reports a number of perspective-shifting insights:

1. Embrace stress and learn to manage it

2. Eat every two or three hours

3. Incorporate rituals for rest and recovery

4. For optimal sustained performance, manage energy, not time.

To answer the question of employee productivity, she solicited the observations of executives Steve Altmiller, CEO of the San Juan Regional Medical Center in Farmington, NM, Kirk Perry, a VP at Procter and Gamble, and Brent Hayward, a participant from Starbucks. Each discusses his experiences with the techniques taught in the program and gives his perspective on the positive impact of energy management training on the employees who participate.

To learn of their reactions, see the story online.

Five Ways Employers Can Create a More Satisfying Work Environment

Individuals who report highest levels of job satisfaction on the Full Engagement Inventory also report self-confidence, an appetite for thoughtful risk-taking, consistency between their values and their work, emotional resilience, the ability to “take a break” through fun, friends and rest, and good relations with bosses and coworkers. This research was recently annouced by the Human Performance Institute, Orlando, FL.

“These all represent sources of positive energy for individuals, and employers can encourage each of them through workplace practices,” says performance psychologist Dr. Jim Loehr, CEO of the Institute. His firm recently announced new research findings on the responses of 75,000 working adults. The Inventory is based on the bestselling book, The Power of Full Engagement. Dr. Loehr offers the following tips for encouraging job satisfaction, based on findings from inventory data:


1. Build employees’ competence and self-confidence through training, feedback and recognition. “There is a very close relationship between high job satisfaction and feelings of effectiveness on the job,” says Dr. Loehr. “Encouragement of genuine self-confidence is probably the number one way to achieve higher job satisfaction.”

2. Communicate the value of the organization’s products and services, and the role the organization plays in the marketplaces where it operates. “People with high job satisfaction also report an extraordinarily high sense of mission, vision and passion for their work,” says Loehr. “They feel their work is consistent with their values. They couldn’t achieve that feeling if their employers didn’t enable them to get meaningful insight about the value they provide to customers,” says Loehr.

3. Encourage and reward thoughtful risk-taking. “People with high job satisfaction also score high on the desire to try novel approaches, face challenges and perform problem-solving both individually and in groups,” says Loehr. “They appear to have an appetite for mission-driven change. They also rate themselves very high on perseverance.”

4. Encourage positive workplace relations. “People who are highly satisfied in their jobs report good feelings about their bosses, peers and coworkers,” says Loehr. “Their feelings of opportunity are elevated, and they perceive a low hassle-factor.”

5. Encourage meaningful rest breaks and light diversion. “High job satisfaction correlates strongly with the feeling of having fun at work,” says Dr. Loehr. “Highly satisfied individuals also report that they find it easy to wake in the morning, and that their sleep is deep and restful.” He adds, “This is consistent with our thirty years of research on world-class athletes. Top performers in every field know how to enhance performance through rest and recovery.”

Learn more about the work of the Human Performance Institute and Dr. Jim Loehr.

Who’s Most Engaged in Life?

PPI has offered the Power of Full Engagement Inventory* to more than 70,000 people since March, 2003. The Inventory, like the book of the same title, is based on the concept that we must manage our energy, not only our time, in order to achieve top results in any part of life. It recommends managing energy by developing specific energy rituals in four areas of life: physical, spiritual, emotional, and mental. It also looks at the importance of rest and recovery in peak performance.

* So who’s “most engaged”? We recently completed a new analysis of the database and it looks as though Professional Athletes, Executives, and individuals over the age of 65 have the highest engagement scores.



* Who’s least engaged? The unemployed, homemakers, and people who rate their current stress level “very high” have the lowest overall engagement in life, according to the Inventory. If you limit the analysis to those employed outside the home, the least engaged are hourly employees.

* The greatest challenge for the average respondent continues to be the management of physical energy through exercise, sleep, rest, and nutrition. The average respondent scores 50% or lower on the practices that can improve this aspect of life.

* Who scores lowest on sleep and rest? Homemakers and full-time parents achieve only 40% on their sleep score. They are followed by students at 44%, and fulltime employees of corporations and nonprofits employees at 45%.

* In a separate question, people who rate their stress “high” have the lowest sleep scores of anyone at 39%. Interestingly, those who call their stress “very high” get 43% on sleep and rest practices.

* Who scores the highest for sleep and rest practices? Sadly for those of us still in the workforce, people over 65 achieve the top sleep score at 66%. Professional athletes do the next best with 55%. Note that both of these groups were in the top three Overall Engagement scores. The advice seems to be clear: Get your rest!

We’ll continue to provide more highlights on this fascinating long-term study. For more information, contact paul@performanceprograms.com.

*The Power of Full Engagement was published by Free Press, 2003, by Dr. James Loehr and Tony Schwartz. The Full Engagement Inventory is coauthored by Performance Programs, The Wenroth Group, and LGE Performance Systems.