The Happiness Index - Data. Insight. Stories

Matt Phelan
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Research, data, evidence and the stories of people focused on employee engagement, workplace happiness and driving performance at work. Connect with Matt via LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewphelan/ You can download The Happiness Index's Global Workplace Happiness Report here https://thehappinessindex.com/the-global-workplace-happiness-report/

  1. Andrea D Carter: Why is belonging a metabolic resource?

    4d ago

    Andrea D Carter: Why is belonging a metabolic resource?

    Matt Phelan catches up backstage at Google HQ in London with Andrea D Carter, a renowned neuroscience researcher and a core contributor to the Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026. In this high-impact five-minute conversation, you will discover: 🧠 The personal spark. How navigating the real-life pain of raising neurodivergent teenagers drove Andrea to decode the neuroscience of workplace inclusion. 🚗 The brake and gas analogy. Why operating in a culture of "fitting in" forces employees into self-protection mode. It is the cognitive equivalent of driving with your foot on the brake and the gas simultaneously. 🔋 The metabolic resource. The science showing that when true belonging is present, the brain expends less energy. This allows your people to achieve peak performance with significantly less effort. ⚖️ The 50-50 rule. Moving past one-sided accountability. True social cohesion means the manager and the employee share equal responsibility to see, understand, and validate each other. Andrea argues that belonging is a fundamental human need—just like food and water. When organisations fail to build a culture of genuine belonging, they are actively draining the cognitive and physical energy required for performance. Are you ready to take your foot off the brake? 🚀 The Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026: https://tinyurl.com/GWHR2026

    5 min
  2. What is the most important data point for modern leadership? With Viktoria Otero del Val

    Jun 18

    What is the most important data point for modern leadership? With Viktoria Otero del Val

    Matt Phelan welcomes back a good friend and headline sponsor of the Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026, Viktoria Otero del Val from Pluxee. In this lightning-fast snippet, Matt fires over one vital question: What is the most important data point for modern leadership? In under five minutes, discover: 🗺️ The multidimensional reality. Why looking at a person as the sum of all their coexisting realities—work, family, and community—completely changes the management dialogue. ⚽ The volunteer surprise. The striking metric showing that 66% of UK workers are actively engaged in voluntary work or sports coaching outside of their day jobs. 👥 The 1-to-1 connection. The single piece of advice for the 250 CEOs in the room on how to take employee engagement from a theory to a daily habit. Viktoria argues that managers must stop treating team members as one-dimensional resources. Success requires understanding the whole individual and meeting them exactly where they are on their personal journey. Are you ready to see your people in full colour? 🚀 The Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026: https://tinyurl.com/GWHR2026

    4 min
  3. Inside the Global Workplace Happiness Report with Stefan Tornquist

    Jun 11

    Inside the Global Workplace Happiness Report with Stefan Tornquist

    This week, we’re changing things up. Our host Matt Phelan is back in the chair, and he’s turning the microphone on Stefan Tornquist. After spending months hosting our Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026 series, Stefan is stepping onto the other side of the desk as a guest. Stefan is the lead author of the report and the managing director of Executive Summary Research. He’s spent over 30 years leading complex research projects and translating vast datasets into actionable business strategies. In this lightning-fast five-minute conversation, Matt asks Stefan to take off his researcher hat and share what surprised him most about the final data. We explore: 📊 The titanic operation. The massive logistics behind crunching 82,000 responses, 1.9 million data points, and 90,000 qualitative open-text answers. ⚖️ The gender divide. The striking, everywhere-we-looked finding that women scored lower than men in 28 out of 29 categories across all age groups and seniorities. 💼 The workplace paradox. Why companies mistakenly treat employment as a transaction, while your people inherently experience it as a relationship. 🔮 The 2027 roadmap. A look ahead at the future of the project, focusing on wider geographic spreads and deeper qualitative context. Stefan argues that the highest-order elements of work always come down to connection. If you want to build a resilient business, you must stop looking at your headcount as an expense line and start building a real relationship infrastructure. Are you ready to see the real story behind the numbers? 🚀 The Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026: https://tinyurl.com/GWHR2026

    4 min
  4. What is radical kindness in leadership in 3 minutes?

    Jun 5

    What is radical kindness in leadership in 3 minutes?

    Natalie Semmes from Kind-Hive: What is radical kindness in leadership? Matt Phelan catches up backstage with Natalie Semmes, CEO of Kind-Hive and contributor to the Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026. In this lightning-fast snippet, Matt asks one core question: What is radical kindness, and why is it the ultimate business multiplier? In three minutes, discover: 🧠 The human-first lens. Why sharing your authentic story and showing up as a vulnerable human being transforms the way people view leadership. 🤝 Radical kindness. Moving past the fluff to define kindness as a strict, non-negotiable strategy required to inspire true employee outperformance. 📈 The EBITDA multiplier. The striking, evidence-based research shows that human-first organisations are 34% more likely to double their EBITDA over 10 years. Natalie argues that there is a better way to do business. Before you can grow your bottom line, you must first have the courage to show up as a real human being. Are you ready to tap into radical kindness? 🚀 The Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026: https://tinyurl.com/GWHR2026

    3 min
  5. Kaly Little from Google: "What is radical safety in the AI era?"

    Jun 3

    Kaly Little from Google: "What is radical safety in the AI era?"

    Matt Phelan sits down at Google HQ in London with Kaly Little, Head of HR, UK Large Customer Sales at Google and contributor to the Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026. He asks her one quick question: What is radical safety in the AI era? In under three minutes, discover: 🚀 Radical safety. Why absolute psychological safety is the non-negotiable permission slip for Google’s famous moonshot thinking and 10x innovation. 🤖 Human in the loop. Moving past the jargon to place human creativity and strategy at the absolute center of technological advancement. 🧠 Automation bias. The crucial role of HR in building critical thinkers so teams do not rely too heavily on AI tools. Kaly argues that the AI era requires leaders who can coach teams to tap into their brains differently, using technology to free up space for bigger, bolder strategy. Are you ready to build radical safety? 🚀 The Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026: https://tinyurl.com/GWHR2026 Guest bio Kaly Little is Head of HR, UK Large Customer Sales at Google. She focuses on deeply supporting teams, coaching managers to become better leaders, and championing the "human in the loop" approach to technological transformation.

    3 min
  6. What do you mean by "Clarity is Capital?" with Dr Amanda Henwood

    May 19

    What do you mean by "Clarity is Capital?" with Dr Amanda Henwood

    Matt briefly chats with Dr Amanda Henwood, a key contributor to the Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026. He asks her one simple question: What do you mean by clarity is capital? In under four minutes, discover: 💰 The metric. Why clarity functions as actual business capital, driving productivity and retention. 📉 The hidden tax. How a lack of clear conditions forces employees to blame themselves, triggering imposter syndrome. 🕵️‍♂️ The warning signs. The quiet behavioural signals that prove your organisation is drowning in ambiguity. Amanda argues that defining what good looks like isn't a fluffy nicety. It's a high-return strategy. Are you ready to stop the second-guessing? 🚀 The Global Workplace Happiness Report 2026: https://tinyurl.com/GWHR2026

    3 min
  7. The science of belonging and performance with Andrea Carter

    May 13

    The science of belonging and performance with Andrea Carter

    This week, we’re welcoming back our host, Matt Phelan, as he takes the baton back from Stefan Tornquist after his brilliant Global Workplace Happiness Report series. Matt dives straight into the deep end with a topic that bridges human emotion and high performance. His guest today is the exceptional Andrea Carter. Andrea is a performance consultant, researcher, and creator of the Belonging First methodology. She has spent over 20 years studying brain differences, behavioural science, and workplace dynamics. Andrea helps organisations move away from surface-level initiatives to build genuine belonging infrastructure. We explore: 🧠 The neuroscience of belonging. Our brains do not distinguish between physical pain and social exclusion. Rejection activates the exact same neural circuits as a physical injury, forcing the prefrontal cortex offline.📉 The manager engagement collapse. Global manager engagement is in a severe decline, driven by invisible emotional labour. Managers are working two jobs by delivering business targets whilst simultaneously absorbing their team’s anxiety.🏗️ Infrastructure over initiatives. Workshops and unconscious bias training have a short shelf life. True infrastructure means changing the actual operating conditions, protocols, and feedback loops that outlast a culture budget.📊 The survey average illusion. A passing grade on a standard engagement survey often hides deep disconnection at the edges of your distribution curve. Traditional metrics measure employee effort, not the conditions for sustainable performance.🧪 The five measurable indicators. True belonging relies on five distinct neuroscience conditions. These are comfort, connection, contribution, psychological safety, and physical well-being.Andrea argues that an environment lacking belonging infrastructure is a massive drain on cognitive capacity. When your people's threat systems are chronically activated, you are paying a full salary for only a fraction of their performance. Are you ready to stop running temporary initiatives and start building a real infrastructure for success?

    48 min
  8. Strategic narrative and the bridge to meaningful work with Dr Sarah Pass

    May 5

    Strategic narrative and the bridge to meaningful work with Dr Sarah Pass

    For the final time in this series, we’re handing the host chair to Stefan Tornquist. Stefan is the lead author of our Global Workplace Happiness Report. He has spent the last few months interviewing the brilliant contributors to this project. While he's signing off for now, Stefan will return next year for our 2027 report. His final guest is the expert-friendly Dr Sarah Pass. Sarah is a senior lecturer at Nottingham Business School and an advisory board member of Engage for Success. She has spent nearly 30 years researching the employee experience to understand what truly drives engagement beyond just a paycheque. We explore: 🤝 Authentic purpose. A mission statement shouldn't just be a strap line on a wall. Real purpose must be authentic to avoid becoming a diluted tick-box exercise as a company scales.✨ Meaningful moments. There is a big difference between overarching meaning and episodic "meaningful moments". These individual moments are often sparked when a manager notices and values an employee’s specific contribution.🗺️ The strategic narrative. Your people need to know where the organisation is going and why. A clear story acts as a bridge during stressful market cycles or restructures.🛑 The micromanagement tax. Micromanagement is corrosive to meaning. It erodes trust and autonomy, forcing your people to disconnect their emotions and work like machines.🤖 AI as a personal assistant. Technology can help overworked managers by handling the "mundane" work. This frees up time for the 15-minute weekly human connections that are vital for engagement.Sarah argues that meaningful work isn't just a "nice-to-have" buzzword. It is a tangible business metric that creates resilience and directly impacts your bottom line. Are you ready to move beyond the Sunday night dread and start building a strategic narrative? 🚀 Download The Global Workplace Happiness Report >

    51 min
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Research, data, evidence and the stories of people focused on employee engagement, workplace happiness and driving performance at work. Connect with Matt via LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewphelan/ You can download The Happiness Index's Global Workplace Happiness Report here https://thehappinessindex.com/the-global-workplace-happiness-report/

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