The key happiness skills that help people become better leaders

The human edge of leadership

This explains why traditional, technically-focused leadership development fails to move the needle. If a manager’s core mandate is to maximise their team’s productivity and retention, their highest-leverage strategy isn’t to micro-manage technical workflows; it is to master the humanistic skills that are associated with happiness.

By actively training leaders in empathy, cognitive agility, adaptive resilience, and active communication, organisations achieve a double sided victory. They cultivate happier, more fulfilled leaders who enjoy greater life satisfaction, while simultaneously reaping the performance benefits of having more engaged employees.

I know for a fact that when I practice happiness skills I think more clearly, I manage my emotions more healthily, and I show up more intentionally. Consistently practicing happiness skills doesn’t just make me a better leader. It makes me a better husband, a better father, a better member of society, and a better version of myself than I would otherwise be.

No leader can force their employees to be happy, nor can they shield them from the natural anxieties of a changing economic landscape and challenging work. But I would argue that great leaders feel pride in taking responsibility for the emotional ecosystem they create in their workplaces.

If we want to create happier, healthier, more thriving workplaces it’s essential to stop treating leadership like a reward for technical prowess or for tenure. If more workplaces treated effective leadership as a moral responsibility, and they supported their emerging leaders to practice and strengthen the humanistic skills of happiness, then I have no doubt we would witness higher rates of engagement, performance, productivity, innovation, and satisfaction across the global workforce.