for W3c validation

Friday Faves is our weekly blog series highlighting a few select pieces from the REG team’s reading lists. You can catch up on past Friday Faves on the archive. 

Rediscover joy at work

Source

Jakkii says: It was only a couple of months ago that I last shared an article relating to finding and practising joy in our Friday Faves, yet here we are again! This week, I want to look at how to rediscover joy at work.

I think the summary at the top of the HBR article this week does a great job putting the issue into stark focus:

A year and a half of the Covid pandemic has left many of us bereft of the joy we once felt at work. Add to the losses we’ve suffered the constant need to present ourselves as more “okay” than we really feel and the requirement to always be in response mode rather than pursuing the work we most enjoy and it’s no wonder that we’re mired in malaise.

I don’t know about you, but I find that really relatable. As the pandemic drags on, as borders remain closed, people remain in lockdown or under restrictions, a year and a half on not much feels like it’s changed besides our collective sense of tiredness and, to borrow from the article, our general malaise. It’s tough, and while it is absolutely valid to have negative feelings, it can also be helpful to work at how we can rediscover more positive feelings, especially at and about work which accounts for so much of our daily lives.

To help us rediscover joy, the HBR article suggests we need to do the following:

• Build your strengths into your day

• Focus on your professional growth

• Share your emotions with a trusted colleague

• Rebuild relationships through the work itself

These ring true to me, even as a layperson – it makes sense to bring things you’re good at into your day as these can help us feel better about ourselves; focusing on learning and developing can also help with feeling like you’re bettering yourself and working to achieve a goal; sharing can often have a positive benefit to our own emotions as well as helping us bond with others; and relationships can help bring positive and joyful aspects to our lives. Of course, the author of the HRB article is an organisational and social psychologist with a PhD, so the whys and benefits are best explained in the article!

In addition to the four suggestions from the article, you may find that practising cognitive reappraisal – or reframing – can help, too, at least according to the findings of a recent study in Nature Human Behavior. This is all about changing our perspective and how we look at a problem, or even a negative feeling, such as loneliness.

Cognitive reappraisal works because “there’s a link between our thoughts and our feelings,” Kateri McRae, a University of Denver psychologist who studies emotion and who was not involved in this study, says. “A lot of times, our feelings are preceded by certain thoughts.” So when we shift our thoughts, that can precipitate a change in our emotions.

It’s a useful skill we don’t always do well at automatically, so it helps to consciously work at it.

I also came across an article on CNN this week about how to fix your job so you love it, which says you need to follow these three steps:

1. Hack your job

2. Enjoy your work neighbours

3. Create a new job title in your head

I’m not sure these suggestions themselves have as much rigour behind them, however, when you distil them down they broadly tend to fit into the suggestions from the HBR article, so I don’t think they’re too far off the mark, even if not entirely scientific!

Ultimately, the best strategies are going to be ones that work for you. What’s most important if you’re feeling like you could stand to rediscover joy at work – or even in day to day life – is to give them a try. And, of course, if you need more help than a few articles, reach out to your doctor or to your mental health professional for more help with coping strategies.

Let’s bring back the joy!

Read:

• https://hbr.org/2021/09/rediscover-joy-at-work

• https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/22641291/global-mental-health-covid-19-cognitive-reappraisal-study

• https://edition.cnn.com/2021/09/06/health/love-job-you-hate-wisdom-project-wellness/

At home

As a parent, I was prepared for the boy to get into violent video games, but I was not prepared for him to become obsessed with a vineyard management sim called Terroir and get upset about critics slagging off his Zinfandel

— Will Wiles (@WillWiles) September 7, 2021

Jakkii says: whatever the pandemic state you’re living in right now, we’ve got your weekly list of a few things you can read and do from home this week to help you stay sane while you’re staying safe and staying home. Look after yourselves!

• Ways to stay sane and relaxed during a pandemic

• Delve into TIME’s 100 most influential people of 2021

• Find the word for how you’re feeling with the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

• Browse through the snaps of the 2021 bird photo of the year winners

• Play a round of music trivia online with Townie Music Trivia, 8pm Thursdays

• Read about the disastrous voyage of Satoshi, the world’s first cryptocurrency cruise ship

• Did you know finger counting gives away your nationality?

• Go behind the scenes on what it’s like to cook on camera

Friday Fives

Source

Hybrid workplace and the future of work

• The reality of hybrid working: New needs for the future of work

• Is the 4-day work week a good idea?

• How to transform your office into a collaboration destination

• Close encounters of the best kind: workplace “collisions”

• Bring the outdoors into your hybrid work routine

Remote work and the digital workplace

Interesting data but I strongly disagree with framing this study as a “remote work experiment” at scale. This is an extreme pandemic work adaptation, big difference. It is not a true test of the art of the possible with more flexible workstyles. (1/x) https://t.co/IyojW7yULi

— Jon Reed (@jonerp) September 12, 2021

• The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

• How to manage remote workers across time zones

• Silicon Valley finds remote work is easier to begin than end

• Finding the right technologies to keep remote workers engaged

• We finally know the true toll of all those bad Slacks

Communication, collaboration, engagement, and culture

• How some women are remaking the workplace to better suit their lives

• Collaboration overload is sinking productivity

• Managing through crunch time — without burning out your team

• Some questions benefit from group discussion. Others don’t.

• Hustle culture is cancelled. Here’s a better way to look at productivity

Community management, moderation and misinformation

• How ‘engagement’ makes you vulnerable to manipulation and misinformation on social media

• Why pandemic-era social media fixes haven’t worked — and could backfire — in the complex case of ivermectin

• Facebook reportedly provided inaccurate data to misinformation researchers

• When it comes to online gender-based violence — the platforms are the problem

• Twitch sues users over alleged ‘hate raids’ against streamers

Privacy and data

• It’s a good day to update all your devices. Trust us

• How Facebook, Amazon and Google abused the Patriot Act after 9/11

• WhatsApp details plans to offer encrypted backups

• The secret history of facial recognition

• The modern data experience

Big Tech, tech and regulation

• For disabled people, accessible technology is finally getting better

• “Where are all the women?” Genevieve Bell on women in tech

• Microsoft says it’s OK with tighter tech regulation

• Google, Facebook to bankroll Australian digital publishers alliance

• Texas law could force social media to host misinformation and hate speech (while similar laws in Brazil have now been overturned)

Social media

• Facebook says its rules apply to all. Company documents reveal a secret elite that’s exempt.

• Facebook aware of Instagram’s harmful effect on teenage girls, leak reveals

• Mental health: TikTok rolls out support to combat suicide searches

• Could a reboot make social media a nicer place?

• Trump insiders are quietly paying teen memers for posts

Facebook & Ray-Ban

• Introducing Ray-Ban Stories: first-generation smart glasses

• Facebook may have a hit with its spy glasses for the masses (which WIRED describes as ‘dangerously easy to use’)

• How smart are Facebook’s glasses?

• Ray-Ban Stories let you wear Facebook on your face. But why would you want to?

• Privacy watchdog concerned about ‘covert’ aspect of Facebook glasses

Extras

This morning my toddler informed me — w great enthusiasm — that when she grows up, she will “drink coffee!” and “go to the office!” And it occurs to me that we’re modeling some pretty grim behavior around here.

— Ashley Parker (@AshleyRParker) September 9, 2021

This is interesting: How a duck learned to say ‘you bloody fool’

Things that make you go hmmm: Meet Altos Labs, Silicon Valley’s latest wild bet on living forever

Space: SpaceX’s all-civilian Inspiration4 crew readies for launch

Podcast: How Slack changed Apple’s employee culture, with Zoë Schiffer

Friday playlist: Get a head start on Townie Music Trivia with this trivia prep playlist, updated each week

Sydney Business Insights – The Future, This Week Podcast

Source

This week: we’re back and what does #BreakUpBigTech have to do with your chicken? There’s also Abba-tars, Gartner all hype no cycle, Musk’s humanoid robots and laser weed zapping ones, COVID AI disappointment, the IPCC report and everything else we’ve missed.

Sandra Peter (Sydney Business Insights) and Kai Riemer (Digital Futures Research Group) meet once a week to put their own spin on news that is impacting the future of business in The Future, This Week.

The stories this week

16:23 – What does break up big tech have to do with breaking up big chicken?

Listen: https://sbi.sydney.edu.au/break-up-big-chicken-on-the-future-this-week/