The Happy Lawyer

This morning I came across another book on happiness - this time through my lovely dad - one which would interest many of my (lawyer and non lawyer) friends and ex colleagues: The Happy Lawyer (a misnomer?)

I'm totally plagiarising my dad, but here's a quick summary of the first half of the book.

The authors looked at the relationship between happiness and dissatisfaction of lawyers and made the following observations:

• Public vs private sector: 2 out of 3 lawyers in the public sector were reported as being more satisfied

• Age: Lawyers over 50 years old are happier than those under 50

• Income: There is a weak link between income and life satisfaction

• Sex: Female lawyers have become less happy during the past 35 years

• Race: Black and Hispanic lawyers are happier than Asians and Whites, apparently because more Blacks and Hispanics work in nonprofit or government legal jobs, and more Asian and White lawyers work for large law firms.

The authors also suggested 6 keys to life satisfaction:

• Security - physical or economical

• Autonomy - ability to make your preferred choices

• Authenticity - being who you really are

• Relatedness - connectivity to others

• Sense of competence

• Self-esteem

According to the authors, self development towards these six intrinsic goals produces more happiness than focussing on extrinsic goals, such as becoming rich or famous.

I found this echoes what Oliver James says in Affluenza (which is a great book by the way) - that the motivation of our actions is important, that if we are driven by "affluenza-ish" desires in what we do (wanting to be famous, rich etc), we will tend to have less satisfaction, than if we were driven by intrinsic values (like we actually like our job, the job develops us), even if the latter may actually end up making us famous and rich.

And finally, the authors introduced some tips from what they called the Happiness Toolbox:

make your job matters to you - choose meaningful projects - become a key player - make you job affect other people - identify how your work has bettered lives - strive for a work-life balance - discuss work flexibility with sympathetic (!) boss - make your job more secure - know and become friends with those who control your fate (I don't like how this sounds) - meet or exceed company expectation - take control of your work product and work space - develop your own strategy for meeting goals - personalise your work space (like with Hello Kitty!) - connect with people - collaborate - eat lunch with colleagues or clients - participate in company events (eating lunch will be a start) - choose face-to-face work when possible - if happiness seems possible (!) in your job, commit to that job - don't always look for greener grass (water your own) - remind yourself what you really like about your job - think about projects that have "made time fly" - look for challenging tasks - avoid when possible, too easy tasks (hmm) - avoid making upward comparisons - choose when possible, projects that benefit the less fortunate - find out what experiences have made your colleagues or work-friends happy - know your strength and what gives you pleasure - align your work with your value

Have you got enough ideas yet?

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I don't think I agree with many things proposed by the authors, but there are definitely some interesting observations and some useful tips.

Although I am no longer in that world, I am still deeply intrigued by how lawyers / corporate people are finding their jobs.

One thing that popped into my head is what about the question of purpose - both in terms of one's own purpose in work/life and the corporate purpose of where you work. Do these matter to you?

As usual, I would love to hear about what you think of any of this!