Does Employee Happiness Have an Impact on Productivity?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Bellet, Clement S.; De Neve, Jan-Emmanuel; Ward, George
• 署名单位: Erasmus University Rotterdam - Excl Erasmus MC; Erasmus University Rotterdam; University of Oxford; Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
• 刊物名称: MANAGEMENT SCIENCE
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0025-1909
• DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.2023.4766
• 发表日期: 2024
• 页码: 1656-1679
• 关键词: happiness; mood; PRODUCTIVITY; SALES PERFORMANCE; natural experiment

摘要

This paper provides evidence from a natural experiment on the relationship between positive affect and productivity. We link highly detailed administrative data on the behaviors and performance of all telesales workers at a large telecommunications company with survey reports of employee happiness that we collected on a weekly basis. We use variation in worker mood arising from visual exposure to weather-the interaction between call center architecture and outdoor weather conditions-to provide a quasi-experimental test of the effect of happiness on productivity. We find evidence of a positive impact on sales performance, which is driven by changes in labor productivity-largely through workers converting more calls into sales and to a lesser extent by making more calls per hour and adhering more closely to their schedule. We find no evidence in our setting of effects on measures of high-frequency labor supply such as attendance and break-taking.