Latest news with #HumanFlourishingProgram
Yahoo
01-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Why Are Young People Everywhere So Unhappy?
Want to stay current with Arthur's writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. We've heard a lot lately about how miserable young Americans are. In the recently released World Happiness Report, the United States dropped to its lowest ranking since that survey began—and that result was driven by the unhappiness of people under 30 in this country. So what's going on? I have some skepticism about these international rankings of happiness. The organizations that produce them always attract a lot of attention by answering 'Which is the world's happiest country?' They derive that answer—usually Finland, with Denmark and other Nordics close behind—by getting people in multiple countries to answer a single self-assessment question about life satisfaction. I don't place much stock in this methodology because we can't accurately compare nations based on such limited self-assessment: People in different cultures will answer in different ways. But I am very interested in the change within countries, such as the falling happiness of young adults in America. New research digs deeply into this issue, and many others: The Global Flourishing Study, based on a survey undertaken by a consortium of institutions including my Harvard colleagues at the Human Flourishing Program. This survey also uses self-reporting, but it collects much more comprehensive data on well-being, in about half a dozen distinct dimensions and in 22 countries, from more than 200,000 individuals whom it follows over five years. Most significant to me, the survey shows that although young people's emotional and psychological distress is more pronounced in wealthy, industrialized nations such as the United States, it is occurring across the world. Scholars have long noted that happiness tends to follow a U-shape across the lifespan: Self-reported happiness declines gradually in young and middle adulthood, then turns upward later in life, starting around age 50. The Dartmouth University economist David G. Blanchflower—who, together with his co-author, Andrew J. Oswald, pioneered the U-shape hypothesis in 2008—has reproduced the result in 145 countries. The left-hand side of the U-shape would suggest that adolescents and young adults were traditionally, on average, happier than people in middle age. But given the well-documented increase over the past decades in diagnosed mood disorders among adolescents and young adults, we might expect that left side to be pushed down in newer estimates. And sure enough, this is exactly what the new GFS study finds, in the U.S. and around the world: The flourishing scores don't fall from early adulthood, because they now start low; they stay low until they start to rise at the expected age. That's the bad news, which is plenty bad. But there is some good news. The flourishing survey discovers one notable exception to this global pattern: a more traditional U-shaped curve among those young people who have more friends and intimate social relationships. This dovetails with my own research into how young adults in today's era of technologically mediated socializing are lacking real-life human contact and love—without which no one can truly flourish. This exception created by greater human connection is the starting point for how we might address this pandemic of young people's unhappiness. [Arthur C. Brooks: Eight Ways to Banish Misery] A plausible explanation for the more pronounced happiness problem that wealthy Western countries like the U.S. have is growing secularization—measured in the increasing numbers of so-called nones, people who profess no religious affiliation. In the United States, the percentage of the population with no religious affiliation has nearly doubled since 2007, to 29 percent. Scholars have long found that religious people are, on average, happier than nonreligious people. How to account for this paradox that a practice that gives so many people a tangible well-being boost is in such clear decline? Researchers have hypothesized that the phenomenon's predominance in well-to-do countries is essentially a function of that affluence: As society grows richer, people become less religious because they no longer need the comfort of religion to cope with such miseries as hunger and early mortality. I have my doubts about this economic-determinist account. As one would expect from past studies, the new survey shows that people who attend a worship service at least weekly score, on worldwide average, 8 percent higher in flourishing measures than nonattenders. But it further reveals that this positive effect is strongest among the richest and most secular nations. This finding suggests that, contrary to the materialist hypothesis, wealth is not a great source of metaphysical comfort—and the well-being effect of religious attendance is relatively independent of economic factors. This leads to the question of what exactly is missing for so many people in wealthy countries when religion declines. Community connection and social capital are two answers. But a deeper answer is meaning, one of the study's categories of flourishing, which it measures by asking participants whether they feel their daily activities are worthwhile and whether they understand their life's purpose. GDP per capita, the survey finds, is inversely correlated with this sense of meaning: The wealthier a country gets, the more bereft of meaning its citizens feel. Others have previously observed this pattern as well. Researchers writing in the journal Psychological Science in 2013 looked at a far larger sample of nations (132) and came to the same conclusion as the GFS: In answer to the question 'Do you feel your life has an important purpose or meaning?,' respondents to the survey in higher-income nations expressed much weaker conviction than those in lower-income countries. The researchers also found that these results were likely explained by secularism in richer nations. This raises the issue of whether something about material success in a society naturally drives down religion or spirituality, and thus meaning, and so also flourishing. Many writers and thinkers throughout history have made this case, of course. Indeed, we could go back to the Bible and the New Testament story in which a rich young man asks Jesus what he needs to do to gain admission to heaven. Jesus tells the young man to sell all he has, give it to the poor, and follow him. 'At this the man's face fell,' the Gospel says. 'He went away sad, because he had great wealth.' [Arthur C. Brooks: Nostalgia is a shield against unhappiness] The Global Flourishing Study exposes many interesting patterns and will undoubtedly stimulate additional research for years to come. But you don't have to wait for that to apply the findings to your life—especially if you are a young adult living in a wealthy, post-industrial country. Here are three immediate things you can do: 1. Put close relationships with family and friends before virtually everything else. Where possible, avoid using technological platforms for interactions with these loved ones; focus on face-to-face contact. Humans are made to relate to one another in person. 2. Consider how you might develop your inner life. Given the trend toward being a none, which I've written about in an earlier column, this might seem a countercultural move. But let's define spirituality broadly as beliefs, practices, and experiences not confined to organized religion—even a philosophical journey that can help you transcend the daily grind and find purpose and meaning. 3. Material comforts are great, but they're no substitute for what your heart truly needs. Money can't buy happiness; only meaning can give you that. That last is a truism, I know. But truisms do have the merit of being true—and the flourishing survey reveals how we're in danger of forgetting these important verities. Sometimes, the cold, hard data are what we need to remind us of what we always knew but had come to overlook. Article originally published at The Atlantic
Yahoo
01-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
What makes people flourish? A new survey of more than 200,000 people across 22 countries looks for global patterns and local differences
What does it mean to live a good life? For centuries, philosophers, scientists and people of different cultures have tried to answer this question. Each tradition has a different take, but all agree: The good life is more than just feeling good − it's about becoming whole. More recently, researchers have focused on the idea of flourishing, not simply as happiness or success, but as a multidimensional state of well-being that involves positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning and accomplishment − an idea that traces back to Aristotle's concept of 'eudaimonia' but has been redefined within the well-being science literature. Flourishing is not just well-being and how you feel on the inside. It's about your whole life being good, including the people around you and where you live. Things such as your home, your neighborhood, your school or workplace, and your friends all matter. We are a group of psychological scientists, social scientists and epidemiologists who are all contributors to an international collaboration called the Global Flourishing Study. The goal of the project is simple: to find patterns of human flourishing across cultures. Do people in some countries thrive more than others? What makes the biggest difference in a person's well-being? Are there things people can do to improve their own lives? Understanding these trends over time can help shape policies and programs that improve global human flourishing. The Global Flourishing Study is a five-year annual survey of over 200,000 participants from 22 countries, using nationally representative sampling to understand health and well-being. Our team includes more than 40 researchers across different disciplines, cultures and institutions. With help from Gallup Inc., we asked people about their lives, their happiness, their health, their childhood experiences, and how they feel about their financial situation. The study looks at six dimensions of a flourishing life: Happiness and life satisfaction: how content and fulfilled people feel with their lives. Physical and mental health: how healthy people feel, in both body and mind. Meaning and purpose: whether people feel their lives are significant and moving in a clear direction. Character and virtue: how people act to promote good, even in tough situations. Close social relationships: how satisfied people are with their friendships and family ties. Financial and material stability: whether people feel secure about their basic needs, including food, housing and money. We tried to quantify how participants are doing on each of these dimensions using a scale from 0 to 10. In addition to using the Secure Flourish measure from Harvard's Human Flourishing Program, we included additional questions to probe other factors that influence how much someone is flourishing. For example, we assessed well-being through questions about optimism, peace and balance in life. We measured health by asking about pain, depression and exercise. We measured relationships through questions about trust, loneliness and support. Our first wave of results reveals that some countries and groups of people are doing better than others. We were surprised that in many countries young people are not doing as well as older adults. Earlier studies had suggested well-being follows a U-shape over the course of a lifespan, with the lowest point in middle age. Our new results imply that younger adults today face growing mental health challenges, financial insecurity and a loss of meaning that are disrupting the traditional U-shaped curve of well-being. Married people usually reported more support, better relationships and more meaning in life. People who were working – either for themselves or someone else – also tended to feel more secure and happy than people who were seeking jobs. People who go to religious services once a week or more typically reported higher scores in all areas of flourishing – particularly happiness, meaning and relationships. This finding was true in almost every country, even very secular ones such as Sweden. It seems that religious communities offer what psychologists of religion call the four B's: belonging, in the form of social support; bonding, in the form of spiritual connection; behaving, in the cultivation of character and virtue through the practices and norms taught within religious communities; and believing, in the form of embracing hope, forgiveness and shared spiritual convictions. But some people who attend religious services also report more pain or suffering. This correlation may be because religious communities often provide support during hard times, and frequent attendees may be more attentive to or more likely to experience pain, grief or illness. Your early years shape how you do later in life. But even if life started off as challenging, it doesn't have to stay that way. Some people who had difficult childhoods, having experienced abuse or poverty, still found meaning and purpose later as adults. In some countries, including the U.S. and Argentina, hardship in childhood seemed to build resilience and purpose in adulthood. Globally, men and women report similar levels of flourishing. But in some countries there are big differences. For example, women in Japan report higher scores than men, while in Brazil, men report doing better than women. Some countries are doing better than others when it comes to flourishing. Indonesia is thriving. People there scored high in many areas, including meaning, purpose, relationships and character. Indonesia is one of the highest-scoring countries in most of the indicators in the whole study. Mexico and the Philippines also show strong results. Even though these countries have less money than some others, people report strong family ties, spiritual lives and community support. Japan and Turkey report lower scores. Japan has a strong economy, but people there report lower happiness and weaker social connections. Long work hours and stress may be part of the reason. In Turkey, political and financial challenges may be hurting people's sense of trust and security. One surprising result is that richer countries, including the United States and Sweden, are not flourishing as well as some others. They do well on financial stability but score lower in meaning and relationships. Having more money doesn't always mean people are doing better in life. In fact, countries with higher income often report lower levels of meaning and purpose. Meanwhile, countries with higher fertility rates often report more meaning in life. These findings show that there can be a trade-off. Economic progress might improve some things but weaken others. The Global Flourishing Study is helping us see that people all over the world want many of the same basic things: to be happy, healthy, connected and safe. But different countries reach those goals in different ways. There is no one-size-fits-all answer to flourishing. What it means to flourish can look different from place to place and from one person to another. One challenge with the Global Flourishing Study is that it uses the same set of questions in all 22 countries. This method, known as an etic approach, helps us compare results across cultures. But it can miss the nuance and local meanings of flourishing. What brings happiness or purpose in one country or context might not mean the same thing in another. We consider this study to be a starting point. It opens the door for more emic studies – research that uses questions and ideas that fit the values, language and everyday life of specific cultures and societies. Researchers can build on this study's findings to expand how we understand and measure flourishing around the world. This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Victor Counted, Regent University; Byron R. Johnson, Baylor University, and Tyler J. VanderWeele, Harvard University Read more: Psychological tips aren't enough – policies need to address structural inequities so everyone can flourish Transform the daily grind to make life more interesting – a philosopher shares 3 strategies to help you attain the good life The curious joy of being wrong – intellectual humility means being open to new information and willing to change your mind Tyler J. VanderWeele reports consulting fees from Gloo Inc., along with shared revenue received by Harvard University in its license agreement with Gloo according to the University IP policy. Byron R. Johnson and Victor Counted do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Atlantic
01-05-2025
- General
- Atlantic
Why Are Young People Everywhere So Unhappy?
Want to stay current with Arthur's writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. We've heard a lot lately about how miserable young Americans are. In the recently released World Happiness Report, the United States dropped to its lowest ranking since that survey began—and that result was driven by the unhappiness of people under 30 in this country. So what's going on? I have some skepticism about these international rankings of happiness. The organizations that produce them always attract a lot of attention by answering 'Which is the world's happiest country?' They derive that answer—usually Finland, with Denmark and other Nordics close behind—by getting people in multiple countries to answer a single self-assessment question about life satisfaction. I don't place much stock in this methodology because we can't accurately compare nations based on such limited self-assessment: People in different cultures will answer in different ways. But I am very interested in the change within countries, such as the falling happiness of young adults in America. New research digs deeply into this issue, and many others: The Global Flourishing Study, based on a survey undertaken by a consortium of institutions including my Harvard colleagues at the Human Flourishing Program. This survey also uses self-reporting, but it collects much more comprehensive data on well-being, in about half a dozen distinct dimensions and in 22 countries, from more than 200,000 individuals whom it follows over five years. Most significant to me, the survey shows that although young people's emotional and psychological distress is more pronounced in wealthy, industrialized nations such as the United States, it is occurring across the world. Scholars have long noted that happiness tends to follow a U-shape across the lifespan: Self-reported happiness declines gradually in young and middle adulthood, then turns upward later in life, starting around age 50. The Dartmouth University economist David G. Blanchflower—who, together with his co-author, Andrew J. Oswald, pioneered the U-shape hypothesis in 2008—has reproduced the result in 145 countries. The left-hand side of the U-shape would suggest that adolescents and young adults were traditionally, on average, happier than people in middle age. But given the well-documented increase over the past decades in diagnosed mood disorders among adolescents and young adults, we might expect that left side to be pushed down in newer estimates. And sure enough, this is exactly what the new GFS study finds, in the U.S. and around the world: The flourishing scores don't fall from early adulthood, because they now start low; they stay low until they start to rise at the expected age. That's the bad news, which is plenty bad. But there is some good news. The flourishing survey discovers one notable exception to this global pattern: a more traditional U-shaped curve among those young people who have more friends and intimate social relationships. This dovetails with my own research into how young adults in today's era of technologically mediated socializing are lacking real-life human contact and love—without which no one can truly flourish. This exception created by greater human connection is the starting point for how we might address this pandemic of young people's unhappiness. Arthur C. Brooks: Eight Ways to Banish Misery A plausible explanation for the more pronounced happiness problem that wealthy Western countries like the U.S. have is growing secularization—measured in the increasing numbers of so-called nones, people who profess no religious affiliation. In the United States, the percentage of the population with no religious affiliation has nearly doubled since 2007, to 29 percent. Scholars have long found that religious people are, on average, happier than nonreligious people. How to account for this paradox that a practice that gives so many people a tangible well-being boost is in such clear decline? Researchers have hypothesized that the phenomenon's predominance in well-to-do countries is essentially a function of that affluence: As society grows richer, people become less religious because they no longer need the comfort of religion to cope with such miseries as hunger and early mortality. I have my doubts about this economic-determinist account. As one would expect from past studies, the new survey shows that people who attend a worship service at least weekly score, on worldwide average, 8 percent higher in flourishing measures than nonattenders. But it further reveals that this positive effect is strongest among the richest and most secular nations. This finding suggests that, contrary to the materialist hypothesis, wealth is not a great source of metaphysical comfort—and the well-being effect of religious attendance is relatively independent of economic factors. This leads to the question of what exactly is missing for so many people in wealthy countries when religion declines. Community connection and social capital are two answers. But a deeper answer is meaning, one of the study's categories of flourishing, which it measures by asking participants whether they feel their daily activities are worthwhile and whether they understand their life's purpose. GDP per capita, the survey finds, is inversely correlated with this sense of meaning: The wealthier a country gets, the more bereft of meaning its citizens feel. Others have previously observed this pattern as well. Researchers writing in the journal Psychological Science in 2013 looked at a far larger sample of nations (132) and came to the same conclusion as the GFS: In answer to the question 'Do you feel your life has an important purpose or meaning?,' respondents to the survey in higher-income nations expressed much weaker conviction than those in lower-income countries. The researchers also found that these results were likely explained by secularism in richer nations. This raises the issue of whether something about material success in a society naturally drives down religion or spirituality, and thus meaning, and so also flourishing. Many writers and thinkers throughout history have made this case, of course. Indeed, we could go back to the Bible and the New Testament story in which a rich young man asks Jesus what he needs to do to gain admission to heaven. Jesus tells the young man to sell all he has, give it to the poor, and follow him. 'At this the man's face fell,' the Gospel says. 'He went away sad, because he had great wealth.' Arthur C. Brooks: Nostalgia is a shield against unhappiness The Global Flourishing Study exposes many interesting patterns and will undoubtedly stimulate additional research for years to come. But you don't have to wait for that to apply the findings to your life—especially if you are a young adult living in a wealthy, post-industrial country. Here are three immediate things you can do: 1. Put close relationships with family and friends before virtually everything else. Where possible, avoid using technological platforms for interactions with these loved ones; focus on face-to-face contact. Humans are made to relate to one another in person. 2. Consider how you might develop your inner life. Given the trend toward being a none, which I've written about in an earlier column, this might seem a countercultural move. But let's define spirituality broadly as beliefs, practices, and experiences not confined to organized religion—even a philosophical journey that can help you transcend the daily grind and find purpose and meaning. 3. Material comforts are great, but they're no substitute for what your heart truly needs. Money can't buy happiness; only meaning can give you that. That last is a truism, I know. But truisms do have the merit of being true—and the flourishing survey reveals how we're in danger of forgetting these important verities. Sometimes, the cold, hard data are what we need to remind us of what we always knew but had come to overlook.
Daily Mail
01-05-2025
- Health
- Daily Mail
The countries where people 'flourish' the most, revealed: Indonesia and Israel top the list…while Britain is almost at the bottom of the rankings
A new study has revealed the countries where people 'flourish' the most – and it's bad news for Brits. Scientists from Harvard University surveyed more than 200,000 people from 22 countries about their health, happiness, meaning, character, relationships, financial security, and spiritual well-being. Together, these seven variables were defined as 'flourishing' by the researchers. The results revealed that people living in Indonesia are flourishing the most, followed by Israel, the Philippines, and Mexico. In contrast, the US ranked 12th on the list, while the UK ranked a dismal 20th out of 22. According to the researchers, the findings highlight the old adage that money isn't everything. 'Flourishing is multidimensional, and different countries are flourishing in different ways,' the team wrote in their study. 'While many developed nations report comparatively higher levels of financial security and life evaluation, these same nations are not flourishing in other ways, often reporting lower meaning, pro-sociality and relationship quality.' Several previous studies have set out to understand the happiest countries around the world - with Finland usually taking the top spot. However, until now, there has been little research into how people are flourishing. Writing in their study, published in Nature Mental Health, the team, led by Tyler VanderWeele, explained: 'The study is intended to expand our knowledge of the distribution and determinants of flourishing around the world.' The team enrolled 203,000 people in 22 countries spanning all six populated continents. According to the experts, this represents about 64 per cent of the world's population. The participants were surveyed across the seven variables, as well as demographic data such as age, sex, marital and employment status, education, health, religion, and personal history. The results revealed that Indonesia topped the list, with a flourish score of 8.3. This was followed by Israel (7.87), the Phillipines (7.71), Mexico (7.64), and Poland (7.55). While Indonesia is not the wealthiest country, it ranked highly in measures of relationships and pro-social character traits, which foster social connections and community. At the other end of the scale, Japan was found to be the country where people flourish the least, with a dismal score of 5.89. This was followed by Turkey (6.32), the UK (6.79), India (6.87) and Spain (6.9). Japan is wealthier and its people live longer, however respondents there were the least likely to answer 'yes' to a question asking whether they had an intimate friend. Brendan Case, associate director for research at the Human Flourishing Program and an author of the study, explained: 'We're not here to say those outcomes [wealth, longer lifespans] don't matter a lot, or that we shouldn't care about democracy, we shouldn't care about economic growth, we shouldn't care about public health. 'But it's interesting to consider that the Global Flourishing Study raises some important questions about the potential tradeoffs involved in that process.' The results also uncovered a link between age and flourishing - with older participants scoring more highly than younger respondents. 'On average, when pooled across the 22 countries, flourishing is essentially flat with age through ages 18–49 and then increases with age thereafter,' the researchers explained. 'This is in striking contrast to earlier work—focused mostly on life satisfaction/evaluation—which had suggested a more dramatically U-shaped pattern with age.' The findings raise important questions for the future progress of society, according to the researchers. 'Are we sufficiently investing in the future given the notable flourishing-age gradient with the youngest groups often faring the most poorly?' they asked. 'Can we carry out economic development in ways that do not compromise meaning and purpose and relationships and character, given that many economically developed nations are not faring as well on these measures? 'With economic development and secularization, have we sometimes been neglecting, or even suppressing, powerful spiritual pathways to flourishing? 'If society is to ultimately flourish these questions of age, and of development, and of spiritual dynamics need to be taken into consideration.' BEING GENEROUS 'REALLY DOES MAKE YOU HAPPY', STUDY FINDS Being generous really does make people happier, according to research in 2017 from an international team of experts. Neurons in an area of the brain associated with generosity activate neurons in the ventral striatum, which are associated with happiness, the study found. A group of 50 volunteers in Switzerland took part in a spending experiment, with each given 25 Swiss Francs (£20/$25) per week for four weeks. As part of the experiment, participants performed an independent decision-making task, in which they could behave more or less generously while brain activity was measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). They were asked to choose to give between three and 25 francs of their money as a present to a recipient different from those previously chosen. The researchers found that participants who had committed to spending their endowment on others behaved more generously in the decision-making task. They also discovered greater self-reported increases in happiness as compared to the control group.
Forbes
30-04-2025
- Health
- Forbes
Flourishing As A Cultural Operating System
3d low-poly people forming a growing arrow. getty In today's world of relentless disruption, organizations aren't just navigating complexity—they're being redefined by it. Burnout is widespread. Engagement is stalled. And even the most well-intentioned culture initiatives are often fragmented, reactive, and insufficient for the moment we're in. Leaders are asking: what comes after resilience? How do we create workplaces where people don't just endure—but evolve? The answer may lie in an idea that's been quietly gaining traction across disciplines: flourishing. According to Harvard's Human Flourishing Program, flourishing is defined as a state in which all aspects of a person's life are good—not perfect, but meaningfully supported. In the workplace, this includes happiness but goes beyond it to encompass purpose, resilience, energy, belonging, continuous learning, and strong relationships. It reflects not just how people feel, but how they function, grow, and contribute over time. In short: flourishing isn't just about feeling good. It's about functioning well, in every domain of life. Flourishing isn't a buzzword or a wellness trend. It's a science-backed, system-wide framework for understanding what helps humans thrive—and why that matters for the future of work. In fact, it is so important that last year, the Harvard Human Flourishing Program launched a Global Flourishing Study—a longitudinal research initiative with 200,000 participants across 22 countries. Conducted in collaboration with Baylor University, Gallup, and the Center for Open Science, this study is one of the most significant studies of human flourishing since Harvard's landmark 1938 Study of Adult Development. Today, the study will be releasing the first wave of data findings, which are poised to transform our understanding of what it means to thrive, taking a holistic look at the human experience across multiple domains. This approach is unique, given that most organizations today rely on a patchwork of programs to connect applied science with culture development—wellness in HR, performance in operations, engagement in surveys. But these siloed efforts often miss the point. They measure what's easy, not what matters. They chase short-term boosts rather than long-term thriving. And they lack a unifying framework to bring clarity, coherence, and strategic alignment across departments. Flourishing, by contrast, functions like a cultural operating system. It's not a standalone initiative or a one-off intervention. It's the underlying architecture that connects culture to outcomes. When embedded well, flourishing informs how decisions get made, how leadership is developed, how success is defined, and how people experience work every day. Flourishing permits and liberates organizations to think differently—so they can genuinely progress. It's not about checking boxes; it's about reframing how we see potential and possibility across the system. Flourishing metrics offer that kind of clarity—not just a snapshot, but a direction. 1. Integration over Isolation – Rather than treating well-being, performance, learning, and belonging as separate priorities, flourishing unites them into one coherent strategy. It sees people as whole humans—and culture as a living system. Consider the example of a UK-based organization that went through a restructuring that placed HR operations under facilities management. When asked by outside consultants how they planned to integrate data between these two functions, leaders responded with puzzled looks. The irony? People literally come to work in buildings. How can we evaluate a department's impact if we don't understand how its context—its space, its energy, its people—interacts with the rest of the system? What if you're building paradise, but employees dread their work or are struggling at home? Who's responsible for how that shows up in the workplace? This kind of operational silo thinking cuts off our ability to see the full picture—or to design systems that meaningfully support flourishing. 2. Measurement with Meaning – In many organizations, data collection has become more of a compliance activity than a compass for decision-making. We measure what's easy to quantify—like hours logged or pulse survey scores—but miss what actually drives human thriving. Flourishing calls for a shift in what we value and how we evaluate it. Rather than relying on one-dimensional indicators, flourishing introduces multi-dimensional metrics that account for the complexity of the human experience. These include purpose, character, health, social connection, meaning, and more—domains that research increasingly shows are interdependent and predictive of long-term performance and retention. With new frameworks emerging from organizations like SHAPE Global that apply a data-centric and epidemiological mindset to culture change, leaders can begin to track patterns across up to 12 dimensions of thriving. But the real power lies not just in measurement—it lies in what we choose to do with the insights. These metrics become a mirror and a map: they reveal where the culture is supporting people well, where it's falling short, and where targeted interventions can spark lasting change. This is not about scoring high for optics. It's about making sense of complexity, holding space for nuance, and elevating what matters most. To support this shift, the World Flourishing Organization is developing a global trustmark to recognize Flourishing Organizations—or F-Orgs—moving companies from top-down, self-declared statements to bottom-up, evidence-based recognition. This initiative will spotlight organizations that are actively embedding the principles of flourishing into their culture, strategy, and operations. The framework is grounded in five core practices: grounding, listening, learning, believing, and elevating. Flourishing Framework for Organizations World Flourishing Organization Being recognized as an F-Org won't mean checking boxes; it will signal a commitment to human-centered leadership, continuous growth, and long-term impact. It's a bold step toward redefining what success looks like in the future of work. 3. Progress over Perfection – Too often, organizational culture is evaluated through binary success metrics: Are people engaged or disengaged? Are we performing or underperforming? Flourishing challenges this thinking by recognizing that growth isn't linear—and thriving doesn't look the same for everyone. Instead of fixating on static benchmarks, flourishing cultures prioritize movement—creating the conditions for people to move from surviving to striving, and from striving to flourishing. Progress becomes the measure of momentum, not perfection. This mindset encourages psychological safety, continuous feedback, and a tolerance for experimentation. It means acknowledging the dips as much as the gains, and designing systems that can flex to support people where they are. A flourishing culture is one that gets smarter, more adaptive, and more human over time—not because it hits every mark, but because it learns how to grow from them. Organizations that embrace flourishing as a cultural operating system don't just feel better—they perform better. Flourishing employees are more engaged, more innovative, and more loyal. They recover faster from setbacks. They collaborate more effectively. And they help build workplaces that are not just high-performing, but future-ready. As early data from the Global Flourishing Study suggests, flourishing correlates with improved health, higher life satisfaction, and stronger relationships—regardless of geography or GDP. This makes it not just a moral imperative, but a business one. In a time when talent is mobile, trust is fragile, and well-being is non-negotiable, flourishing may be the competitive edge leaders have been looking for. Flourishing isn't a trend. It's a transformation. One that requires awareness, intention, and systems-level thinking. What if we stopped treating culture like an afterthought and started seeing it as infrastructure? What if we stopped measuring engagement once a year and started listening in real time? What if we built not just for output—but for enduring human growth? This is more than a mindset shift. It's a leadership evolution. The future of work won't be defined by the next tool or policy. It will be shaped by the organizations that choose to reimagine what thriving looks like—and commit to building systems that support it. Because flourishing isn't the bonus. It's the baseline.
