When Business Meets Love, Wellbeing is Possible.

Bia Affonso

Can love and business co-exist? And why does it matter?

I’ve been pondering over these questions as we, at Neu21, have explicitly said out loud that ‘love’ is a core part of our essence. We have always talked about love when we spoke about our approach to being a deliberately developmental organisation (DDO), but now it feels more grounded and beyond being a DDO. We’re comfortable and confident to talk about it.

Yes, love. Not love as romantic love, but as in a driving force for real connection as human beings.

Jungian Robert Johnson wrote that “love is the one power that awakens the ego to the existence of something outside itself”. Read that again and let that sink in.

I’ve now come to believe that business without love is transactional and meaningless.

But when business finally finds room for love, people gain a deeper level of relating. That feeling of showing up fully with no strings attached and no blame. The ability to build significant connections and collaborate, to navigate problems without pretending to know it all...to care for each other and run the business with love in mind to enable the generative force of business. It’s awakening the organisation to the fact organisations are made of people. 

In most cases, workplaces have space for love, but it’s not intentional and certainly, there is way more drive for business results which can be explained as ‘power’, or how Adam Kahane beautifully explains: “power is how we make a difference in the world; it is the means by which new social realities are created. Without power, nothing grows”. We want this willpower…this drive. We all need it, personally and professionally, but too much power without love and we fall prey to the added bureaucracy and transactional relationships in order to command and control.

Since the pandemic the concept of meaningful work has been emphasized as people were scared, isolated, lacking community and trying to drive their work as best as they could. I am oversimplifying this by suggesting that people really needed love. Real meaningful conversations, moments of appreciation, space for being together without agendas, and as we all know too well…people were craving a real-life hug, not a hugging emoji sent via text message.

A 2022 working paper by Brookings University shows that relatedness is the biggest determinant of work meaningfulness. Relatedness means our relationships; how much care others show and our sense of belonging in the workplace. Humans are wired to connect, not only in times of crisis, but especially when things get tough, and most workplaces today are incredibly stressful environments. People are exhausted, stressed out and overworked.

Adding to Brookings’ findings, Positive Psychology has “relationships” as a key pillar when assessing and cultivating one’s wellbeing. We need positive relationships to flourish.

You know where I am going with this: love + business = wellbeing.

It’s not an exact equation though. I wish it were this simple. I guess my hypothesis is that when love and business are well-balanced and understood as equally important, we are actively and intentionally designing an environment where people’s wellbeing is valued and cultivated.

Traditionally, employees’ wellbeing has been delegated to a team or function who are not usually trained or incentivised to create thriving policies, practices, processes or KPIs. We thought that we were giving our people everything they needed to feel good, but we were still stuck in a mindset of fixing complex challenges with technical solutions. Are our employees tired and disengaged? Give them meditation classes, but don’t pause projects and most certainly don’t reduce our meetings.  

Sometimes a brave conversation or a streamlined process is more powerful than any fruit bowl or that free yoga class that we don’t have the time to attend. This is what I call wellbeing-lite (inspired by journalist Sarah Wilson on her use of lite when something is not being used or lived fully).

Wellbeing-full on the other hand is when organisations help people navigate adaptive challenges with a 21st century mindset. It’s about intentionally designing our organisations for courageous conversations and progressive practices. It’s having that feedback conversation with love in mind as it allows for better listening. It’s creating meetings for connection as well as for performance. It’s thinking of how people will react to yet another process that might make their jobs harder.

Wellbeing-full in the workplace does not equal health and wellness. Wellbeing-full is about putting love at the centre of our business decisions so that we create organisations where people can find meaning, a sense of belonging and engagement and have opportunities to work on their health. All of this whilst driving and achieving business results.

That’s why love matters so much in workplaces. My vision is that love is part of every business strategy, and that wellbeing is a core part of everyone’s job. After all, working on our wellbeing is also a personal responsibility, and when we feel good and function well, we’re even more prone to receiving and giving love at work.

Love + business is a win-win.