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There was a point in time where happiness wouldn't have been considered part of the job scope for HR. But particularly today, with remote working resulting in skewed work/life balance and boundaries, and stress and mental health issues on the rise, ensuring that employees can continue to build positive habits in uncertain times will help provide a more positive and productive work environment.

The good news is that there are some simple steps employers can take to help workers build these habits, despite the other priorities and uncertainties they are facing at the moment.

It's easiest for a positive habit to form with a small, consistent effort daily, instead of trying to do a massive overhaul all at once.

We see this with New Year's resolutions quite frequently. Individuals have enthusiasm around a massive change they'd like to make for a few days, and then they revert back to their old self. The more willpower that is required, the more difficult it is for the brain to stick with and fortify the positive habit, and it's important to use the brain to our advantage when forming positive habits.

Below are a few recommendations for helping your employees and teams create and reinforce positive habits to lead to more productivity and energy.

Start small

Habits are most easily formed if they require less than 20 seconds to implement from the old behavior. Encourage employees to start to make small shifts when building new habits, instead of getting overwhelmed with a massive change.

For example, if an employee wants to start being more productive, encourage them to write down one thing they'd like to accomplish the next day the night before. From there, they can slowly build this habit up and expand the list. This takes less than 20 seconds and is a positive habit formed around productivity.

Give examples of habits to implement

Quite often, employees want to create a more positive work environment, but are not entirely sure how. I recommend giving examples of positive habits to make it easier for them to choose one to start with, and grow from there. Here are a few examples of popular positive habits throughout the USA:

• Tracking progress each evening, both personally and professionally
• Writing in a gratitude journal each morning
• Drinking water every two hours
• Setting an intention for each hour of the day
• Taking a brief walk each day

Encourage managers to lead the way with positive habits

When employees see that their managers value positive habits and are working to develop them, it motivates them to take time to prioritize and implement them into their own lives as well.

Encourage managers to share the positive habits they are working to develop in one-on-ones and team meetings as well.

Build systems

When deciding to form a positive habit, employees will likely be motivated initially by the goal/result they want to accomplish (i.e. getting a promotion, losing 10 pounds, etc). The problem here is that this often leads to frustration during the duration of time that it takes to reach this goal and employees can become demotivated along the way.

Reaching a goal or accomplishment is only a moment in time, and doesn't necessarily lead to long term, consistent improvement. Goals are good for planning your progress but systems are good for actually making progress.

A system is the action an employee takes daily towards their goal. Implementing systems inevitably leads to the goal they're striving for–focusing on the "how" instead of the "what" is best for long term improvement and implementation of positive habits. Managers can support their teams in system formation to implement positive habits by doing two things:

1. Normalize sharing systems rather than just goals in meetings

Managers can help with this by encouraging employees to share in team meetings the systems they are implementing, the progress they have made towards their goals, and also share their own systems they implement daily.

By placing more emphasis on the system/progress behind the goal — rather than just the goal itself — employees are getting a daily reward instead of delaying the reward for a larger goal. This keeps up motivation and creates validation and enthusiasm among coworkers.

2. Assign accountability partners and accountability appointments

Managers can also encourage employees to find an accountability partner at work to implement systems and form positive habits or assign them to one another.

The American Society of Training and Development (ASTD) reports that you have a 65% greater chance of completing a goal if you commit to someone. In addition, if you have a specific accountability appointment with the person you've committed, you will increase your chance of success by up to 95%!

Overall, creating space for employees to start prioritizing positive habits will help strengthen mental health, reduce stress, and lead to more productivity and impact at work. When employees start small and have encouragement and support from their managers and leaders, they are more likely to stick to systems that lead to goal achievement and impact at the company and beyond.

Michelle Wax is the founder of American Happiness Project and hosts virtual team workshops to help your team build positive habits, use stress to your advantage, increase productivity levels, resilience, and happiness while working from home.

Read more: 

• 5 small but powerful changes for better employee engagement
• 6 key factors of workplace happiness
• Technology, work/life balance top factors in employee happiness