The Quest for Citizen Happiness possibilities for government and business in the 2.0 era

part 1 of 2

in two parts:

•why happiness?

•the building blocks of citizen happiness

in two three parts:

•why happiness?

•lunch!

•the building blocks of citizen happiness

who the heck are we?

tara huntaka missrogue

• canadian living and working in san francisco

• blogging for 5 years

• online/community marketing 8+ years

• author: how to be a social capitalist, winning with the currency of online communities. due out in fall 2008 with crown publishing/random house

chris messinaaka factoryjoe

• involved in several open source communities for the past 4 yrs (drupal/civic space, spreadfirefox, flock, songbird)

• blogging for 4 years

• trained in interaction design

• community leader on open standards projects such as oauth, openid, microformats and diso.

we runcitizen agency

• we work with companies to help them build connections to their customer communities

• we advise government services organizations in the US and New Zealand how to employ web 2.0 technologies and practices effectively

• we work with web communities, open source projects and standards groups to make the web a nicer place

exercise: and who are you?

btw, when this dude appears,it means that we have a discussion,

but you should feel free to askquestions along the way...

why happiness?

welcome to the ‘me’ era

play 60 minutes video

video by: dr. michael weschhttp://mediatedcultures.net“a vision of students today”

a more positive look at the ‘me’ generation

but it’s not just the millennials...

...every ‘generation’ seems to be searching for happiness...

pampering and relaxing

leisure time and hobbies

work/life balance

world travel and adventure

health and fitness

books

movies

what movieisn’t aboutthe search

for happiness?

happiness is a multi-billion dollar industry

people are very conscious of every decision they make towards becoming happier

exercise: what do you consciously do to make yourself happy? how often do you prioritize your happiness?

how does government and business fit into this need to find happiness?

exercise: name a time when government or business delivered happiness?

the sad truth is...

while this is how corporations see themselves.

this is how people talk about them.

and government?

instead of feeling like we are part of this...

...we feel like we are under this.

the craziest part of all of this is that

businesses andgov’ts are

made up ofpeople.

people who, like everyone else, are pursuing their own happiness...

exercise: write down the names of 5 people who you work with. List the things that make them happy.

so, what is enabled through focusing on citizen happiness?

happiness leads to

• work efficiency

• increased life expectancy

• higher productivity

• raised confidence

• more reproduction

• deeper cooperation

• more job satisfaction

• improved work ethic

• reduced stress and anxiety

• higher levels of trust

• more forgiveness

• increased openness

inspired by: Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt

exercise: how do you think happiness could benefit your customers/consituents? do you think this could benefit your business? how?

so, then, what makes people happy?

exercise: what makes you happy? what do you think are the things that make people happy?

what makes people happy?

•autonomy (feeling that your activities are self-chosen and self-endorsed)

•competence (feeling that you are effective in your activities)

•relatedness (feeling a sense of closeness with others)

•self-esteem (set-point, or the person’s natural propensity to happiness)

from the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, published by the American Psychological Association (APA).

autonomy

autonomy includes:

•feeling in control of one’s surroundings

•understanding one’s own resilience

•feeling of agency

•empowerment

exercise: list 5 ways you can create autonomy for your customers or constituents.

competence

competence includes:

•confidence in one’s abilities/knowing one’s strength’s

•feedback from others on one’s performance

•learning and growing skills

•self-actualization

•doing meaningful work

•getting into flow

exercise: list 5 ways in which you can help employees and/or customers feel more competent.

relatedness

relatedness includes:

•interacting with others

•connecting with people and connecting people

•giving to others/being generous

•feeling loved

•emotional security

•acknowledgement and support (mentorship)

exercise: list 5 things that you can do to promote relatedness between your customers/constituents.

self-esteem

self-esteem includes:

•your ‘set-point’ or natural (genetic) confidence level

•something you can work on through cognitive behavioral therapy, meditation or medications

•not influenced from the outside world, but apparent when triggered by events from the outside world

what are the barriers to happiness?

exercise: name the barriers to happiness in today’s world. What are your personal barriers and what are general barriers?

barriers to happiness

• fear (anxiety of failure, ignorance, mistrust)

•confusion (noise, paradox of choice, lack of good information)

• loneliness (isolation, disconnection from others)

• lack of control (feeling of loss of control over one’s life and surroundings, secrecy, loss of agency)

•struggle for survival (basic needs not met)

fear

contributors to fear

•ignorance

•misinformation

•insecurity

•inexperience

•fear-mongering

•mistrust

pew internet research noted that the majority of people ages 50+ who are not online are not online because of the scary stories they hear.

confusion

what leads to confusion

•paradox of choice

•noise ratio

•lack of clear information

•secretiveness

•half-truths

loneliness

what causes loneliness

•isolation

•distrust of others

•fear of rejection

•lack of acceptance

•insecurity

lack of control

what leads to lack of control

•loss of control over the circumstances of one’s life

•loss of agency

•withheld information

•secrecy

•uncontrollable circumstances

struggle for survival

remember maslow’s hierarchy of needs

you can’t

get here

without all of these being taken

care of

how does all this relate to business and gov’t?

in order to be an agent of happiness, you need to either create the environment for it or you have to intervene in the barriers...

okay, but what does this have to do with web 2.0?

...after lunch we will make the connection and tell you what to do with it...

http://www.slideshare.net/missrogue

About those rockin’ images• Many of them are purchased from iStockPhoto.com (yay! iStockPhoto is an

awesome Canadian company!)

• Except for:

• book covers, movie posters (from Amazon.com)

• And the Flickr photos used from:

• Starbucks Cup: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mjb/118418786/

• Starbucks Globalism: http://www.flickr.com/photos/thorinside/55362248/

Tara Hunttara@citizenagency.com

415.694.1951skype: tarahunt747

Chris Messinachris@citizenagency.com

412.225.1051skype: factoryjoe

www.citizenagency.comwww.horsepigcow.com (tara)

www.factoryjoe.com/blog (chris)