Love@Work

Love is what makes the world go round

There is no theme discussed, sung, and described as much as love. But it’s a word we don’t like to use when it comes to work. Quite strange when you consider how many hours we spend working in our lives. What we do and think is guided by what we care about and what we deem important. Actually: love. And that doesn’t stop at the boundary between business and personal life. Love provides us with a framework of principles and goals that emboldens us to dare to live our lives. By loving things, we can achieve our goals. If we didn’t love anything, nothing would truly have value in life. This holds just as true in a business setting.

People who love their work perform better. We actually know it: it’s the people who make the difference in organizations. Yet, we often do not act in accordance with that. That’s why it’s so important to put love on the agenda.

The book: Love@Work. Bringing back humanity into the workplace.

People that love their work and companies that love their people perform better. Deep down we know that it’s the people who make a difference in companies. But it turns out to be unruly to put that into practice. That’s why it’s so important to get happiness and love on the agenda at companies, especially right now. And that’s how my book came to be. Love@Work introduces you to why love it’s so important to focus on love in a business context, to various themes related to love and work and it provides practical tools so you can immediately start implementing love. A must-read for everyone who believes it’s high time for more humanity in organizations. The English version of the book will be available in June 2024. Here you can pre-order it.

The only thing of importance when we depart, will be the traces of love we have left behind.
– A. Schweitzer

Love Manifesto

Central in the book is the Love Manifesto, a short summary of the themes in the book. The eight principles of the manifesto largely speak for themselves. As you read the book, you’ll naturally come across the motivation behind each of the values.

We before I

Feel before think

Now before past, future

People before technology

Compassion before condemn

Agile before strict

Earth before more, more, more

Colourful before colourless

If you stand behind the eight principles, I’d like to invite you to sign the manifesto here. Are you in?

You can also download the Love Manifesto in PDF-format.

What we offer

Do you already pay attention to work happiness, well-being, and vitality of employees in your organization, or are you planning to do so? Is it because it’s essential right now to find the right employees and retain current ones? Then take the step towards working with love immediately. We are eager to work with you, using tools including the ‘Manifesto of Love’, to engage the leaders in your organization in discussions about how they can work with more love for each other, their employees, your customers, and your company. This discussion is also an excellent baseline measurement: where are you now? And where do you want to go? The manifesto also serves as the starting point for an inspiration session with the employees.

Next, we would like to determine with you where you stand. What are you already doing that resonates with the philosophy of working with love? What can be different, better, more, or should be less? Step by step, we will proceed, because as you probably know, a new mindset and a different way of working is not a change that can be secured in just a few weeks.

Do you want to get started as soon as possible?

The possibilities are:

• A practical workshop where we share what love means in a business context, let you experience what ‘working with love’ does to how you feel, think, and act, and help you take the first steps towards working with love for yourself and/or your business. After this workshop, you will have experienced what love does in a business context, how love is linked to happiness (at work), you will have practical tools to start working with (more) love, and you will have the facts with which you can inspire the people you work with. One of the methods we can employ during the workshop is LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®.
• Presentation on Love & Work for everyone interested in the topic: Why love? What is love in the context of work? How are love and (work) happiness related?
• Interactive inspiration session for, for example, management teams and HR teams: Why love? What is love in the context of (our) work? What themes are important in love & work? How are work happiness and love related? How do you start working with love? The manifesto plays an important role during this session.
• Love & Work Program: during a start-up session, we determine together, with the help of the Manifesto, which steps your organization can take towards working with love, and how you can organize it. You will then receive a tailor-made proposal.

If you want to get started in a practical and down-to-earth manner and want to know which steps suit your organization best, please contact us.

About the author

Drs. Annemieke Mintjes is a communication expert and a trainer and facilitator in agile work and workplace happiness at Geluk Werkt. She supports organizations in developing their human capital in a rapidly changing world. Annemieke employs various methodologies, including Scrum, LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®, storytelling, and serious gaming. In 2020, she co-authored the book Hybride bijeenkomsten. Praktische gids voor effectief en sprankelend samenwerken (Hybrid Meetings: Practical Guide for Effective and Dynamic Collaboration). In 2022 she published the Dutch version of her book about Love.

Annemieke about Love@Work

“My focus on happiness and love in the context of work has evolved over the years. It started with the Return on Happiness programme at EHERO, part of Erasmus University in Rotterdam. I took more courses on the subject and started offering workshops about Happiness at Work and supporting organizations to work with it. When a few years later the University offered first a masterclass and later a complete programme about Love at work I was one of the first to attend. I immediately felt I needed to share the knowledge I gathered and the experience I gained. As my fellow student Monique van Strien said to me: ‘You are being moved and then come into action.’ And that’s how it is. Because sharing is multiplying and it brings me closer to my dream: a more loving world in which not the numbers and the cold facts predominate, but in which people genuinely pay attention to each other.”