Cultivating the positive: a small habit with a big impact on your work well-being

Cultivating the positive: a small habit with a big impact on your work well-being | People ACCIONA
Cultivating the positive: a small habit with a big impact on your work well-being
A study reveals how a positive attitude at work impacts on people’s well-being.
There are days when one negative comment can stand out more than the rest. Even if we have received several tokens of appreciation, our attention is often focused on what didn’t turn out as we had hoped or on aspects that could’ve been developed differently.
This inclination to focus on the negative isn‘t accidental: from an evolutionary perspective, what poses a threat captures our attention more quickly because, for millennia, our survival depended on it.
However, this tendency can play tricks on us in contexts such as the professional world, where emotional balance and the ability to maintain a positive attitude at work are key not only to our well-being, but also to the way we relate to others, make decisions and contribute to the team.
What we often overlook is that this attitude can also be trained. And that sometimes the biggest changes begin with a gesture as simple as pausing to reflect on three good things that have happened to us during the day.
What will I read about in this article?
A positive attitude in the workplace starts with a different outlook.
The 3 good things experiment
Does it work the same for everyone?
A positive attitude at work starts with a different look at the world
This natural tendency to focus on what goes wrong also influences our positive attitude at work. Even if something has gone well during the day, it’s easy to forget it in the face of a misunderstanding or The workplace, as a part of life, is no exception.
It’s relatively easy to go to sleep thinking about “the bad thing” that has happened at work: a meeting that didn’t go quite right, a comment we didn’t quite get through, an email with a tone that we thought was too harsh.
Psychology has traditionally been concerned with understanding how negative factors impair a person’s well-being. However, for a couple of decades now, there’s been a boom in positive psychology , which wants to understand what factors
positively affect a person’s life and well-being , outside and inside work.
“Training the mind to recognise the good – however small – can make a major difference to how we feel and act in our work environment.
The simple exercise of the 3 good things
Surprisingly, such a seemingly simple task as reflecting at the end of the day on three good things that have happened to us can have very pleasant consequences.
If maintained with discipline, it will become a habit that can change our outlook on life and foster a positive attitude at work. Reflecting on the good that’s happened to us helps to cultivate an appreciative and grateful outlook on life.
A group of researchers led by Professor Xiaoxiao Hu of West Virginia University wanted to understand the impact of this type of practice.
For seven days, 74 taxi drivers in southern China took part in an experiment: half of them were asked to write down three good things that happened to them during their working day. The aim was to counteract the tendency to focus on the negative and to encourage a positive attitude at work from the everyday.
The authors, based on affective event theory , observed that those who undertook the exercise showed an improvement in their well-being , an increase in behaviours that go beyond their role and a reduction in rule breaking.
A positive attitude at work, therefore, is not only a matter of personal attitude, but a lever for organisational transformation, with benefits for both the individual and the company.
Does it work the same for everyone?
The study also wanted to know if this habit had the same impact on employees with different types of motivation. They found that those with achievement and progress-focused motivation benefited the most.
In them, a positive attitude at work boosted not only their well-being, but also their performance and commitment.
Helping to think positively generates a new sense of well-being, which is transformed into improved behaviours in the workplace.
That’s why it is important for all actors involved in the work system to implement initiatives such as the 3 good things a day , which help to reinforce a positive attitude at work on a sustained basis. By valuing the positive, we not only feel better, but also contribute to more sustainable, humane and productive work environments.
Sources:
Baumeister, R. F., Bratslavsky, E., Finkenauer, C., & Vohs, K. D. (2001). Bad is stronger than good.  Review of general psychology ,  5 (4), 323-370.
Seligman, M. E., Steen, T. A., Park, N., & Peterson, C. (2005). Positive psychology progress: empirical validation of interventions.  American psychologist ,  60 (5), 410.
Hu, X., Zhan, Y., Kim, S. K. I., Jimenez, W. P., & Yao, X. (2025). Don’t leave the good things in the rearview! A field experiment examining the influence of a positive work reflection intervention on taxi drivers’ work behaviors.  Journal of Vocational Behavior ,  156 , 104069.
Weiss, H. M., & Cropanzano, R. (1996). Affective events theory.  Research in organizational behavior ,  18 (1), 1-74.
Dr Marc Grau is Professor of Social and Family Policy at the Education Sciences Faculty, UIC Barcelona, and Coordinator of the Joaquím Molins Figueras Chair for Childcare and Family Policies. He was research fellow at Harvard Kennedy School (2016-2022) and has a Master in Business Administration from ESADE Business School, as well as a Master in Social and Political Science from the University Pompeu Fabra and Doctorate in Social Policy from Edinburgh University. He has published several books, including  The Work-Family Balance in Light of Globalization and Technology  (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2017),  The New Ideal Worker  (Springer, 2019),  Engaged Fatherhood  (Springer, 2022) and Human Flourishing  (Springer, 2023). He is currently Co-Editor of the magazine Community, Work and Family .
I accept the  Information on data protection
Information on data protection
In compliance with Regulation (EU) 2016/679 on Data Protection and with other Data Protection regulations in force, you are hereby informed that your personal data shall be processed by Acciona, S.A. (hereinafter “ACCIONA”), whose identification data are as follows: Tax ID No. (NIF): A08001851; Address: Avenida de la Gran Vía de Hortaleza, 3, 28033 (Madrid); Tel. No.: +34 91 663 28 50; email: protecciondedatos@acciona.com. Your data shall be processed in order to send you information, through the subscription to our Newsletter through electronic means, regarding our latest technological innovation of ACCIONA´s initiative “PEOPLE”.
The consent given by the data subject by indicating that they have read and accept this data protection information comprises the lawfulness of processing. The data provide is your email address. If you fails to provide the required data, the subscription Request cannot be satisfied. We may also process your satisfaction or preferences, if you voluntarily respond to surveys. Data shall be stored until the elimination is requested.
In order to carry out our purpose, we may give access to your data to service providers (such as technology service providers) who assist us in fulfilling this purpose. Some of its service providers, may be located outside of the European Economic Area in territories that do not offer a level of data protection that is comparable to that of the European Union. In such cases, we transfer User data with appropriate safeguards and always ensuring the security of the same.
The data subject can exercise their rights of access to or rectification, erasure or portability of their data, and/or the restriction of or objection to the processing of such data, by contacting Acciona, S.A. by writing the Department of Data Protection located at Avenida de la Gran Vía de Hortaleza, 3, 28033 (Madr…

Text scraped from the landing page for research purposes. © respective owners. This text is sourced from the advertiser's public landing page; for removal, contact dmca@luba.media.