A new study (PDF) by Christian Krekel, George Ward and Jan-Emmanuael de Neve finds a link between employee happiness and business success. “The study, based on data compiled by Gallup, a polliging organization, covers nearly 1.9 million employees across 230 separate organizations in 73 countries,” reports The Economist. From the report: The authors studied four potential measures of corporate performance: customer loyalty, employee productivity, profitability and staff turnover. They found that employee satisfaction had a substantial positive correlation with customer loyalty and a negative link with staff turnover. Furthermore, worker satisfaction was correlated with higher productivity and profitability. Of course, correlation does not prove causality. It could be that working for a successful firm makes employees more contented, rather than the other way round. However, the authors cite studies of changes within individual firms and organizations which seem to show that improvements in employee morale precede gains in productivity, rather than the other way round.

What might explain the link? One school of thought, known as human relations theory, has long argued that higher employee well-being is associated with higher productivity, not least because happy workers are less prone to absenteeism or quitting. However, as the authors of the paper admit, there is very little research on the best measures that managers can take to improve employee well-being, or indeed which are the most cost-effective. Rather like the judge’s famous dictum about obscenity, a well-run company may be hard to define but we can recognize it when we see it. Workers will be well informed about a company’s plans and consulted about the roles they will play. Staff will feel able to raise problems with managers without fearing for their jobs. Bullying and sexual harassment will not be permitted. Employees may work hard, but they will be allowed sufficient time to recuperate, and enjoy time with their families. In short, staff will be treated as people, not as mere accounting units.

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Source: Slashdot – Employee Happiness and Business Success Are Linked, Study Finds

The University of California is suing five major retailers, including Amazon, Walmart, Target, IKEA, and Bed Bath & Beyond, for infringing on four patents related to “filament” LED light bulbs. Reuters reports: These patents relate to what the university called the “reinvention of the light bulb” by researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara led by professor Shuji Nakamura, who won the 2014 Nobel prize for physics. The university is seeking unspecified damages, including royalties, in lawsuits filed with the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, and wants the retailers to enter license agreements. It has also asked the U.S. International Trade Commission to open a probe into the retailers’ conduct, saying the retailers have failed to require their suppliers to honor the university’s patents.

Filament LED light bulbs are sometimes called “Edison” or “vintage” bulbs because they resemble light bulbs created by Thomas Edison that have glowing filaments visible inside. According to the university’s lawyers at Nixon Peabody, the litigation is the first-of-its-kind “direct patent enforcement” campaign against an entire industry. The university said it was intended “to spearhead a broader, national response to the existential threat” posed by the “widespread disregard” for the patent rights of universities, including when schools encourage the private sector to develop commercial products containing their research.

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Source: Slashdot – University of California Sues Five Major Retailers Over Edison-Style LED Bulbs