How Hiring a Chief Happiness Officer Can Save Your Business

What is a chief happiness officer?

A chief happiness officer (CHO) is a C-suite executive dedicated to ensuring employees are happy, engaged and fulfilled in their roles. Since people spend roughly one-third of their lives at work, the experience should be about more than completing tasks for a paycheck: It should feel meaningful and rewarding. A CHO helps make that happen by shaping a workplace where employees feel valued, supported and motivated to do their best work.

Common CHO responsibilities include:

• Measuring employee happiness across individuals, teams and departments.
• Developing programs and initiatives that promote well-being and a happy and productive work culture.
• Coaching managers on effective communication and leadership styles.
• Training employees in skills like communication, workplace conflict resolution and stress management.
• Collaborating one-on-one with team members to build personalized happiness strategies.
• Supporting professional growth and ongoing development opportunities.
• Identifying problem areas where satisfaction or engagement is slipping.
• Encouraging open feedback and frequent, meaningful conversations across all levels of the organization.

If your company is struggling with retention or simply wants to enhance employee well-being, bringing on a CHO could yield measurable — and happy — results.

How can a chief happiness officer help your business?

If you’re on the fence about hiring a CHO, it’s worth understanding the real impact they can have on your organization. Research from the University of Oxford Wellbeing Research Centre and other institutions makes it clear: Prioritizing employee well-being isn’t just good ethics — it’s good business.

Here are a few key ways CHOs help the companies they serve:

1. CHOs enhance employee motivation, performance and productivity.

A CHO’s primary goal is to boost employee engagement, happiness and satisfaction. Happier workers tend to be more motivated, perform better and stay productive longer. In fact, the University of Oxford’s Wellbeing Research Centre (cited above) found that companies with the highest levels of well-being outperform standard stock market benchmarks and report higher productivity and gross profits.

By contrast, productivity-killing workplace stress drains focus, dampens motivation and increases the likelihood of mistakes or tense interactions. With a CHO helping to reduce stress and strengthen satisfaction, employees are better equipped to stay engaged and perform at their best, creating a win for both morale and the bottom line.

2. CHOs reduce employee burnout.

Employee burnout can start small, but if left unchecked, it can quietly erode morale, productivity and retention. A CHO can work closely with staff to identify early warning signs and help stop burnout before it takes hold.

Research published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine (2025) found that burnout costs U.S. employers billions each year, with about 10.5 percent of those losses tied to absenteeism and employee turnover. In other words, when companies take steps to lower burnout, they also see fewer missed workdays and less voluntary turnover, both of which directly boost profitability.

3. CHOs promote employee health and well-being.

Preventing burnout is one way to promote employee wellness, but a CHO can do much more than that. They can work with staff to identify and provide the benefits, resources and support employees need to stay physically and mentally healthy. This might include mindfulness and meditation programs, wellness programs, fitness or exercise challenges, and initiatives that encourage rest and recovery.

The World Economic Forum’s 2025 Future of Jobs Report found that 64 percent of employers now identify supporting employee health and well-being as a top strategy for improving talent availability. This is a clear recognition that healthier, happier employees show better attendance, resilience and long-term retention. Companies that prioritize well-being aren’t just helping workers thrive; they’re also creating stronger, more sustainable organizations.

4. CHOs encourage employee growth and development.

Today’s workers expect more than a paycheck: They want opportunities to learn, grow and advance. Providing clear paths for professional development helps you keep great employees while also building future leaders within your organization. A CHO can play a key role here by maintaining high satisfaction and ensuring employees have access to meaningful growth opportunities.

A joint TalentLMS and Vyond survey found that 66 percent of U.S. employees believe they need new skills to succeed at work, and 41 percent said they’d look for another job this year if their company didn’t offer training opportunities. Likewise, iHire’s 2024 Talent Retention Report revealed that 11 percent of employees left jobs due to limited professional development, while more than 60 percent said access to training and growth opportunities would motivate them to stay.

When professional growth is part of your culture — and championed by a CHO — employees feel valued, engaged and invested in your company’s long-term success.

5. CHOs foster teamwork and a positive company culture.

Strong relationships between employees and managers amid a workplace built on trust, belonging and shared values can make a huge difference in performance and innovation. A CHO can help cultivate that environment by championing collaboration, psychological safety and mutual respect across teams.

According to How Employers Can Improve Productivity and Change Lives (a 2025 World Economic Forum report), investing in workplace connection and well-being can improve returns, boost productivity and lower costs. Likewise, Gallup’s Global Indicator on organizational culture found that employees who feel strongly connected to their culture are 4.3 times more likely to be engaged, 62 percent less likely to feel burned out and 47 percent less likely to be looking for a new job. 

6. CHOs reduce employee tardiness and absenteeism.

Employee tardiness and workplace absenteeism can quietly drain productivity, morale and resources across an organization. When a team member is consistently late or missing work, a CHO can step in to uncover the root cause and collaborate on meaningful solutions, whether that means addressing burnout, workload imbalance or personal stressors.

According to research from the University of Oxford Wellbeing Research Centre (cited above), happier employees are less likely to call in sick and more likely to stay engaged at work. The study also found that when overall well-being improves, both absenteeism and presenteeism — when employees show up but feel unwell or disengaged — tend to drop. That combination leads to stronger performance, higher morale and a healthier bottom line.

7. CHOs increase employee recruitment and retention.

Employees want to work for organizations that prioritize their happiness, and that trend is only growing stronger. The World Economic Forum’s 2025 Future of Jobs Report (cited above) found that employers investing in people-centric strategies like well-being, inclusion and continuous learning see stronger recruitment and retention outcomes, as these efforts improve both employer branding and culture. In simple terms, happier employees are less likely to leave, and organizations that value well-being are more appealing to high performers.

Even if you manage to attract great employees without focusing on happiness, you likely won’t keep them for long. While employees quit for many reasons, according to Indeed’s 2025 Work Wellbeing Insights Report (cited above), 18 percent of employees look for other jobs simply because they aren’t happy at work, while other top reasons include lack of job satisfaction (20 percent) and feeling stressed at work (24 percent). These are all issues a CHO can help address head-on — improving retention, morale and your company’s overall reputation as a great place to work.

Should all companies have a chief happiness officer?

As with most things in business, whether your company needs a CHO depends on your specific goals and resources. Some leaders see the role as unnecessary, arguing that engagement, wellness and culture responsibilities already fall under the CEO or chief human resources officer. Others believe a CHO is essential for driving morale and long-term success.

For small businesses or larger enterprises with the hiring process resources to add high-level staff, a CHO can make a real impact by keeping employee well-being front and center. This is especially valuable for organizations that define their brand around employee experience.

If you’re running a lean startup, though, you probably don’t have the budget for an executive solely dedicated to happiness. In that case, it’s still crucial to make employee satisfaction a priority, even if those responsibilities are shared among managers or taken on by leadership directly.

What companies have a chief happiness officer?

The CHO role has grown in popularity over the past decade, and many leading organizations now have executives or teams dedicated to employee well-being, even if their titles vary.

Here are some well-known companies with positions focused on employee happiness and well-being:

• Airbnb: Global Head of Employee Experience
• Coca-Cola: Vice President, Global Benefits & Well-Being
• Deloitte: Chief Well-Being Officer
• Ernst & Young: Chief Well-Being Officer
• Google: Chief People Officer
• Mount Sinai Health System: Chief Wellness Officer
• Rakuten: Chief Well-Being Officer
• Salesforce: SVP of Employee Success
• SAP: Head of Humanizing Business
• Siemens: Head of Psychosocial Health and Well-Being
• TikTok: Wellbeing Strategy & Innovation Leader
• Unilever: Chief Health & Well-Being Officer

These businesses’ continuing success is proof that it can be beneficial to invest in your employees’ happiness and well-being.

How do you measure employee happiness?

Tracking employee happiness should be an ongoing effort, not a once-a-year box to check. Here are a few practical ways to measure employee happiness:

• Ask your employees: The most direct way to gauge happiness is simply to ask. Your CHO and other leaders can gather consistent feedback through one-on-one check-ins, pulse surveys and anonymous feedback forms. According to Gallup, employees who have one meaningful conversation with their manager each week are 80 percent more likely to be engaged and perform at a high level. These regular check-ins help employees feel heard and valued — two key ingredients of happiness at work.
• Observe your employees: You can also assess happiness by paying attention to day-to-day behavior. High productivity, strong collaboration and a generally positive attitude are good indicators that employees are engaged and content.
• Track workforce trends: Attendance and retention can reveal a great deal. Are people showing up on time, staying with the company long-term and performing well? If you see increased tardiness, absenteeism or turnover, especially in certain departments, it’s a sign that morale should be addressed.

Combining these methods gives you a well-rounded picture of how happy — or unhappy — your employees are, and where your CHO’s efforts can make the biggest impact.