"But it's an ever-moving target and the happiness you feel from achieving a target - nailing a sales goal, a promotion or getting published - is only fleeting until the next target comes in.
"I spent years working in a sales-based organisation and you would see the salespeople working their socks off towards year-end trying to hit their target.
"Yes, there would be celebrations and pats on the back - and then the clock gets reset and they are back to square one."
Instead we should learn to enjoy the ongoing journey to success.
"An ancient Greek definition of happiness is the joy that you feel striving towards your potential. It's that lovely old quote that 'happiness is not a destination, it is a journey'."
She outlines the four sustainers of happiness:
"Optimism is number one - believing that what you do makes a difference.
"The second is social connections, the breadth and depth of our relationships. The human being is wired to be a social animal.
"Number three is the way we perceive stress - if we perceive stresses as challenges instead of threats. We know that too little stress leads to poor performance just as much as too much stress.
"The trick is to get that sweet spot in the middle so you can perform at your potential.
"A lot of people don't have a good understanding of their personal optimal level of stress.
"It is well known that the happiest people are the ones striving for the more challenging goals, who feel they are making a difference.
"The fourth is about meaning, the connections between our values and our actions. That purpose - what is it that gets you out of bed in the morning?"
But surely some people find happiness more easily than others?
"We all have individual variations and, yes, some people are half-full and some are half-empty personalities.
"If you start from a positive place it is easier to maintain it.
"If you think about the laws of physics, the moment of inertia is always the hardest thing to overcome. If you can start with momentum, it becomes easier."
While defining happiness is could be argued to be abstract, she says it is relatively easy to scale people's happiness levels.
"If I was saying to 100 people: On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being low, everybody would give me their own sense of happy against their perception. Perception is reality. If you perceive yourself to be a happy person, then you are a happyperson.
"But how often do people consciously think about their levels of happiness? It is really only when you are in distress that you actually think 'I'm not happy'.
"Quoting Shakespeare's Hamlet: 'There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so'."
Another helpful assessment of work satisfaction is to identify the split of cross-energy.
"You basically have two tanks of energy - your flow tank for things that come naturally to you and your boost tank for doing tasks that don't come naturally.
"For example, for me it is attention to detail, putting calendar invites in the diary, email follow-ups - not my favourite thing to do but I know I have to do it and I use my boost energy to get me through that task. Then I am back on to the next enjoyable task.
What is the ideal ratio? "75/25, but if you are using more boost than flow energy that sounds like a mismatch of skills. That would put that person into stress or distress and they are far less likely to be happy.
"I come back to the four qualities that define happiness:optimism, social connection, the way we perceive stress and meaning.
"When you surround yourself with people who believe what you believe, that is when you start getting into the flow, the work is effortless, doing what you love and that is when you become happy."
If employees decide they would be happier in another role, they need to carry out due diligence before moving on.
"Most people generally know when it is the right time to leave. Leave when you have done everything you wanted to do, but don't leave it too late.
"By the time you get disengaged, you are starting to do damage to your personal employment brand.
"New Zealand is small and workplace And, again, look for an alignment of values in your new role.
"Look for a company that has a good track record of putting the things first that you would also put first.
"Because we live in New Zealand we can ask around and most people will have an opinion on the company or people you want to work with.
You can get that more personal in-depth information. So look at things like engagements.
"If a company does measure and track and care about engagement that is usually a good sign that they care about employee happiness. An engaged employee tends to be a happy employee."
