Empowerment and support of senior management in promoting happiness at work

Purpose Happiness at work is a critical element of workers' performance; in this sense, it is necessary to analyse the conditions that increase employees' subjective well-being. Therefore, the purpose of this paper was to determine the relationship between the autonomy provided to employees and the support of top management on happiness at work. Design/methodology/approach This research was quantitative, non-experimental and cross-sectional in design. The data collection instrument was a questionnaire based on validated instruments in their respective fields. This instrument was applied to a sample of 603 workers from companies in different sectors of the north-western border of Mexico. For the validity of the measurement construct, exploratory factor analysis was carried out using the principal components method; Cronbach's alpha tests were applied to assess the reliability of the instrument and to determine the relationship of the variables in this study, the multiple linear regression techniques were used using the least-squares method. Findings The results suggest that autonomy and support positively and statistically significantly influence the levels of happiness manifested in the workforce. It concludes with the importance of valuing practical organisational governance actions to increase happiness in the workforce. Research limitations/implications In this research, the study of happiness is limited to a non-probabilistic sample. Employees from the northwest border of Mexico were surveyed, so the results cannot be generalised to all territories. In addition, the research explains happiness at work based on only two variables of organisational behaviour. A thorough analysis of this behaviour is recommended through new research methods and techniques and the adoption of integrative models. Practical implications The results of this study facilitate decision-making by the top managers of the company, especially about the promotion of actions of best business practices that create a harmonious state among its workers and that finally allow the company an improvement in their performance. Social implications This study facilitates the understanding of happiness in workers from the actions of senior managers, so it can be used in the justification of programs for the development and retention of human talent. Originality/value This study was based on a systematic review of the existing bibliography in the leading scientific repositories such as WOS and Scopus. It was found that in the study of happiness at work, just under 400 documents were found under the terms associated with Happiness Business. Therefore, the importance of contributing to the construction of theory on the subject is highlighted by studying new predictors in various contexts and territories.