How to decrease the stress in a business start-up, by Gozoop’s Rohan Bhansali

Life in a start-up is demanding and stressful; this isn't breaking news. What most people don't realise though, is that stress can kill a start-up just as easily as anything else. Stress can have a detrimental effect on an individual’s performance and can consequently progress into negatively affecting the larger team. Hence this needs to be dealt with consciously.

Now we may not be able to eliminate work pressure completely, especially in a start-up, but we can certainly do things to make the work environment more happy and positive.

I am going to share some of the things we do to lighten up the environment at Gozoop. I am going to let the pictures speak:

1. Cupcake surprises. Bansi, our Happiness Officer, delivers random cupcakes surprises to our team.

2. Make greeting cards for each other. This is Jeff playing Secret Santa to someone within Gozoop.

3. Showcase our culinary talent. Suraj enjoying the #PotLunch.

4. FoosBall mashups. Randomly pair people for a Winner Takes it all Foosball match.

5. Instant photo sessions. We did this random session in the middle of a very regular Tuesday. Props provided by Happiness Officer.

6. Do something fun and good. This is us spending time with the children of Mother Theresa's Missionary at Vile Parle. The kids spent more than an hour on the Talking Tom application.

7. Cricket. #GozoopPremierLeague.

8. Themed Saturdays. Gozoop goes traditional.

9. Donut treats. This is when our client, Mad Over Donuts, sent donuts for the entire team on my birthday. Free donuts taste so much better.

10. Fine dine Saturdays. We make whacky desserts and sandwiches for each other - ice cream toppings can range from oreo biscuits to green chillies.

A lot of these activities are simple. Maybe that's why they go a long way in improving the work culture. One Wednesday we got the entire team together on the pretext of a serious team meeting and started making crank calls to each other's friends. It was awesome!

You can see some of the other fun random things we have done on our Facebook page.

Rohan Bhansali is CEO of Gozoop