How Tracking 'Small Wins' Makes You Happier and More Productive

Theresa Amabile, professor and director of research at Harvard Business School, studies how everyday work life can influence people and their performance. In this talk based on her current research, she discusses the importance of measuring progress, documenting challenges, and taking time to reflect by using a daily work diary. She suggests that everyday at around the same time, take ten minutes to unwind, reflect and write down what accomplishments you made that day, obstacles you overcame, and issues that may have been resolved. Amabile says that rather than focusing on the big wins, tracking the small accomplishments keeps us going and actually makes us happier and more motivated. The diary also acts as a tool to look back and see how you are progressing. She reccomends using a medium you enjoy writing in, like the app iDone This, a regular notebook, or this intersting alternative: the Five Year Diary - each page devoted to one day of the year and subdivided into five sections, so that as time goes by, past entries can be read as the new ones are written.