Category: “Personal Productivity”

I don’t know if everyone is able to feel it, but happiness at work exists. Most of us have experienced what Mihály Csíkszentmihályi calls a state of flow, a time when you’re absorbed in your creativity and feel a great satisfaction developing your work. Even if you are working, those moments of happiness are perfectly comparable to those you spend with your family and friends.

All of us, some more than others, are victims of the default effect. When we have a lot of options to choose from, among which there’s a predetermined one—a default choice—most of us just go with the standard option. In other words, we choose not to choose.

“Satisficing” is a term that the economist Herbert Simon coined in 1956. It’s actually a cross between the words “satisfying” and “sufficing”, and comes to say that when we have to make a decision, we generally don’t waste much time evaluating all possible options, we just choose the first reasonable option we find.

When we are working usually there’s a background noise intermittently distracting us and hindering us from finishing the task at hand. Whenever a noise or an outside conversation distracts you, your brain suffers a small disconnection from the task at hand and you will need a few seconds—sometimes it can be minutes—to reconnect and continue the task from the point where you had stopped.

In 2010, a group of economists carried out a study in order to find a way to encourage teachers of the American educational system to make greater efforts, deliver more and better knowledge and, therefore, make students reach a higher level of academic performance.