Not Happy? Relaaaxxx. Or Don't...It Hardly Matters

In an ongoing dialogue with my laptop, the General Social Survey and RStudio, I have uncovered another simple measurement: hours spent relaxing on a typical work day and reported levels of happiness.

If you look at the first column in the table below, you will find the number of reported hours spent relaxing per typical work day for a survey respondent. Then, the following three columns are the respondent's reported levels of happiness, with "1" corresponding to "Very Happy", "2" corresponding to "Pretty Happy," and "3" corresponding to "Not Too Happy."

The people who are relaxing 0 hours a day, myself included, are by and large reporting themselves as being "Pretty Happy."

The happiest people? Around 40% of the "Very" happiest people report having three to four hours of relaxation per typical work day. But then again, look at the "Very Unhappy" people in column 4: they majority of them relax two to five hours a day, too!!

So happy people and unhappy people alike seem to relax. It doesn't have much of a relationship to happiness, whatever the yoga studios are telling us.

The More Asian Friends You Have, the Less TV You Watch (And Other Statistical Curiosities)

I have a small addiction to Korean soap operas. They are so good. My favorites are "My Love From Another Star," and "When a Man Loves."

And, independently, I have a lot of Asian American friends, whom I adore.

Recently, two things have come to my attention. The first: since I've graduated from college, the number of friends of mine who are Asian or Asian-American has gone way up. The second: I watch no TV at all. Except for my bonanza runs of Korean dramas every so often, I have no time for it.

According to statistics, I do actually fall outside American TV watching tendencies. In fact, I just analyzed the relationship, using  the the General Social Survey,  I looked at two variables: number of TV hours watched per week, on average, and the number of Asian acquaintances.

What I found was that the less hours that a respondent said they watched per week, the more Asian acquaintances they also happened to have, on average.

For example, among those who listed "0 hours" of TV watched usually per week, the average number of Asian acquaintances respondents had was 2.95. Look at the table below for yourself, and you'll see that as the number of TV hours watched per week increases, the number of Asian friends a person has decreases. And vice versa.

If that seems like an inconclusive relationship, okay. Since we're having fun here, how about we look at the number of years of education respondents had on average, analyzed according to the number of Asian acquaintances they said they had...

If you look at the number of Asian "pals" a person said they had in the middle column, you will see that the more Asian friends a person has, the higher their education level, on average. So an education of "12" means that they have finished the senior year in high school. An education level of "14" means that they have finished another two years of community college or vocational training. And an education level of "16" would indicate that the respondent has finished four years of college after high school. 

Last week, I did some studies on women and harassment in the workplace, which I may post if I have time later.

Tip of the Day: 4 Easy Steps to Doing Anything Better

Today, my tip is about improving your work life (and eventually, your personal life, too). It's 4 easy steps involving planning, communicating, doing the plan and reviewing the plan for improvement. It could also be build, reveal, share and improve.

4 Easy (EASY!) Steps:

1. Plan
2. Communicate
3. Do
4. Refine

Each of the four stages has its own components.

For Planning, you need to make sure that:

• The plan fits your overall goals for the project / organization
• The plan fits within your values (i.e. timeliness, excellence, providing more than was asked for)
• The plan has clearly defined what will be done, who will do each part, when each part will be done, and what resources/information is necessary to start / finish the project

For Communicate, you have to make sure that you communicate your plan to

• The people above you,
• The people affected by your decisions or waiting on your project,
• The people working with you who need to do some part of the plan, and
• The people outside of the organization that might need to know.

Figuring out who will be affected by your plan, and who is waiting on it is a good process.

For Doing the Plan, you have to have a good to do list that is clear and in logical order. Nobody can do everything at once. Do you shampoo your hair, dry your hair and then put conditioner in it? No! There is a sequence that makes everything more efficient!

1. First, do this.
2. At the same time, start this.
3. Then, once #1 has been completed, do this.

Some things can be done simultaneously (at the same time), but other things happen sequentially (one followed by another). You should draw "Flow Charts" to figure out where the bottle necks will be in your plan, and make sure that you address potential obstacles early on.

For Refining the Plan, you want to think about the process you used, the people and situations you took into account as you communicated and performed each task.

Ask:

• Where did you lose time?
• Who did you have to wait for before getting started?
• What made the plan hardest to accomplish?
• What do you know now that can help you next time you do something?

The planing process can help you in personal and professional matters. From the way you make your breakfast (do you start the stove fire first or get your ingredients out of the refrigerator first), to the way you schedule your free time (do you set personal goals for the 1-year, 5-year, 10-year?), to the way you respond to emails from colleagues and employers.

The more often you take your "PROCESS" outside of your head and put it on paper to analyze, the more improvement you will see over time.