Happiness Through 80/20 Thinking
From the Happiness PhD Project with Jackson Kerchis...
Do 20% of things lead to 80% of your happiness? Do 20% of things lead to 80% of your unhappiness?
Imagine it’s around the year 1900.
An old Italian economist, named Vilfredo Pareto, is relaxing in his garden. And today he noted something curious. He has 10 plants that have produced about 50 peas. But about 40 of the peas have come from just two of the plants while the other 8 plants barely produced any peas.
He observed this pattern several more times. So, he decided to bring this line of thinking, comparing the distribution of inputs to outputs, into his field. In almost an identical distribution, he found that about 20% of the population in Italy owned 80% of the land. He found that in Britain about 25% of taxpayers accounted for 75% of tax revenue. In the modern world, it looks more like the top 8% own about 85% of total wealth (that’s from Credit Suisse in 2013, estimates vary).
It’s important to note that the distribution is not always 80 to 20 and it need not sum to 100.
For example, it may be that 15% of drivers cause 97% of wrecks. It may be that 5% of your clients contribute 70% of your revenue. It may be that 1% of TV shows get 85% of the viewership.
This concept would go on to be called by several names: the Pareto Principle, the Trivial Many and Vital Few, and the 80/20 Rule (amongst others). It’s now an established concept in fields ranging from economics to management to chaos theory and physics. But what can this do for you?
You tell me...
If you examine your work and life you may find the following to be true. Do approximately 20% of people, situations, or inconveniences contribute 80% of your stress?
Does approximately 20% of your time in a given week contribute 80% of your enjoyment?
Can you identify a few recurring things that lead to the vast majority of the problems in your workplace?
And if you look back over the last few months can you identify just a few things you did or focused on that had the most outsized impact?
The point is, you can apply this way of thinking to better understand your work and life so as to minimize unhappiness and maximize happiness.
your happiness nerd,
Jackson K.
PS I recommend The 80/20 Principle by Richard Koch.
