Gained some insight about how to get more out of giving while reading Adam Grant's book Give and Take. He cites an experiment which showed that individuals who "chunked" their giving into one day were significantly happier than those who "sprinkled" their acts of kindness across many days.
It was supposed that grouping, clustering, or chunking of acts of kindness created more impact and satisfaction for the person doing the giving, while doing one small thing daily across five days it was harder to see the impact and gain a sense of satisfaction.
This is not to say that one should be kind only once per week. Building a habit requires repetition and reinforcement. The point is to chunk your kindness into a large enough amount to have an impact, to create satisfaction and to build motivation for the giver to give the next chunk.
The lean analogue is to work in a continuous flow until the results of one's work can be confirmed. Did it meet the customer requirement? Was it completed on time? Do I feel good about this? What can I do better next time?
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