The end of the year most often finds me reflecting on the year that’s ending and planning for the year ahead.  I can’t help it.  It’s just the way I’m wired.  Over the past ten years or so my year end reflection considers what I’ve accomplished and how I handled (or not) situations and people that used to have me baffled, frustrated or both.

I love Producthunt.com for the work they to do track new apps.  I subscribe to their Daily Digest and one this week caught my eye because it calls out the trend of Quantified Self: the ability to collect data on yourself for the purpose of tracking aspects of your life you feel need tracking.  Believe me when I tell you that you can track almost any aspect of yourself.  A sample from the site include:

Capsule.ai – the app that helps you remember everywhere.

8,760 Hours 2.0 – How to get the most out of next year.

Forksy – А chat bot for tracking calories and eating healthy.

Joy – Track and improve your mental health.

Fitmeal – Keep track of what you eat via Messenger.

Instant 4.0 – Google Analytics for your life, now with a chatbot coach.

The Gyroscope App – See the complete story of your life.

Gratefulness – Learning to be grateful, one text reminder at a time.

Exist for iOS – Personal analytics to help you understand your life.

Dreampire – The first audiovisual dream-sharing network.

Releaf – a thoughtful approach to cannabis treatment.  Mindful management of your medical marijuana.

On one hand I see the attractiveness of having an app track a piece of yourself or your whole self, however it begs the question: Now that you have all that data, what are you going to do with it?  

I see the same thing in the small business realm – the tools and means are available for most small businesses to capture relevant data about their operation and their customers, but once they capture it the data sits on a hard drive with no one to review it, analyze it, think about the implications of the analysis, and take steps to improve the business as a result of the analysis.

I’m not knocking the apps above or any app that can provide a person data on an aspect of their life they find important, however if the individual isn’t prepared to review the data, analyze it objectively, develop conclusions and take steps to improve their life, maybe resolutions are the easier, quicker way to go.  For me, I’ll grab another cup of tea and finish my reflection and begin my plan for 2017.  

Happy New Year.