Counting change

So after you have become the change you want to see in the world, after you have gotten things moving and after you have begun your "impact", till when do you continue what you started? How do you know if doing something differently can create more "impact"? Where do you improvise and course-correct?

That can be tricky. Establishing a sound model for measuring change might not be the simplest task but delving straight into execution without one in place is only an effort well-wasted. The key to making an effort count for is to make its results countable. It holds true for almost anything that you might want to change. They now have scale-o-meters even for fairness creams and whitening toothpastes!

Here's my 2-step guide to making your own change-counting model,

• Make a metric system – Define numeric parameters that will indicate progress or not. For instance, a tutor uses the reading speed of the kids in her classroom as a parameter to measure her impact. A good metric system gives the advantage of setting quantifiable goals – when has ‘must reach X number in Y time’ not helped?

• Don’t forget a peer comparator – Always make room for measuring how peers are faring w.r.t. the parameters in the metric system. States of more, less and equal impact are all useful indicators. For instance, if a kid in a tutor’s classroom has the same improvement in reading speed as any other kid of the same age, then where’s the impact? 

'Busy'ness

I often wonder what is Seth Godin's typical day like or whether the concept of a typical day even exists for him. And yet amidst his daily entrepreneur+author+thinker superhuman day, he 'ships' blog posts so frequently as if they were tweets. Maybe his brilliant blog posts are really the usual stuff that's 'on his mind' but the point is as Seth very succinctly puts it - It's all about shipping! Quieting the lizard brain to get things moving and it pretty much applies to everything right from an amazing start-up idea to the long-lived intention of penning down your head onto your own blog.

Now that I have your attention, let me probe further into our sense of 'busy'ness. Let's just for sometime agree that doing a full-time job doesn't afford energy for non-work-related interests during weekdays. However, mostly everyone has 2 full days off every week and invariably everyone has a wishful list of want-to-dos. Typical items featuring on that close-to-heart list are start a hobby, read more, practice a sport or volunteer for a cause. Sigh! but who's got the time for it? Umm..the weekends are practically a third of our lifetime and yet the weekends are somehow not enough! Or is it that 'feeling' busy makes for a convenient way to explain inaction? Is "I don't have enough time" just a deluded version of "I have not been able to get myself to do it yet"? Is the real problem with not having enough free slots for the dear wish-list or is it with what actually makes it to those free slots? And I'll leave it at that.

Towards better design..

Let's talk about focusing on the design of a solution. The Russians nailed it when they used pencils in space - my first lesson in focusing on the solution instead of the problem. However, in designing solutions to problems, a third option tends to add to the confusion - the problem, the solution and the 'cleanup'. In the context of Russian space research,

- Not being able to record data in zero-gravity space is analogous to the problem.

- The pencil is analogous to the solution.

- NASA trying to invent techniques to somehow make sense out of bad data recorded with an earthy pen!

Well that in all its absurdity is analogous to the cleanup and it tends to creep into most designs. The cleanup solution, as usual, has its attractive instant gratification but neither does it solve the actual problem of 'not being able to record data' nor does it stop the bad data from coming in. The mess persists forever!

In a community initiative, if an NGO invests more on tending to its subjects (say poor/abused/sick) than on reducing the possibility of more subjects being generated, then it has fallen into the cleanup trap of solution designing. Time to realign its focus!

Two good questions to ask for validating a design D: 

• 
  
  Does D help me get what I want (space research data/welfare of subjects)?
• 
  
  Will D take me closer to ending what I am trying to fight (bad data/poverty/crime)?

Success if both affirmative!

The power of the band

Silicone wristbands, more popularly known as the awareness bracelets have become a way to express loyalty to a cause or belongingness to a community. My personal favorites are Lance Armstrong's LiveStrong bands and these.

One day over lunch, one thing led to another and a new band idea was born. We all mortals, at some point in time are on the usual diet control regimen imposed on us by self/doctor. So at any given place, the number of people on a diet is mostly huge enough to form a local support system and in moments of temptation and weakness, all diet-ers could use a little push or some may even do better with the feeling of being watched over.

A lot is possible with 'I am on a diet' bands! Imagine the Subway guy at the office cafeteria regulating the mayo on your sub taking a hint from your wrist band. Or picture an onlooker giving you a kind look to back you fight the chocolate bar at the supermarket. I know fellow foodies understand what I am trying to say.

I thought I should establish our IPR on this idea ASAP. In all its humour, due credit also goes to my friends Dhruv and Suhas.