Positive Reinforcement
Yesterday I went to work a little early, and because it was the first Monday in November traffic was light. (For those who don’t know, the Melbourne Cup is run on the first Tuesday in November, and it is a public holiday. Many workers give themselves a four day weekend by taking Monday on Annual Leave. Hence, little traffic.) In the couple of months since I have been driving our “new” car to work, I’ve played a game of minimising fuel consumption, keeping score by watching the car’s computer. Yesterday was a record.
This made me think of the role that analysis of performance plays in my life. One area is that each year I run the Melbourne Marathon, and every year I recognise that training must commence immediately if I want to run an acceptable time. When I start training, distances are short, times are slow. Nothing is written down. When fitness increases, I start recording training in a diary - now Excel but originally a paper diary. The fitter I get, the more detail and analysis goes into the spreadsheet which becomes a motivator - “I can’t miss training today, because the 7 day rolling average would drop.” A couple of years ago, my training was so bad that no diary survives. In a slightly different class, Robert de Castella went over 1000 days in a row where he ran at least twice.
I assume the Weight Watchers organisation uses the weekly weighings for a similar reason. Those participants who succeed will do so at least in part because of seeing the achievement of weekly successes, each of which will be small, but the cumulative effect can be the desired weight reduction.
Here comes the commercial. The Home Energy Analysis System can operate in the same way by enabling monitoring of energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions. The graphs available will soon show changes by day, week or month. Stick them on the refrigerator so that the whole family can see what is happening.