Counting Steps, Gaining Insights: A 100-Day Walking Challenge

For those who have been reading my newsletter regularly, you probably know that I am a marathon runner and a fairly active person. Over the last few years, my Garmin watch has faithfully recorded my steps, and I walk (or run) an average of about 12,000 - 13,000 steps a day. On days when I do my long run, I might get well over 30,000 steps, while on days when I am traveling on long-haul flights or when it's raining, I might get fewer than 2,000 steps. For the three months this summer, I challenged myself to get a minimum of 10,000 steps daily, and I reached exactly 100 consecutive days of meeting that goal before my trip to Europe.

Here are a few interesting observations from this mini-experiment about performance measurement and target setting:

• Daily vs. Average Targets: Meeting a daily target is much more challenging than meeting an average target. When focusing on an average, I pay less attention to the specific numbers and concentrate more on the activity itself. In contrast, focusing on a daily target makes me pay more attention to the numbers, which can make the activity less enjoyable.
• Building Resilience and Perseverance: Focusing on the daily target helps develop resilience and perseverance. It's not hard to get 10,000 steps when I go out for a run. However, on hot and humid days in Texas, or when it's pouring rain, it is much more difficult to get the steps in. It is exactly these challenging moments that help build discipline and resilience. Life is not easy.
• Creativity in Meeting Goals: When focusing on an average target, I sometimes find excuses to take it easy. With a daily target, I become more creative in finding ways to meet the goal. If it's raining, I can always go to the gym and run a few miles on a treadmill. If it's too hot, I can get up early to get my steps in before the temperature rises.

Performance measurement and target-setting are important for exercise, personal development, and any business process. While individuals and many small businesses can operate quite comfortably without formal measurement or target-setting, controlling these processes is indispensable for any serious personal endeavor or business activity. Knowing how different areas of your business are performing is valuable information in its own right, but a good measurement system also lets you examine the triggers for any changes in performance. This puts you in a better position to manage your performance proactively.

One of the key challenges with performance management is selecting what to measure. The key is to identify and focus on quantifiable factors that are clearly linked to the drivers of success in your endeavor. Different target settings will drive different personal or organizational behaviors.

As an example, the famous college entrance exams in many Asian countries, including China, reward high-performing students but also drive students to focus excessively on exam taking rather than problem-solving. On the other hand, the "No Child Left Behind" (NCLB) policy implemented in the United States around 2000 pressures schools to guarantee that nearly all students meet the minimum skill levels (set by each state) in reading, writing, and arithmetic—but requires nothing beyond these minima. It provides no incentives to improve student achievement beyond the bare minimum. As a result, programs not essential for achieving mandated minimum skills were neglected by those districts due to budget constraints. In particular, NCLB does not require any programs for gifted, talented, and other high-performing students.

Another industrial example is Toyota’s famous lean manufacturing system, which rigorously identifies and eliminates any activities that do not add value to the product or service, including overproduction, waiting, transportation, extra processing, inventory, motion, and defects. The combination of these processes with just-in-time production reduces excess inventory and ensures a smooth flow of materials through the production process, which is a key reason behind Toyota’s success in becoming the world’s number one car manufacturer around 2008.

Returning to my walking example, it turns out that the notion of walking 10,000 steps a day originated from a marketing campaign by a Japanese pedometer company before the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. Some argue that it lacks sufficient scientific support. My assumption is that staying active is more likely than not to be beneficial for both physical and mental health. Whether you aim for 10,000 steps daily or on average, it probably won't make much difference to your physical health. However, it will drive you to adopt different behaviors.

So, watch your steps!

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