Instead of Making New Year Resolutions, Try a VE Study of Your Life

We've all been there: with the end of a perhaps disappointing year, and the sparkling promise of a new year, many of us make hopeful New Years Resolutions that ultimately fail.

Whether it's eating healthier, going to the gym, to sleep earlier, to drink more water, or otherwise, it's clear that this method simply does not work for the majority of people.

As VE/VA/VM practitioners, we have a proven process that everyone can utilize to elicit creative ideas and solutions to products, projects, programs, and processes. Why not apply it to our own lives as a fun exercise?

What would this look like?

Of course, we would follow the VE 6-Step Job Plan:

1. Information: Gather information to better understand the project.
2. Function Analysis: Analyze the project to understand and clarify the required functions.
3. Creative: Generate ideas on all the possible ways to accomplish the required functions.
4. Evaluation: Synthesize ideas and concepts and select those that are feasible for development into specific value improvements.
5. Development: Select and prepare the ‘best’ alternative(s) for improving value.
6. Presentation: Present the value recommendation to the project stakeholders.

I'd like to add two additional steps: Implementation & Audit

7. Implementation: Implement the alternatives to be executed.

8. Audit: Ensure that the alternatives were implemented to satisfaction.

Let's start with the first phase, Information. Hopefully we know ourselves and our own lives enough to have the information we need to move on to the next phase, Function Analysis, which I believe is key to the success of value engineering.

In function analysis, relevant and required functions are identified in a verb/noun format. For example, if it is important for the person value engineering their own life to maintain their health, "Maintain Health" would be one of the functions identified during this phase.

I've taken the liberty of identifying some functions that I feel are important to my own life. Others' identified functions may be similar or different depending on their personal views and experiences.

Identified Functions:

• Maximize Life
• Benefit Community
• Contribute Resources
• Spread Culture
• Maintain Health
• Sustain Activity
• Reduce Intake
• Make Income
• Develop Skillset
• Uphold Morals
• Maintain Conscience
• Continue Lineage
• Maintain Aesthetics

Next, we organize these functions in a Function Analysis System Technique (FAST) Diagram. The following is a diagram of the ground rules:

Here's my FAST Diagram of my own identified functions:

After identifying functions and understanding how they fit together, we move on to the Creative phase, where we brainstorm ideas to accomplish each function.

Some examples of ideas I brainstormed for each function follow:

• Benefit Community

-Improve living situations of those around me

-Provide mentorship to younger generations

• Contribute Resources

-Volunteer time to non-profits

-Donate money to community organizations

• Spread Culture

-Inform others of Korean culture

-Create culture of excellence

• Maintain Health

-Exercise

-Stretch

-Manage stress

-Eat healthy food

-Avoid "bad" food ex. fatty foods, excess meat, dairy, sweets

• Sustain Activity

-Walk at least 30 mins a day

-Stationary bike/treadmill while binge-watching Netflix/Hulu/Amazon Prime shows

• Reduce Intake

-Skip meals

-Eat smaller meals

• Make Income

-Get a higher-paying job

-Develop my own business

-Invest in stocks, bonds, and cryptocurrency

• Develop Skillset

-Learn trade

-Learn professional skills

-Obtain professional certifications

• Uphold Morals

-Live strictly by determined moral code

-Follow Bible

-Follow Quran

-Follow Talmud

-Live by my own conscience

• Maintain Conscience

-Reflect on sins/wrongs I've committed and resolve to never repeat them

-Confess sins to a priest

• Continue Lineage

-Get married, have kids

-Don't get married, have kids

-Adopt

-Take someone on as my heir

• Maintain Aesthetics

-Wear nicer-fitting clothes (e.g. suits, skinnier jeans, t-shirts)

After brainstorming ideas to execute the identified functions, the ideas are brought into the Evaluation phase to be further evaluated. Ideas may be combined into new differentiated or further fleshed out ideas, or eliminated if unrealistic or undesired.

The following were ideas to be further fleshed out in Development

-Improve living situations of those around me by providing mentorship to younger generations, volunteering, and donating money to non-profits

-Spread Korean culture

-Create culture of excellence

-Exercise by walking at least 30 mins a day, ride stationary bike/treadmill while binge-watching Netflix/Hulu/Amazon Prime shows

-Stretch

-Manage stress

-Avoid "bad" food ex. fatty foods, excess meat, dairy, sweets

-Eat smaller, healthier meals

-Develop my own business

-Learn professional skills

-Obtain professional certifications

-Determine moral code, live strictly by my own conscience

-Reflect on sins/wrongs I've committed and resolve to never repeat them

-Get married, have kids

-Wear nicer-fitting clothes (e.g. suits, skinnier jeans, t-shirts)

Being as I am the stakeholder, there was no need for the Presentation phase.

What remains is Implementation, which is the purpose of the entire VE process. I will conduct an Audit of myself quarterly and let you know of my progress in the comments section of this article!

Now it's your turn to conduct a VE study of your own life. What does your FAST diagram look like? What new ideas will you come up with to implement and improve your life? Let me know in the comments!