What Can Fitbit Teach Us About Learning & Development?

I am the lucky recipient of a Fitbit Charge HR this past holiday season as I have to say, the data has been interesting and rewarding. Not that I'm an athlete (not yet anyway), but that I'm trying to learn more about myself so I can balance my health, career and family successfully. This, I'd expect is what many others seek in balancing their own lives. I'm also a fan of wearable tech and data analytics. 

So, as an Organizational Development (OD) executive, of course I have to look at the latest doodad and wonder, "What can this teach me or others about Learning & Development?" Well, a lot as I'm seeing it. 

For starters, it's social! No sooner did I set up my Fitbit profile and invitations to connect with individuals who share similar goals started to show up. Pretty cool to know you aren't alone on day one, right? Secondly, it's competitive. These nice people that wanted to connect in reality want to share their results that in turn, help motivate one another as a team. Also, it instantly bonded myself and others with good common goals who love wearable tech! Yes, all these wonderful things in the first 5-minutes. After wearing it for several days, a few things began to surface that I found very informative, interesting and useful. 

Where I Stand

Having your sleep, heart rate, steps, mileage, calories burned, floor climbed, active minutes tracked over time, you really get to understand where you stand, what you need to do to improve and then, you can adjust and go from there. Similar to how an Individual Development Plan (IDP) can help managers and employees gain insights to performance and competency improvement over a period of time, Fitbit puts my numbers right where my mouth is. I can either do better or worse tomorrow, but I can't change the numbers. Those are my choices. How does this aligns to L&D?

If an employee does not know their current state, development is harder to frame as there is no launching or starting point. Hearsay from top down or bottom up is just that, opinions and hearsay. Solid numbers and data that means something allows everyone to elicit performance in and around real development. In order to develop, we need to also track data that means something.

Where I'm Great And Not So Great

I'd love to say I'm the pinnacle of health, but this isn't true. I'm in good shape but like many in the middle-aged years, need to keep a check-in on my weight. What I found remarkable is that years of heavy strength training has made my heart and vascular system a smooth operator, when at rest. My resting heart rate is in the "athlete" zones, but I just know I'm not in the shape I should be. Not surprisingly, I noticed that my heart rate climbs quickly and maxes out with moderate to fast activity (running, cycling, CrossFit). So, now I know my challenge. Continue to strength train moderately to maintain my heart's low beat per minute (BPM) at rest and sleep, but concentrate on higher impact cardiovascular activities to improve the long game. You know, help my heart hit the top line numbers I expect while still enjoying the low end numbers. How does this aligns to L&D?

If an employee does not know what good and bad look like, training for an outcome is an easily missed target. FitBit helped me compare my personal performance against national standards (similar to a competency model) and then, of course, against my new online friends competing to be better with me (a wonderful teaming experience). 

Make Goals Realistic With Some Wins In There

Raising a son, being a father and husband, eating better, running and cycling more, sleeping more, loosing 15lb, running a business, fixing the garage roof and concentrating on total health are tall and lofty goals. Why not break out what goals are required, attainable and some that can be hit in a shorter order. You know, get some wins right away? Always look at the bigger picture, but keep those feel-good wins in mind too. How does this aligns to L&D?

If an employee sees the performance goals as too lofty or too challenging, you just may well end up with a job shopper/hopper, a disengaged employee or worse, someone who does just enough to fly under the radar. Competency models that allow individuals to improve incrementally and employees that view these as wins are going to have better performance and retention overall. But give folks some wins and recognition right out of the gate. The wins feel good, reaffirm the mission and get folks engaged for the next level.

I'm looking forward to my continued Fitbit experience throughout 2016 and hope you enjoyed this quick read and thought. Make it a great week!

327 Solutions is The Agency for People and Talent Development? supporting our clients’ success through placement, consulting, and training. Our team applies more than two decades of experience and know-how in contingent staffing (placement), design and build services (consulting), and facilitation services (training) that supports a national client base in the Fortune 1000 and US Government Agencies. With a hyper focus in organizational people, process, and technology, we are able to bring forward the absolute best resources, ideas, and solutions in the market for your workforce.

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