THE LIFESTYLE ENTREPRENEUR

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Weekly Measurables

• Wellness Tip: Walking

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• Article: Weekly measurables

Wellness Tip

Walking is cool in wellness circles again.

It’s always been cool, but 10 years ago it wasn’t talked about as part of a wellness program like it is today.

10 years ago it was only talked about in vague ways, like “the europeans are all skinny because they walk all day”. And then it was ignored in favor of other recommendations.

Now it’s gotten tangible, and in typical American fashion, supported with scientific studies to give it authority.

Walk 10,000 steps a day and substantially reduce your mortality risk.

I admit to paying little attention to walking in younger days as a fitness entrepreneur. Like many things, I’ve gone a complete 180, and now think walking is a primary measurable for overall wellness.

Get enough steps in each day and you’re very likely to be healthy. Not just because of the steps taken, but because of the lifestyle surrounding someone who walks a lot.

10,000 steps is easy if your work allows it.

10,000 steps is very difficult if you spend your days in an office.

Here’s the easiest way I’ve found to guarantee getting steps if you’re a typical office/at-home worker - turn one meeting a day into a walk.

Your calendar is full of meetings - can you turn one into a walk? If so you’ll get almost 50% of your steps done in one fell swoop.

One 45-minute walk, based on walking 3-4 miles an hour, is 4500-6000 steps.

Get that done and you’re likely to hit your numbers each day just from moderate walking.

What’s the right number of steps per day? I don’t think it’s a hard rule, 10,000 is just a rule of thumb - is 8,000 the best for you? Awesome. The point is, it’s more walking than most Americans get in a day.

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It’s not about having time, it’s about making time

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8 Stoic Principles to live in the Present - Link

Article - Weekly Measurables

In business, for me and my clients, I preach having a weekly scorecard that gives the team an absolute pulse on their business. That’s 5-15 numbers that give them a clear sense for how things are going on a weekly basis.

If done well, this is a powerful tool that allows leadership teams to know where things are going well, and where they need to put their focus to force correct.

Most businesspeople have some form of a scorecard - it’s a universal concept at this point.

So why don’t most people have a personal weekly scorecard?

I think in 5 years they will, so now’s your chance to get ahead of the curve.

The concept is simple - what are your long, medium, and short-term plans, and what actions on a daily or weekly basis keep you on track for those plans?

Getting down to this level of granularity requires reflecting on what you want to improve in life, and putting pen to paper.

Do you want to:

• Have more quality time with your kids?

• Be more active?

• Start a business?

• Save money for a new house?

• Drink less alcohol?

All of the above are great goals. We can get into making them more specific, but that’s for another post.

If your goal is more quality time with kids - one measurable could simply be 1:1 time with each kid per week. That’s been one of mine, and with four kids getting 1 per week per kid feels like a win for me.

If your goal is to be more active - one measurable is steps per day. Another could be # of fitness classes attended.

There’s nuance to setting good measurables.

For example on the activity goal - Steps per day is a clearly objective measurable. # of classes is also objective - if you go to a studio where there’s no choice but to work hard in the class. But just listing # of workouts can have some risk because if you’re doing things on your own you may sandbag it 50% of the time, and a few months later wonder why you’re not making any progress.

The way to get started?

Just get started and come up with 3-5 weekly measurables total to align with your goals.

If you measure it every week, you’ll start to narrow down on numbers that actually work for you.

I have a relatively lengthy scorecard that includes my business metrics, so mine’s a combined scorecard.

If you have a more traditional work/personal separated scorecard, here’s a few of mine as an example to get your thinking started (weekly goal is in parenthesis):

• Avg sleep score (>75)

• Avg steps (>10,000)

• Avg daily protein (215g)

• Avg phone pickups (<150)

• Days at jiu jitsu (2)

• Days with drugs and alcohol (2 or less)

• 1:1 time with kids (1 or more per kid)

And here’s a few rules of thumb for building your scorecard:

1. Leading indicators - some action that will lead to a result, we don’t want a result as a measurable

2. Weekly is best - try to figure out how to break things down weekly for a goal

3. Have a goal - establish your goal each week

Good luck!!

Talk to you next week,

Mike

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