Confessions of A Personal Feedback Junkie- I'm obsessed with my Fitbit.

Happy New Year!

It appears that fitness trackers, notably Fitbit, were a big hit over the holiday season. These wearables are taking the legendary Peter Drucker's "What gets measured gets improved." concept down to the most personal level.  Of course, since I am in the business of collecting, organizing, and distributing feedback for businesses, I also see these personal feedback devices through another lens.

My family actually gave me a Fitbit for my birthday about 2 months ago, so I got a bit of a head-start on the holiday recipients. And, full disclosure- I've been somewhat of a distance runner for the past 10 years, so keeping track of fitness routines (mileage/times) is something I'm accustomed to. That said, I'm completely hooked on my Fitbit and the constant body feedback metrics that it offers me both on my wrist and through an app on my smartphone.  I find myself checking the number of steps I take every day; I'm ashamed (not really) to admit that I've even taken a lap around my dining room table at 11:57pm on more than 1 occasion to reach the next even 100 step mark for the day. Additionally, I check my sleep stats and resting heart rate daily to try to find patterns in the fluctuations and make adjustments to my routines based on activities, stress levels, diet, etc.​

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Putting on my "work hat", I see the Fitbit similarly to how some of our clients look at the feedback data we provide to them. By pushing feedback metrics to our clients on a weekly basis through email (which Fitbit also does), we keep managers  engaged with the idea of quantifying their guests' perceptions, as well as help them set goals. Just like I want to be sure I reach a weekly goal of 70,000 steps, we have clients who are looking to achieve a minimum average Fan Value Score (FVS) of +1.2 each week (each guest is assigned a FVS from -2.0 to +2.0;  a +2  guest is most likely to positively influence social and review ratings, a -2 is most likely to have a negative impact). And, just like I try to find the connectivity between an especially restless night and what happened the evening before (or what was coming up the next morning), our clients drill down into guests'  operational evaluations and open-ended comments to see what's driving those FVS scores. By making the connections between feedback metrics and their drivers, we can adjust our personal and business behaviors to effect better outcomes more often.

JR

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