OR/MS Today - October 1998 - Was It Something I Said?

October 1998

It Ain't Over 'Til it's Over

By Vijay Mehrotra

I had read about it, heard about it and seen it happen to others.

This was no help when it happened to me. I knew what had to be done, but felt powerless to make a change.

I was overweight, and getting fatter.

I knew this was bad, though I was fuzzy about the specifics. My risk of heart disease was higher, and isn't that the leading cause of death among men? (I didn't dare look it up.) Overweight men are susceptible to serious back injuries, which would necessitate a more sedate lifestyle, which terrified me. My asthma was worse, and my stamina — and mental energy — had started to slip in a small but telling way. These nagging problems and worries hung over me like a dark cloud.

Over the years I tried several different things (my personal quality improvement initiatives). Most were ill-conceived because of my lack of knowledge about nutrition and diet. All of them failed, mainly due to a lack of commitment. While my head was in the right place, I seemed to lack the will.

I discovered Jennifer Conley (JC) by accident. My local hospital sent out a mailing about Wellness programs, and I called to get some information. Like many of my clients, I was looking for some elusive combination of expertise, perspective, coaching, cheerleading and discipline. From the time that we made contact, JC demonstrated characteristics that all of us can learn from.

Persistence, Preparedness, Positivity. When JC first called, I didn't return her message. "Hey, I'm busy," I rationalized.

Classic pattern that consultants know all too well: would-be clients know that help is needed, that there are problems that really ought to have been solved yesterday, but still can't get their attention focused on taking real steps. As Dana Carvey said in "Wayne's World," "We fear change."

JC kept calling, just enough to stay on my radar. Never pushy, but always positive, and always listening to what I had to say. She had a lot confidence and pride in herself and in her program.

Eventually I signed up.

Education and Data Collection. There is a tremendous amount of information about nutrition and exercise out there, and most of us gather it randomly and without context. We vaguely adopt "truths" about what is good and what is bad, and nod or shake our heads while observing our own behavior.

JC started with fundamental education. We reviewed information that she had culled together about nutrition and exercise, played with rubber food to graphically represent the content of different foods, and examined the labels of supermarket foods.

At the same time, she did not rely on my impressionistic recollections about my current state. She conducted tests and implemented a system for data collection, defining specific measures for food and exercise and teaching me how to log this data.

Frankly, this was a pain in the butt. Why did I stick with it? Well, I was a desperate man who knew he had a problem, and her education process was insightful and frightening, bringing issues of mortality and quality of life squarely into focus. At the same time, JC was inspiring, helping me believe that these improvements were worth making.

Also, as a consultant, I have struggled with clients' unwillingness to build a foundation of knowledge ("we already know about that") and inability to honestly assess where the organization actually is ("we just need to get this fixed fast"). Such laziness and hubris, typically hidden behind some combination of bravado and apology, is the first step on a path to failure.

Goal Setting and Sustainability. In "Built to Last," Collins and Porras emphasize that successful organizations rally around "Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals" and then emphasize "clock building," the emphasis on the processes and infrastructure to produce the desired long-term results.

JC seemed well-versed on these concepts. She worked with me to establish a series of challenging and concrete goals, and to put in place some accountability to these goals. Though these goals were developed gradually, systematically, JC continued to push me to "raise the bar" over time. The whole thing sometimes seemed overwhelming.

Yet a modicum of terror did serve a purpose. To meet these goals, I would have to invest some emotion and creativity into the effort. I needed to develop strategies to deal with, for example, getting enough exercise during periods when I am putting in long hours at work. I needed to actively manage the quality of what I was eating, even during business trips where every meal is a potential fast-food feast or gourmet gorging. The goals that JC helped me set were a real kick in the pants.

However, unlike crash diets that we hear about in self-help books and late night infomercials, she also encouraged me to develop sustainable strategies within the context of my own lifestyle, likes and dislikes. For example, to overcome late-night overeating due to long hours and a one-hour evening commute, I now bring healthy snacks to work for breaks. Though I still eat a lot of my meals in restaurants, I learned to identify healthier choices.

The Struggle Goes On. We consultants like to see ourselves as saviors, white knights who dash in with problem-solving sticks, slay the demons, and ride into the sunset. My diet and exercise issues, like my clients' problems, are set in the context of a dynamic world, and while the specifics of it change, the challenges go on. The biggest risk to my newfound good health is drifting back into bad eating and slovenliness.

JC knows. Therefore, as part of her program, she has included quarterly maintenance visits for one year, as well as structured checks that I will continue to administer to myself for a long, long time.

As Yogi Berra said, "It ain't over 'til it's over."

Vijay Mehrotra is the CEO of Onward, an operations management consulting firm in Mountain View, Calif. He holds a Ph.D. in operations research from Stanford University and can be reached via e-mail at vijay@onward-net.com

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