3 Ways Wearables Can Help Entrepreneurs Supercharge Their Health, Energy and Productivity Technology can become one of your most valuable assets to improving your health and business.
By Julian Hayes II Edited by Dan Bova
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Technology is continually reshaping and redefining how we go about our day-to-day lives. When it comes to entrepreneurs, technology has provided a gateway to new opportunities and methods for growing a business.
Never has it been easier to get your products and services in front of a worldwide audience.
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With that said, one overlooked area where technology can be impactful is through managing your personal health. Through utilizing wearable health technologies, entrepreneurs can boost their energy, happiness, and well being.
The concept of having some sort of technological device to help improve your health isn't a novel concept.
After all, devices such as pedometers and heart rate monitors have been around for decades. But, the level of sophistication and trackable metrics from wearable health technologies through companies such as FitBit, Garmin, BioStrap, Whoop, and many others is what's enticing.
As someone who advises busy and high performing entrepreneurs, here are three of the biggest reasons why I encourage them to utilize some sort of wearable health technology.
1. Accountability and awareness
Maybe you've mentioned something along the lines or have heard a peer or a friend mention sentences like these:
"I plan to exercise five days per week." "I'm going to walk 10,000 steps each day." "I plan to eat 2000 calories each day while eliminating sugary drinks." "I'm going to be in bed by 10 pm so I can get eight hours of sleep."
Unfortunately, more often than not, those promises and optimistic plans disappear and get lost in the daily shuffle of growing and managing your business.
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However, through leveraging wearable health technologies, you can increase your self-accountability and keep wellness top-of-mind.
For example, if you promise yourself 10,000 steps daily, and the data only shows 6,000—you can't hide behind excuses such as not knowing.
Another common example is to get lost (and sometimes overwhelmed) in your goal and not feel like you're making any progress nor any sorts of improvements.
In both examples, leveraging technology and data provides non-objective feedback and most importantly, separates what you think you did to what you actually did.
Emotions and feelings can often times cloud and impede your progress within your business. The same can happen with your personal health. Therefore, having data to provide non-objective and non-biased feedback in both avenues is important.
2. Shift from a reactive to a proactive mentality
What do Blockbuster, the transportation and hotel industries and the U.S. Healthcare system have in common?
They're examples of organizations that are more reactive as opposed to proactive in their overall actions.
Speaking of the U.S., in the most recent edition of the Bloomberg Healthiest Country Index, which ranks 169 economies according to factors that contribute to overall health, the U.S. was nowhere near the top of the list (we came in 35th in case you were curious).
A big reason for this was the system being built with an emphasis on reactivity instead of proactivity. Countries at the top of the list focused on preventative care and action, whereas the U.S. tends to take action only once illness and disease manifest themselves.
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Many entrepreneurs approach their health in the same manner.
Only once the weight accumulates, the lab numbers are out-of-sorts, the stress gets out of control, or the day-to-day energy is nowhere to be found will they spring into action.
Instead of thinking about your health once a year during your annual physician visit or waiting until a problem manifests — leveraging wearable health technologies brings awareness about your health on a daily basis.
An example of this is a recent study appearing in The Lancet, where 200,000 individuals wore wearables and utilized its data to predict flu outbreaks due to increased resting heart rate over time along with an increase in sleep time.
Over time, once you establish a baseline with your wearables, they can essentially serve as your caution light to check in with yourself and prevent future illnesses.
3. Leverage data for more precision-based solutions
With any good marketing campaign, there will be key metrics and KPI's that serve as the benchmark and progressions for your business.
In health, it's no different. What gets measured, gets managed, and will improve over time. Identify at least one thing on your wearable that you will measure as a key metric toward your goal.
In addition, leveraging data is beneficial when it comes time to visit your doctor, coach, or even your accountability group.
With a massive data set, you can identify what's the chock hold by looking at the weeks and months of data accumulated; thus leading to quicker and more precise solutions. There will be less guessing and hoping with your strategy.
How to start utilizing wearable health technologies
Two of the biggest obstacles for individuals using wearable health tech are feelings of overwhelm and interpretation of the data.
There are numerous metrics you can track. But, when you're just getting started, here are a few things to consider to help you decide on what device to try along with what to measure:
- How tech-savvy you are?
- How easy is it to wear?
- Does it seamlessly fit in with your ideal day-to-day lifestyle?
- What are the different tracking and reporting features?
- What are your goals and what do you want to track?
Technology allows entrepreneurs to front-load their work, operate with precision as if they're a symphony orchestra, and no longer be relegated to mostly playing defense concerning their personal health.
