User>Driven

Okay, this doesn't have anything to do directly with product management, design or development, but it's important so listen up.

As I mentioned a couple of posts ago, I've always tried to be green, but Al Gore's well-reasoned arguments in An Inconvenient Truth have put me on something of an eco-kick. Fortunately, since so many people are going green these days, it is easier than ever. Frankly, I am finding it's not so hard to be green and still enjoy the good life - and the results are very real. I just got my July electrical bill and it is 30% below July of last year. If that average were to hold, I would be looking at a monthly savings of over $75 just in electricity. That's $900 a year!

Here are some of the things I've been doing to try to be greener along with a little analysis on their ROI.

• I mentioned I've started using more compact fluorescent bulbs. I still am sensitive to the color of the light so I don't use them everywhere, but I believe they are contributing to our savings. I've probably spent $100 on discounted bulbs from EFI and regularly priced ones from the local hardware store in the last few months. If they are contributing to the $75 per month savings, payback would seem to be both quick and long-lasting.
• We're being more vigilant about turning off lights and appliances when not needed. I've found, for instance, that the fluorescent fan light in the bathroom is sufficient while I'm showering and I can switch on the incandescent vanity lights when I am actually looking in the mirror afterward. The kids are even getting into it and turning lights off when they leave a room, something they never did until we started talking about trying to be environmentally responsible.
• We're now actually able to measure the payback of individual energy use decisions precisely with a new PowerCost Monitor from Blue Line Innovations. The device hooks up to your electric meter and provides a wireless display you can take anywhere of the actual dollars you are spending at any given moment on electricity. (It works like the wireless weather stations you see a lot of.) It's amazing how much the air conditioner or the oven spikes our usage, more or less doubling the usual load. Thanks to a subsidy from Nstar, we were able to get the monitor for $30 and we are learning a lot about usage trade-offs.
• Adjusting the air conditioner thermostat a few degrees was tough for me. I loathe the summer heat and humidity and I felt trapped in our comparatively cool basement in the summer until we got central air. I used to keep it cranked all the time. I had the top floor (where the thermostat that controls the AC is) set at about 70 because the AC was less effective on the main floor, resulting in about 72-74 there. One day while I was at work, though, Chris set the top floor at 76. I noticed it immediately when I got home and we negotiated it down to 74. To my surprise, I got used to this setting pretty quickly. Given what the monitor says about the energy cost of AC, I think a large chunk of our July savings may have come from just that one adjustment of 4 degrees on the AC. To maintain our savings, I suspect we'll have to compromise on the heat setting come winter as well.
• In my entry on Triple Plays I mentioned several things I've been doing that pay me back in multiple ways. I think the one that has the most energy impact is taking the train to work instead of driving. I figure I'm saving about $1,300 a year in gas plus about $1,000 in parking and, of course, wear and tear on my car. With the $13.50 daily train fare I am coming out about even on costs, I think, but I feel good about the ecological effect and as I mentioned in that post, there are several other benefits.
• I also mentioned that I was driving the speed limit now, though I bent that rule today when I was late getting the girls to a birthday party. I was good on the way back, though, and I've been taking advantage of the manual transmission on my Audi A4 (23 MPG) to coast down hills and avoid unnecessary braking in partial imitation of a hybrid.
  
• We looked at how much we could save by updating appliances using Nstar's online Energy Savings calculators. We could save some by replacing our drier or washer, but both are relatively new. Our fridge, though, is 17 years old and the calculator suggested we could save enough on our electric bill with a new, more efficient model to pay for it in just a few years. So last weekend we splurged on a new Energy Star rated fridge. (We did well with a sale they were having at Sears and they took an advance order to process this weekend so we could take advantage of the tax holiday.) Katja posted a link to an even more efficient fridge, but it is unfortunately too small for our needs. Before we chose a model, we looked at GreenerChoices.org, a sister site to Consumer Reports where they provide efficiency and quality ratings on appliances and such.
  
• Nstar's calculator also suggested we turn off the drying cycle in our dishwasher. Some of the silverware is still a little wet in the morning, but it uses a lot less energy now. There were a number of other tweaks the calculator suggested that we'll try to implement like insulating our hot water pipes in the utility room and installing some efficiency gadgets on the boiler, but we had already done some of the things they recommended like rolling back the fridge and hot water thermostats.
• We've also become carbon neutral. Climatecrisis.net (the companion website to An Inconvenient Truth) has a carbon calculator that allows you to figure out how much carbon your family is adding to the environment. At 10 tons per month, we are higher than average due to living in the northeast US where heating uses a lot of energy and to the fact that we drive a non-hybrid SUV. (Our Toyota Highlander gets about 19 MPG.) The calculator provides a link to an organization called Native Energy that funds wind and other sustainable, non-polluting energy projects. Donating $10 per month to Native Energy offsets our carbon footprint by helping to generate clean energy that can displace coal or oil burning electric plants.
• I'm interested in solar water heating, as I read somewhere that it could offset some energy usage. I haven't seen any mainstream information that suggests there is a positive ROI there, though. I'd be interested if anyone has any information on that.
• I don't know that it saves on net electrical usage, but we have started using rechargeable batteries for game controllers and such. Consumer Reports indicates one rechargeable battery can prevent up to 50 disposable batteries from the landfill. Given the caustic chemicals involved, this seems like a really good idea.
  
• This is really minor but it was so obvious and easy once I thought about it that I wanted to mention it. I switched from using a ziplock snack bag for the nuts I pack in my lunch every day to using a reusable plastic container. It's probably saving me less than a penny a day, but it's using less petroleum and less manufacturing energy so I feel it's worthwhile.
  

So these are the ways I am trying to reduce and offset our effect on the planet. There's probably more we could do but these have been easy. And I am really amazed at the effect on our electric bill in just a few weeks. Tell everyone your strategies and ideas. And wish us luck keeping it up!

So often in life (as in product management) things are about trade-offs. The latte tastes better with caramel but it adds unwanted calories. The LX model comes with intermittent wipers but you have to pay for the power seats you'll never adjust too. And the custom code will perform faster but will take longer to implement and be harder to test and maintain.

Sometimes, though, there are win-win situations. In fact, I've recently been finding a number of win-win-win situations - triple plays, I call them - in my every day life. These are situations where I can make a lifestyle choice that pays me back in multiple ways. Usually these pay-backs are in the areas of health, wealth and ecology, but there are other benefits.

Here are some recent examples from my life.

• A brown bag lunch. Actually it's an insulated red and black bag, but the point is I assemble the lunch at home and bring it with me to work. This takes only a few minutes work in the morning. (I have simplified my lunch to allow for quick assembly.) It pays me back in health because I can control what I eat and the portion size more easily than eating at a restaurant or getting takeout. It pays me back in wealth because it is incredibly cheap compared with a bought lunch every day. And it is more ecologically responsible because my (uncooked) lunch uses much less energy, packaging, and transportation to prepare than a restaurant meal.
• Avoiding fast food. I used to eat fast food once or twice a week because it was, well, fast. It was also reliably filling and comforting. Giving it up seemed like a hardship but I motivated myself by recognizing the multiple benefits that accrued every time I skipped a fast food meal. The health benefits of avoiding fast food should be obvious. The wealth benefits are real as well. If you add up a $4.00 meal at a major chain twice a week for a year, you come to $416 a year for just one person. A family of four could be putting good money away for education every year with the savings. Fast food is tough on the environment as well with all of the packaging, transportation, mass production of food, artificial ingredients and such that go into it. Some chains are trying to improve, but no one can argue they are a positive force overall.
• Avoiding soda and Starbucks. I'm telling ya, caffeinated beverages are a near-perfect system for sucking money out of your wallet. (Cigarettes are more addictive but their more dramatic health effects make people want to quit.) Just one grande latte per day adds up to over a grand a year. And a grande caramel Frappucino with whipped cream (my wife's one-time fave) adds 380 calories each time. Add that to your gut every day for a while and see what happens to your health. The environmental impact of transporting coffee beans all over the planet is real as well, adding CO2 to the atmosphere and increasing global warming. Starbucks at least uses recycled paper in its cups. Soda, on the other hand, has all of the downsides of coffee plus the creation, distribution and disposal of all of those plastic bottles. Most are returnable in states that require it, but I see a lot of them in trash bins. Too much caffeine doesn't really agree with me so I had switched to decaf and tea (which seems to affect me less). But the budget and environmental arguments have gotten me to drop all of that in favor of good old water. Oh, and that's water from the tap (with a filter). Dasani and Evian and all of those new smart waters and fruit waters are no different than soda on the cost and environmental dimensions, and some of them have sugar as well. And some of those brands turn out to be - guess what? - filtered tap water.
  
• Buying local and organic produce. Local produce doesn't have to last as long during transportation so it has time to vine ripen and you get it fresher, often the day after it's picked even at the supermarket. Organic produce uses less pesticide which means you're ingesting less pesticide. Between these choices you get more nutrition and less toxicity. Local foods in season can also be less expensive (not usually true for organics at the supermarket) because the transportation costs are lower. And, of course, less transportation and lower use of pesticides is good for the environment.
• Driving the speed limit. Okay, this one was the hardest for me. I like to drive. I like to drive fast even more. I was the one always complaining at people who didn't start up right away at the green light or who dawdled on the highway. In one week recently, though, I read an article about how much I could improve my mileage just by driving the speed limit, and another one suggesting my greatest statistical risk of dying was from a speed-related accident. Now I tell myself I'm saving money, saving on CO2 emissions and saving my health all at once by cutting a few miles per hour off my speed.
• Taking the train to work. This one may be a quadruple play. Perhaps that's a home run? I started commuting on the train when gas prices went up a while back. It saved me money on gas. And of course, not burning that gas has an environmental benefit, too. I also started walking from the train station to the office (about 20 minutes) each way, which provides terrific exercise benefits. I also discovered how much less stressful riding quietly on the train is than fighting traffic and worrying about being late. I figure the stress-reduction is just another health benefit, but then I also discovered how productive the train time can be. I bring my laptop and my Blackberry and I get two hours more of work time in every day. I now think of driving to work as a waste of time and resources.

It's hard to make changes just because you "should." It's easier, though, when you get paid back in several ways for those changes. Reminding myself of this multiplier effect motivates me to keep going on these things.

Product managers get good at trade-off decisions (usually cost and time vs. features) because they have to make them so often. I suspect, though, that there are hidden triple-play opportunities here as well. Here are a couple of ideas:

• QA automation. Taking resources away from your current release cycle is hard because it means you deliver less "stuff" (features, bug fixes, etc.). Putting those resources onto creating automated testing tools, though, pays off in multiple ways later. Once you start using the tools, QA goes faster which means you can test more features in less time, increasing the amount of "stuff" you can deliver. Good tools will also increase quality (fewer bugs), which will, in turn, result in higher customer satisfaction. This should lead to more business, which will allow you to grow and hire more engineers and testers to deliver and test even more "stuff." A triple play.
• User testing. Bringing customer in to test prototypes product designs will no doubt improve those designs through the natural feedback process. At the same time, contact with customers will improve your designers' understanding of your customers and their needs which will result in better initial designs. And finally, bringing your customers in and listening to them will cement in your customers' minds the idea that you care about their needs and are working on their behalf. This should result in greater sales growth over time. Another triple play.

What are your personal or product development triple-plays? Post your comments below.

A while ago I wrote a post about why I don't use compact fluorescent bulbs. A few others posted that they, too, had trouble adapting to the new style bulbs because of the off color and the slow warm up times. But then I went and watched An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore's movie about the dangers of climate change - and it scared the crap out of me.

I'm a greenie. I recycle and turn off the lights when I leave the room. I even take the train to work. But this movie made me realize I need to do more. It also helped me think about how I could do more without making big compromises in my lifestyle. I still don't love compact fluorescents, but I've come up with some ways to use them that bug me less.

Here's where I am using them now:

• In my stairwells. These are just pass-through rooms I don't spend much time in so the quality of light is less important to me than, say, in the dining room where we sit to eat.
• In my bathroom fan units. I kept my beloved GE Reveal incandescents above the vanity so I can look at my face with a natural color of light, but I use the fluorescents in the exhaust fan light that's on while I shower.
• Over the stove. That little light over the stove that doesn't get used except when you are cooking can be replaced by a miniature CF bulb I found at the local hardware store.
• In some lamps with cloth shades. As others have pointed out, the color is less noticeable if it is filtered by a shade. I don't use them, though, on lamps I use for reading.
• In the laundry room. It's a utility area that we never spend much time in.
• Half of the recessed lights in my family room. We have 8 recessed cans in the family room ceiling. 4 of them have halogen floods that cast a bright, white light over key spots like the couch, the computer desk and the sewing table. The other four cans are filled with these new compact fluorescent floods I found on the Energy Federation's website at a discount (subsidized by my electric utility, Nstar). The mixed light isn't bad and the brighter lights are over the key areas.

I still don't like the color of the lights in the hallways and these new bulbs do have a slight delay before they come on (which is annoying when walking into a dark laundry room). But these feel now like minor inconveniences compared with the consequences of inaction. And I'm hoping I will save some money as well.

There are some other things we're doing to save energy that I will write about in a separate entry to come soon. Check out ClimateCrisis.org (the companion site to the movie) for more on what you can do. What has been your experience with compact fluorescent bulbs or other energy-saving methods? 

Seth Godin - marketing guru and regular blogger - asked bloggers to "create a post with their own riff on why CF bulbs are cheaper, better politically, harder to market or just plain cute."

In his post he speculates about why these energy efficient, (now) inexpensive, and long-lasting light bulbs haven't replaced traditional incandescent bulbs in many people's homes. He speculated: "They need to stop looking so weird, being so expensive and being so hard to open."

Actually, I don't have any of those issues with them. I'm a geek, so I'll overcome bad packaging and weird looks for something I find useful. I have used them in various places in my home, including my living room and the outside lights on either side of my door. My problems are with the product itself. It doesn't do some basic things I want a light bulb to do so it's not useful to me.

First, I find the light cast by fluorescents harsh and unappealing. I use natural spectrum bulbs made by GE that cast a whiter, more pleasing light that feels more like sunlight. I just find it much more palatable than traditional yellow incandescents or harsh white fluorescents. I tried color-corrected fluorescents as well but I found them too bluish and flickery.

Second, they warm up very slowly in cold weather, which means they aren't good for outdoor or utility spaces (which is where I was tempted to use them once I figured out I didn't like the light for every day use).

So I'd like to save the money, sure, but the product fails on much more basic product usefulness grounds for me.

Links:

Seth's blog:

http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/7363108

 

Natural spectrum bulbs:

http://www.gelighting.com/na/home_lighting/products/reveal_main.htm