Hobbes Design Principles
A question I’m frequently asked is: who are you building Hobbes for and what problem are you trying to solve for them? While I hope Hobbes will eventually serve everyone, right now I'm focusing on busy professionals juggling high-stress work and personal life—a group more likely to be high-earning and, paradoxically, less healthy.
How do you design for this group? Here are five principles guiding my design:
- Decrease decision fatigue. Busy people make countless decisions daily—prioritizing work tasks, choosing meetings, replying to emails, or figuring out dinner and weekend plans. Add health decisions to this mix, and it’s overwhelming, leading to inertia and non-compliance. Hobbes will make it easy for people to make decisions (or decide for them), so they can take action without thinking. Using Hobbes will be like putting your wellness on “full-self driving” mode.
- Progress over perfection. Successful people are typically Type A people. They are ambitious and impatient. Their strive for perfection can make health journeys frustrating if results don’t come fast. Hobbes is designed to help people appreciate progress, celebrate milestones, and savor the journey. Becoming a better version of yourself everyday is more important than comparing yourself to someone else.
- Integrate seamlessly. If you’re rushing to drop off your kids to school in the morning and gulp down a smoothie or if you barely have time to grab a burrito for lunch in between meetings, you don’t have the time to stop, scan a barcode, weigh your ingredients, or fill out forms. Yet, that’s what all diet tracking apps expect you to do. Hobbes will not interrupt your day to ask you to give us data. Hobbes will work within your schedule - maybe the best time is on your drive back from work or when you’re watching Schitt’s Creek for the 5th time in the evening.
- You are one of one. Most health apps treat you like a template - if you’re this height and this weight, you need to meet this calorie target to lose weight. Health is not one-size-fits-all. Hobbes encourages use of tools like a fitness tracker and a glucose monitor (even briefly) to understand how your body reacts to your diet and movement and gives you insights that work for you. Maybe eating rice is better for you than eating pasta - we’ll find out!
- Private social. Research shows the social influence (through encouragement, competition, and accountability) is a strong factor in motivation to continue to make progress towards our goals. At the same time, not everyone wants to share the details of their health journey with family or friends. Hobbes will attempt to tread that fine line of allowing your family or friends to encourage you, keep you accountable, and motivate you to strive harder, without sharing personal details such as your calorie intake or weight goals.
There are other obvious principles - the app should be engaging to use, secure (and comply with HIPAA regulations), accurate, and fast.
I’d love to hear your thoughts—do these principles resonate with you? What would you add or change? Just hit reply, and your feedback will come directly to me.