Eating your own lasagne

I thought I would make this post topical!

I had a decent day on Saturday. The racing wasn’t anything amazing, though I put in a solid performance, but the football gave me a rare day with no losses and that result netted far more than the racing. At least this was the case on Saturday, on Sunday football was slightly negative, it all balances out over time.

Each sport I work on I tend to use different tactics and it results in different returns. Pre-off trading on the racing yields consistent results with few losses but in-play trading will always produce much higher variability in both directions. So I use different accounts on different strategies and sports so I can actively monitor the performance of each. This helps put things into perspective and allows me to easily keep track of things over longer time periods.

One important aspect of what I do on a regular basis is actually participate in the market. I do this because I enjoy the challenge but also because it’s important, for me a least, to actually eat my own dog food. I would feel guilty being a guitar instructor if I had never played the guitar, let alone not very well. So actual participation is vitally important to me, especially as an instructor. I can offer advice with confidence knowing I have actually put it to use and in a not insubstantial way. I also use this experience to test and build new features into Bet Angel. When we are looking at a new idea or a suggestion I’ll be the first one to get the rough end of the stick. People who work with me are strongly encouraged to get their hands dirty, that way they can experience the same emotions as our customers. I once worked with a retailer who used to mystery shop their own shops, it’s no surprise that they had the highest reputation for customer service.

To be honest I think the world would be a much better place if people where forced to each their own dog food and / or prove that they do. That bloke from Findus could dine on horse meat, that e-book seller would lose thousands, the banker could get shafted by his own ‘investment’ product and that politician could be punished by his own policies!

Maybe it’s a bit idealistic, but I would like to think this would ensure the world would be a better place?

Tags: dog food, lasagne

Category: General