Making a Watertight Beeminder - BaaS goal

So you've read our blogpost on Boss as a Service's integration with Beeminder, and you're ready to create a BaaS-Beeminder goal. You'd like your Boss to monitor and add the Beeminder points to keep you accountable. Excellent, we're off to a great start!

We've been talking to many folks who'd like to use Beeminder and BaaS together, and one frequently asked question is how you'd prevent anyone except your Boss from adding datapoints to Beeminder. So this short post is a quick look into how to lock down your Beeminder-BaaS integration and make it as watertight as possible.

How do I make sure only my Boss can add data to my Beeminder goal?

Step 1: Agree with your Boss that they can reduce / add datapoints for things you don't report or prove

Bad news first: it's not technically possible to prevent anyone but your Boss from adding a point to Beeminder. But don't despair, there's a workaround. Just ask your Boss to keep an eye on your goal, and if they see any points they haven't personally added (after making sure your proof checks out!), they can just remove the datapoint. This works similarly for both a Do More and a Do Less goal. If it's a Do More goal, and your Boss sees datapoints added that haven't been proven, they can add negative point(s) to nullify the extra points added. If it's a Do Less goal, they can just add positive points.

Step 2: Turn on the No Excuses mode!

For even more watertightness (is that a word?) turn on the new No Excuses mode on Beeminder. This means just what it says – if you do derail, Beeminder will not accept any excuses you make!

Between these two steps, your goal should be pretty loophole-free!

If you try it, let us know how it goes!