The McKinsey Quarterly recently interviewed Chip Heath, co-author of Made to Stick, who spoke about his new book, Switch: How to change things when change is hard. Heath is proving himself to be a master at taking important concepts and boiling them down to their essence. The interview is remarkable for how many key concepts he puts into a short conversation (including the myth of best practices).
"The core idea is that there are two sides to the way human beings think about any issue. There’s the rational, analytical, problem-solving side of our brains, which may think, “I need to eat less.” But there’s an emotional side that’s addicted to impulse or comfortable routines, and that side wants a cookie. At work, the rational side may say that the company needs to go in a different direction. But the emotional side is comfortable with the old ways of thinking and selling, and it has great anxiety about whether the company can change successfully."
Heath makes the case that most leaders focus on convincing the rational (cortex-oriented thinking) aspects of individuals, and completely ignore the emotional (lymbic-gator brain) interests, and he's right. That doesn't mean you create fear as a motivator, since fear doesn't work for causing real change, but it means helping to create a situation where people want to change and are comfortable with the change being made.
Grab yourself a cookie and read the interview here: http://bit.ly/9ihOAl
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