Rider, Elephant, and Path

how could you move an elephant? Each has an elephant living comfortably inside the mind. Chip and Dan Health tell us how to motivate the elephant, i.e. how to change. I found their recent book Switch: how to change things when change is hard (New York : Broadway Books, c2010) thoughtful and engaging. Here I quote:

For things to change, somebody somewhere has to start acting differently. Maybe it's you, maybe it's your team. Picture that person (or persons).

Each has an emotional Elephant side and a rational Rider side. You've got to reach both. And you've also got to clear the way for them to succeed. In short, you must do three things:

DIRECT the Rider

- follow the bright spots. Investigate what's working and clone it.

- script the critical moves. Don't think big picture, think in terms of specific behaviors.

- point to the destination. Change is easier when you know where you're going and why its worth it.

MOTIVATE the Elephant

- find the feeling. Knowing something isn't enough to cause change. Make people feel something.

- shrink the change. Break down the change until it no longer spooks the Elephant.

- grow your people. Cultivate a sense of identity and instill the growth mindset.

SHAPE the Path

- tweak the environment. When the situation changes, the behavior changes. So change the situation.

- build habit. When behavior is habitual, it's "free" - it doesn't tax the Rider. Look for ways to encourage habits.

- rally the herd. Behavior is contagious. Help it spread. (p. 259)

The Heath brothers identify twelve common obstacles that people encounter as they fight for change, and provide some advice about overcoming them.

1. people don't see the need to change. advice: find the feeling, create empathy, tweak the environment.
2. I'm having the "not invented here" problem: people resist my idea because they say "We've never done it like that before."advice: highlight identity, find a bright spot that is invented here and clone it.
3. we should be doing something, but we're getting bogged down in analysis. advice: find the feeling, create a destination postcard, simplify the problem by scripting the critical moves.
4. the environment has shifted, and we need to overcome our old patterns of behavior. advice: create a new habit, set an action trigger, script the critical moves
5. people simply aren't motivated to change. advice: create a new identity, create a destination postcard, lower the bar, use social pressure, smooth the Path
6. I'll change tomorrow. advice: shrink the change so you can start today, set an action trigger for tomorrow, make yourself accountable to someone.
7. people keep saying, "It will never work." advice: find a bright spot, engineer a success, carve out a free space for some who do think it will work
8. I know what I should be doing, but I'm not doing it. advice: create an Elephant problem, lower the bar, tweak the environment, get someone else involved to spread the influence
9. you don't know my people. They absolutely hate change. advice: question: how many of your people are married or have a child?
10. people were excite at first, but then we hit some rough patches and lost momentum. advice: focus on building habit, remind people how much they've already accomplished, teach the growth mindset.
11. it's just too much. advice: shrink the change, develop the growth mindset
12. everyone seems to agree that we need to change, but nothing's happening. advice: script the critical move, create the Path, find a bright spot (p. 261-4)

Finally, I am looking forward to visit the book's website: www.switchthebook.com/resources. Their earlier book includes Made to stick: why some ideas survive and other die (2007), which I read some time ago.