Switch. How to Change Things When Change Is Hard (1)
July 04, 2011 at 10:24 AM
One of the recurring themes when we are Coaching people is the desire they have for Change; often to change themselves in ways that they can usually articulate quite well, and always to change the dynamics in their team or company. But achieving lasting change is surprisingly difficult. I once heard it said that “the only human being that likes change is a baby with a wet nappy.”
The primary obstacle is a conflict that’s built into our brains, say Chip and Dan Heath. Psychologists have discovered that our minds are ruled by two different systems, the rational mind and the emotional mind, that compete for control. The rational mind wants a great beach body; the emotional mind wants that KitKat. The rational mind wants to change something at work; the emotional mind loves the comfort of the existing routine. This tension can doom a change effort but if it is overcome, change can come quickly.
The authors note, "If you go to the bookstore, you'll see a long aisle of self-help books: how to diet, how to beat alcohol, and so on. You'll see parenting books. You'll see ‘change management’ books for executives. You'll see ‘save the world’ type books. And it's like they're all addressing unrelated problems. But ultimately, for anything to change, somebody somewhere has to behave differently. And that's why it was so easy to spot patterns among these different domains - that you can literally use the same change strategy when you're trying to change your son or change your neighbourhood. It all comes down to behaviour change."
So this book is about Change and how people, businesses, teams, hospitals and communities can be changed. Those who have read Tim Gallwey’s book “The Inner Game” will be familiar with the notion of Self 1 (our conscious mind) and Self 2 (our subconscious) and this book uses a similar theme throughout.
The Heath brothers compare change management to an elephant with a rider. The ‘rider’ is the conscious mind that is logical, reasonable, able to deal with the facts and looks long-term. They argue that it is this skill that is most usually sought after in companies because it is rational. The ‘elephant’ however is the emotional part and the rider has relatively little control over the elephant. The premise of the book is that for any change to be successful both the ‘rider’ and the ‘elephant’ need to be engaged and if you only engage one then the chance of success is greatly reduced.
The book has three easy to digest sections:-
Directing the rider
Motivating the elephant
Shaping the path.
(more to follow..........)