Innovation and the formula for change -6
“For anything to change, someone has to start acting differently (…) To change someone’s behavior you’ve got to change that person’s situation. The conventional wisdom in psychology is that the brain has two independent systems at work at all times. First there’s what we called the emotional side (…) second is the rational side (…) More recently, behavioral economists dubbed the two systems the Planner and the Doer.”
Switch. How to change things when change is hard. Chip Heath & Dan Heath.
I’m reading “Switch” this week, which is a good source of insights for anyone interested in change management as well as “emotional design” in human factors engineering.
My take on the Heath brothers’ book is that when we get to work on innovating and changing things, it pays to address three aspects:
- the context by developing situational awareness
- behavioral patterns and forces pulling in other directions
- the actual worthiness of the effort, available options and required energy
I think that this formula for change would look like this:
- Change = D * E * P
- Clarity of Direction
- Level of emotional Engagement
- A set Path forward
Related posts:
J. de Francisco blogging from Chicago on July 13, 2010
