1. Leading Fearless Change in Organizations
Mary Lynn Manns
Crescent PPO       March 2010
Intrigue them: How many people will change when told that if they don’t change their life is likely to be shortened.
Tell PART of the story of the heart patients and the criminals.

3. What are
your
challenges
in leading change?

4. In order to persuade someone to change, you need to create…
(1) tension between the present state and the desired state (2) a belief in the ability to change How do you, as the change leader, create these two feelings?
Tension – exercise person who always finds excuses
Belief – I tried this before but it didn’t work; this is too hard
Yeh, something needs to be done but we’ve tried this before

5. Tension
Belief

6. How do we attempt to persuade?
Fear
What not to wear…. Ask Chip
Chance you will change if given the facts – 10%
Heart patients
We like to think we are rational people.
Facts can contradict
Info overload
You have to care about the facts
Fear:
Ah, that will never happen to me
Rationalize
Learned helplessness
Short term wake-up call
Need clear steps or will deny
Force:
Push back
What happens when force goes away
Fix:
People hate change
Facts
Force
Fix

7. Attempting to persuade with….
Force
treats the symptoms
rather than the underlying causes
Laws, directives, policies, etc. do not create a fundamental change in thinking and behaving
Criminals
Rules in organizations
Vision statements!

8. Attempting to persuade with….
Fear : works in the short term
Too frightening to contemplate
People use coping mechanisms to “justify”
Example: an Inconvenient Truth
Can backfire: Learned helplessness
“Preventive innovations” have a low rate of adoption
Wake-up call

9. Attempting to persuade….
you get frustrated and…
Fix
But what happens when the “fix” is gone?
Money
Medical pills
I’ll just do it for them
Solution not sustainable

10. Attempting to persuade with….
Facts
Facts provide knowledge
“factual battle” versus a “motivational battle”
Information overload
Conflicting facts – climate change
Experiment – what caused you to buy your car?

11. Is there another ‘F’ word that can create a fundamental and sustainable change in thinking and behaving?
Why did you buy your last car?... Honestly!

12. Feelings…
Behavior change happens mostly by speaking to a people’s feelings. (John Kotter)
Our emotions drive our decisions and then we use logic and reason to justify our decisions.
People will forget what you said, forget what you did, but not forget how you made them feel. (Maya Angelou)
First bullet: Back to the heart patients and the criminals – finish the story
Second bullet: Why you bought your car
Third bullet: Mary – recycling
My decision to speak to Leadership Asheville
Guy who had brain problems – orbitofrontal cortex (OFC)
Our emotions are easy to draw on

13. knowledge – persuasion – decision – implementation – confirmation
Knowledge (facts) – help the person understand the facts Persuasion (feelings) – help the person care about the facts

14. Knowledge: communicate information
Stress the core of your message
Elevator Speech
Just Enough
Concentrate on the possibilities
Small problems Step by Step; propose a strategy
Keep your message visible and frequent
In Your Space
Tackle preconceived notions
Myth Buster
Capture attention
Wake-up Call
Avoid the Curse of Knowledge
“Anchor and Twist”

15. Persuasion: transform information into action
Create an Emotional Connection
Show a truth that influences feelings
Match your idea to needs
Personal Touch
Use stories rather than statistics
Hometown Story
Allow people to imagine the future
Imagine That!
Show a truth that affects their feelings

16. Persuasion: transform information into action
Recognize what people are losing
Shoulder to Cry On
Address the fear
Fear Less
Build ownership
Group Identity

17. Making an Emotional Connection
Show a truth that influences their feelings
Other ways you can do this?...

18. Take-aways…
Facts, Fear, Force, Fix do not persuade people to make a sustainable change
Persuasion calls for an appeal to emotion rather than to logic
Help individuals feel something (rather than only think about it). Inspire them to act.
Show a truth that influences their feelings rather than only their logic.
Feel something rather than only think about something
Change happens one individual at a time

19. Leading change is hard, but…
You miss 100% of the shots you never take.
Feel something rather than only think about something 19

20. Leading Fearless Change in Organizations
Mary Lynn Manns
www. fearlesschangepatterns.com
Crescent PPO       March 2010