CONDUZINDO SEU ELEFANTE
Scott Wright, MBA
June 2015
Strategic Leadership Management
Executive Education Seminar
Brazil ranked ____/144 in
Global Competitiveness.
A.
B.
C.
D.
57
68
82
104
Brazil ranked 57/144 in Global Competitiveness.
What is Argentina ranked?
A.
B.
C.
D.
57
68
82
104
“Change is the only constant”
“Mudança é a única constante”
~ Heraclitus – Greek Philosopher
Change is difficult
• Multiple studies have shown that 70% of the
time, when significant change is needed:
– People back away
– Try but fail miserably
– Stop, exhausted, after achieving half of what they
want using twice the time and money
Mudança envolve três elementos
• Guia – intelecto
• Elefante - motivação
• A trilha - ambiente
Direct The Rider
• Riders love to contemplate & analyze but the
analysis is usually directed at problems rather
than bright spots
Knowledge Does Not
Change Behavior
Conhecimento não altera o
comportamento
• Overweight doctors – médicos obesos
• Divorced marriage counselors - conselheiros
matrimoniais divorciados
• Corrupt police officers – policiais corruptos
• Depressed psychologists – Psicologos
depressivos
Ask the Exception Question
• When does the problem you’re fighting not happen?
i.e.,
– When does your teenager not talk back?
– When have the two warring departments collaborated
instead of feuding?
– When does your front-line employee show a “customer
service focus”?
Provide Explicit Direction
• What’s wrong with:
– Be more innovative
– Be a more loving couple
– Teach more effectively
– We want to have the best sales force
• Remove abstractions
3rd Party Observation
• Would someone observing from the outside
be able to tell if you were making progress
toward your goal?
• Will your team know when it is time to
celebrate?
Decision Paralysis
• Retirement options
– For every 10 additional options,
participation goes down by 2%
• 6 jams vs. 24 jams
– Shoppers who viewed only 6 jams were 6x more
likely to buy
• Speed dating
– Young adults who met 8 other singles made more
“matches” than those who met 20
Rider Review
1. Focus on the positive
2. Provide clear direction
3. Be careful of too many choices
Motivating the Elephant
– Managers initially focus on strategy, structure,
culture or systems which lead them to miss the
most important issue
– Behavioral change happens in highly successful
situations mostly by speaking to people’s feelings
Source: John Kotter in “Heart of Change”
Motivating the Elephant
• Most people think change happens in this
order:
– Analyze, think, change – generally unsuccessful
– See, feel, change – is more successful
You’re presented with evidence that makes you feel
something – speaks to the elephant
Decision Making
Rational
20%
Emotional 80%
http://youtu.be/wYtnbpSC9vQ – Life Insurance
New York University – found individuals invested 50% more of
their paycheck when seeing a future image of themselves.
Make the Change Visual
• Seeing is often more emotional than reading
or hearing
• What can you show your employees to exhibit
your desire for change?
• If you could video one person, who would that
be – a competitor, an employee that has seen
the benefits, etc.
Hospital Screen Saver
www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-8PBx7isoM&NR=1
Candle Problem
Attach candle to wall so wax does not drip on table
2 groups asked to solve problem
No reward structure
Only measured for time
Offered $20 for best time
2 groups asked to solve problem
No reward structure
Only measured for time
Offered $20 for best time
Took 3 ½ minutes longer
2 groups asked to solve problem with
tacks out of box – making it easier
No reward structure
Only measured for time
Offered $20 for best time
2 groups asked to solve problem with
tacks out of box
No reward structure
Only measured for time
Offered $20 for best time
This group was faster
Candle Solution
Incentives
• Rewards, tend to narrow our focus and
concentrate the mind.
• If-then rewards work really well for those sorts
of tasks, where there is a simple set of rules
and a clear destination to go to.
• London School Economics looked at 51 studies
of pay-for-performance plans
– financial incentives can result in a negative impact
on performance.
Optimism Bias
• We’re more optimistic than realistic
– Driving ability
– Honesty
Source: The Optimism Bias: A Tour of the Irrationally Positive Brain
- Tali Sharot
How many of us have the optimism bias?
A.
B.
C.
D.
50%
60%
70%
80%
Why is this a problem for management?
Which card should be paid first if client
has hard time paying off debt?
Card
A
B
C
D
Amount
Owed
$9,000
$8,000
$3,000
$500
Interest Rate
13%
15%
9%
7%
Shrinking Change
• Make the change small enough that people
can easily feel an accomplishment
Shrinking Change
• Car wash frequent-buyer cards study
• ___% returned 8 times
• ___% returned 8 times
Play for Small Wins
• How long does your team have to wait before
they have a sense of how they’re doing?
Growth vs. Fixed Mindset
• 1. Sua inteligência é algo tão básico que você não
pode modificá-la muito.
• 2. Você é capaz de aprender coisas novas, mas você
não pode realmente modificar seu nível de
inteligência.
Source: Mindsetonline.com
Growth vs. Fixed Mindset
• Imagine Edison inventing the lightbulb
Your Role
• If people have a fixed mindset they may see
hard work as a sign that the problem can not
be solved or that they are not the right kind of
people to do it.
• You need to help them understand that they
are building “muscle” that will pay off in the
future.
Elephant Review
1. Financial incentives don’t always work and can
decrease performance.
2. Emotionally, we need to feel that change is
needed.
3. Make change appear easy by starting with small
steps.
4. Help people develop growth mindsets.
People or Situational Problem?
Shaping the Path
• Management often commits the
“Fundamental Attribution Error”
– Psychologist Lee Ross
• We tend to attribute people’s behavior to
the way they are rather than to the situation
they are in.
– Person driving recklessly
– Nurses distributing wrong pills
47%
Organ Donation
check this box if you want to
participate in the organ
donation program
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016762960600004X
check this box if you don’t
want to participate in the
organ donation program
Why do errors occur?
• Errors of ignorance (mistakes we make
because we don’t know enough)
OR
• Errors of ineptitude (mistakes we made
because we don’t make proper use of what
we know)
– Projectcheck.org – how to create checklists
Source: The Checklist Manifesto – Atul Gawande
Van Halen – no brown M&Ms
Highlight the Changes
• Save the Planet
• Be a good citizen
• Save $54 a month
Which had the most impact on consumers?
Path Review
1. Make the environment conducive to change.
2. Utilize checklists.
3. Show how others are changing (moving on
the path).
How to Change
• Direct the Rider
• Motivate the Elephant
• Shape the Path
Idéia
Pegajosa
• Sticky = Understandable, memorable, and
effective in changing thought or behavior
• Why is it so easy for an urban legend like the
“kidney thieves” or “flying angels” to stick?
• What are some examples of situations when
it’d be important for you to make an idea
stick?
Making Ideas Stick
•
•
•
•
•
•
Simple – Simples = 1 idea
Concrete – Concreto = Understand and remember
Credible – Digno de confiança = Believable
Unexpected – Imprevisto = Gets your attention
Emotional – Emocional = You care
Story – História = Puts into context
Sticky or Abstract?
• “Our mission is to become the
international leader in the space industry
through maximum team-centered
innovation and strategically targeted
aerospace initiatives”
Sticky or Abstract?
• President Kennedy - “Put a man on the
moon & return him safely by the end of the
decade”
• What is the difference between
the two statements?
–
–
–
–
–
–
Simple?
Unexpected?
Concrete?
Credible?
Emotional?
Story?
Simple - Simples
1+1=2
Simple
– Proverbs – Sound bites that are profound
• Bird in the hand (Aesop – 570 b.c.)
• Golden Rule
– Visual proverbs: The Palm Pilot wood block
– Existing Schemas: The Pomelo fruit
– What is the lead of your story?
• Netflix
–
–
–
–
large library
convenience
no late fees
inexpensive
Is it harder to be simple or complex?
• Develop a high-concept pitch for a CFL-light
bulb (compact fluorescent light bulb).
Concrete - Concreto
OR
Velcro Theory
• Remember the capital of Bahia
• Remember the first line of Hino Nacional do
Brasil
• Remember the Mona Lisa
• Remember the house where you spent most
of your childhood
• Remember the definition of “verdade”
• Remember the definition of “maçã”
Credible - Digno de confiança
Cure for Ulcer?
Duodenal Ulcer Disease
Barry Marshall found cure but had no credibility.
Making #s Credible
• Only 37% said they have a clear understanding
of what their organization is trying to achieve
and why.
OR
• Only 4 of 11 players on the field would know
which goal is theirs.
Source: The 8th Habit – Stephen Covey – 23,000 employees polled
US Fiscal Condition
US Tax revenue: $2,170,000,000,000
Fed budget:
$3,820,000,000,000
New debt:
$1,650,000,000,000
National debt: $14,271,000,000,000
Recent budget cut: $38,500,000,000
Make it Relevant
$21,700
$38,200
$16,500
$142,710
$385
Annual family income
Money the family spent
New debt on the credit card
Outstanding balance on credit card
Total budget cuts
• How do urban legends manage to convince us
that they are credible, even though they are
false?
• More broadly, why do we believe false ideas?
Unexpected - Imprevisto
Enclave Minivan
What Makes People Interested?
• Common sense is the enemy of sticky
messages – If I already understand what
you’re trying to tell me, why should I obsess
about remembering it?
• Basic way of getting someone’s attention:
Break a pattern
– Great Wall of China seen in space
– We should drink 8 glasses of water a day
– We only use 10% of our brain
What Makes People Interested?
• Find the knowledge gap
– Highlight specific knowledge that your audience is
missing
– Pose a question that exposes their gap in
knowledge – Celsius
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBlRbrB_Gnc
airline safety
Emotional - Emocional
Emotional - Emocional
• Feelings inspire people to act (moving the elephant)
• Make people care
– People donate more to a girl than to Africa
• 7-year old girl in Mali vs Save the Children
• Emotional doesn’t mean tear-jerking or melodramatic
— it simply means that, for an idea to stick, it needs to
tap into something people care about.
• Army mess-hall leader who says his mission isn’t to
serve food—he’s in charge of ________. That’s a
powerful motivating mission.
–
–
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMfSGt6rHos farming
http://youtu.be/c4xmFcrJexk anti- smoking
Mission Statement
• Write down a brief two to three sentence
mission statement that would inspire an
employee of Receita Federal.
• The mission statement should capture the
deep, idealistic principles that motivate
people who work there, and it should also
inspire others who might want to work for
them.
Story - História
Story - História
• Stories provide simulation (knowledge about
how to act)
• Stories are like flight simulators for the brain
• Hardest part is to keep them simple and
deliver your core message
Making Ideas Stick
•
•
•
•
•
•
Simple – Simples = 1 idea
Concrete – Concreto = Understand and remember
Credible – Digno de confiança = Believable
Unexpected – Imprevisto = Gets your attention
Emotional – Emocional = You care
Story – História = Puts into context
Subway Story
•
•
•
•
•
•
Simple – Simples
Concrete – Concreto
Credible – Digno de confiança
Unexpected – Imprevisto
Emotional – Emocional
Story – História
• What story can a a beer company tell?
– youtube.com/watch?v=xwndLOKQTDs
– youtube.com/watch?v=8SrGRyI4lXM
Additional Readings from Faculty
ohiofgv.com - Materials