Switch

Book Review by Hirak Raval

Recently I read book “Switch- How to change things when change is hard” by Chip and Dan Heath. This is one of the best books on motivation and handling change management effectively. If you want someone to behave in new way as per your vision and end goal than this book is highly recommended.

Author clearly and very simply proves that Change is nothing but the state of mind, If we can convince the rational self and emotional self of people to achieve aspire change than desire change is

possible.

Basically the author gave clarity for leaders on act to perform and influence to change own or others behavior. Author compared the human change behavior with elephant and rider on top.

There are 3 major chapters in book:

1.      Direct the rider (Influence the rational side of people)- Resistance during change process is lack of clarity to people regarding change. Direct the rider means showing people path for aspire change and setting up the new benchmark to achieve goals. You need to script the critical moves, Pointing the rider to right destination through clear instructions by eliminating ambiguity. Finding the bright spots and clarity on sense of progress is also very important.

2.      Motivate the elephant (Emotional side of people)- This chapter gives clarity on importance of small wins to achieve milestones during the change process. You need to extract the growth mind set of people by finding the feeling to accept the change. If you win emotional side of elephant, you may win the elephant who is more powerful than you.

3.      Shape the Path (Win over situation)- This chapter gives importance on building habits, Right habits and right behavior to achieve desire change in auto pilot mode is possible through shaping the path- means having clear knowledge on road to the destination. Author suggested many ways to shape path with easy to embrace habits and spread of good work by peers to reach to destination easily.

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I will rate this book 3/5 and recommend the same for people managers, new Managers in new organization with existing old team and for Change influencers in any organization.