This Is Strategy: Make Better Plans (Create a Strategy to Elevate Your Career, Community & Life)

by Seth Godin

127. The Five Steps to Widespread Change It begins with a nucleus. This core group shares a desire. Perhaps they’re frustrated, left out, seeking something better or something new. They are not typical. Offer that group connection, status, forward motion, opportunity, and insight. This feeling is often different from what the masses will eventually adopt. Second, maximize the chances for a small win. Small wins are evidence of progress. They create group cohesion, commitment, and most of all give the nucleus something to point to. Third, give the nucleus a way to talk about the work. What they say to the others is almost certainly not what you said to them. This requires an empathic leap, offering the next circle of people a story that resonates with their desires, not yours. Fourth, create the likelihood of another win. This stepwise process of story » action » cohesion can be repeated again and again. Momentum is often the only thing on offer. “This is happening—are you coming?” is more powerful than, “Let me explain all the facts about what is possible.” Finally, establish new status roles, affiliation opportunities, and data exchange to codify a system going forward. The infrastructure doesn’t come first. In fact, it gets built much later, after people care enough about being part of the new system.