Our Iceberg Is Melting Quotes

“Empower Others to Act. Remove as many barriers as possible so that those who want to make the vision a reality can do so. Encourage others to remove barriers and make true innovation happen.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Question: Recent research is reflected in this new edition? JK: Yes. We have learned, for example, that talking about hazards, like your iceberg is melting, is a great way to catch people’s attention if they’re very complacent. But if you keep hitting them with hazard, hazard, hazard, they panic, and panic doesn’t help people. They start worrying about themselves or their families, not the community, and anxiety can start to wear them down. There’s a lot of evidence that’s come up in the last decade that to sustain any effort to make some big changes that are needed you have to shift the emphasis from hazard to opportunity. You have to think more in positive terms. And this helps a group of people not to burn out, not to focus just on themselves, but to stay motivated and focused on the group.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Tradition dies a hard death. Culture changes with as much difficulty in penguin colonies as in human colonies. But with this colony, culture did change.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“reducing complacency and increasing urgency they had taken exactly the right first step in potentially saving the colony.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“8. Create a New Culture. Hold on to the new ways of behaving, and make sure they succeed, until they become strong enough to replace old traditions. Better still, make all of these steps a central part of the way you live to help you adapt to an ever faster changing world.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“7. Don’t Let Up. Press harder and faster after the first successes. Be relentless with initiating change after change until the vision is a reality.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“6. Produce Short-Term Wins. Create some visible, unambiguous successes as soon as possible—something that makes today better than yesterday and tomorrow better than today.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“5. Empower Others to Act. Remove as many barriers as possible so that those who want to make the vision a reality can do so. Encourage others to remove barriers and make true innovation happen.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“4. Communicate for Understanding and Buy-In. Make sure as many others as possible understand and accept the vision and the strategy.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“3. Develop the Change Vision and Strategy. Clarify how the future will be different from the past, and how you can make that future a reality.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“2. Pull Together the Guiding Team. Make sure there is a powerful group guiding the change—one with leadership skills, credibility, communications ability, authority, analytical skills, and a sense of urgency.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Question: Is there one takeaway you want readers to carry with them? JK: Yes. In these turbulent times, sufficient leadership, not just from the top couple of people, is very important, far too rare, and it does not have to be that way. It often starts with only one person not looking away or waiting for something to happen, but seizing opportunities to act where others see problems, fault or threat. Why couldn’t that one person be you, or anyone reading this interview right now?”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“I’ve been studying for a long time how people learn. And I think it is pretty clear that our brains are hard-wired for stories. A good story is easy to absorb and remember, especially if it has emotional components. This is probably because that was how humans learned for tens of thousands of years. The leader tells the youngsters the great story about how one from their clan grabbed dinner from the mouth of the saber-toothed tiger and saved the tribe, or how he was eaten by the saber-toothed tiger. A dramatic, interesting story that has important lessons in it.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“We throw people into launching and supporting change initiatives and projects and we just assume that life and past experiences have been a good teacher for everybody to pick up today’s relevant insights and skills. But we have seen again and again that this is not necessarily true when you have to change more often and in bigger ways. Life—which means the past—can be a pretty bad teacher.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“So what have you learned in the last decade? JK: The most basic point is that the rate of change continues to go up in most places, in most industries, and in most sectors. As a result, the number of significant initiatives inside organizations has gone up. Initiatives in operations, marketing, sales, finance, anywhere. And that has big implications.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Create a New Culture. Hold on to the new ways of behaving, and make sure they succeed, until they become strong enough to replace old traditions. Better still, make all of these steps a central part of the way you live to help you adapt to an ever faster changing world. Consider: Are we putting those who have helped make change happen in leadership roles? Have the scouts been rewarded? How can we institutionalize change, like adding scouting to the school curriculum?”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Don’t Let Up.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Produce Short-Term Wins.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Communicate for Understanding and Buy-In. Make sure as many others as possible understand and accept the vision and the strategy. Go beyond “stopping resistance” to creating more and more people who want to help you.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Develop the Change Vision and Strategy. Clarify how the future will be different from the past, and how you can make that future a reality. Consider: What would be the equivalent of becoming nomads and being “free”? Is that better future attractive enough? Do we have a credible path to achieve that goal?”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Pull Together the Guiding Team. Make sure there is a powerful group guiding the change—one with leadership skills, credibility, communications ability, authority, analytical skills, and a sense of urgency.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Create a Sense of Urgency.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“We offer you the following summary to help you lead change. It shows the Eight Steps to successfully implement change, and asks you to think about these in relation to your situation.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Grandfather Louis became the colony’s number one teacher. He was asked again and again by the younger birds to tell them the story of the First Great Change. He was initially reluctant, fearing that he would sound like an old-timer boasting about past successes—real or imagined. But eventually, he saw the importance of telling the chicks more about the specific steps the colony had taken, and were taking, to cope with change and the various acts of leadership by many that had helped the colony move forward. Although Louis never said so explicitly, he felt the most remarkable change of all was in how so many members of the colony had grown less afraid of change. The army of volunteers was now an irresistible force of change.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“There was always some tension between those who thought their role was to keep things in order and those who were urgent about producing necessary changes. But most penguins intuitively understood that you needed both to thrive in this new era.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Buddy was offered a number of more important jobs. He turned them all down, but helped the Leadership Council find other good candidates. His lack of ambition came to be seen as great humility. The birds loved him even more.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Alice (backed up with the Professor’s relentless logic) convinced Louis to shake up the Leadership Council. He was reluctant to do anything that would show disrespect for birds who had worked hard for years to help and serve the colony. Making the moves while preserving the dignity of all was not easy.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“The next season, the scouts found a still better iceberg, larger and with richer fishing grounds. And though it was tempting to declare that the colony had been subjected to enough change, and should stay forever on their new home, they didn’t. They moved again. It was a critical step: not becoming complacent again and not letting up.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“At one point, even the Head Penguin suggested that the right step might be to slow down. But Alice wouldn’t hear of it. “We are constantly at risk of losing our courage. Some birds are already suggesting we wait until next winter. Then, if we are still alive, they will say the danger was overstated and that any change is not needed.” It was a good point.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions

“Still, parents felt a bit awkward. “You don’t share food, except with your children” was a very, very old and established tradition. So the inspired youngsters made it clear that they would be extremely embarrassed unless (1) their parents came to Heroes Day, and (2) each mother and father brought two fish as the cost of admission. As soon as a few parents relented, announcing that they would be bringing fish, others decided they must also. Social pressure works as well in penguin colonies as in human colonies.”
― John P. Kotter, Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions