Minnesota Institute of Public Health

An interesting read is a book by the Heath brothers (Dan professor at Duke University, Chip professor at Stanford) entitled Switch: How To Change Things When Change is Hard. It is a true story of the dynamics of focusing on organizational change, with special emphasis on "What are we doing that's right?". It is solutions -based planning versus simply admiring the problems that exist. Glass half full by building on what works rather than mourning what doesn't work.

With many examples from education (the troubled student) to parenting (the difficult child), to conflict at work, to major systems change in organizations and even countries Switch actually breaks down success - WHY something works - into bite-sized action steps that may be replicated and taken to scale, led by the person or people who actually have succeeded. Whether mothers in Viet Nam who found ways to have nourished children in a mal-nourished culture, or teachers who help their colleagues replicate very ground level specific strategies for helping  challenged learners learn (greet student by name at the door, allow a bit of extra time, check impersonally to see if he ‘got' the assignment and directions, follow up with immediate feedback). Solutions based change and improvement.

In a world of Can't or Won't, this is refreshing and very doable.

Check it out.

-JJ

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