Here are the three most important pitfalls and success factors we’ve discovered. Our research shows that these three elements can make you and your loved ones ten times more likely to succeed.
Mistake #1: We attack people with information.
We assume that, if the person only knew what we knew, they’d change. The problem is, often they already know what we know, plus more.
.. Solution: People need to examine their own narrative.
When you’re trying to influence people who need motivation, but not information, don’t offer more information. Instead, work to create a safe environment where they can explore motivations they already have. People need to re-examine their narrative, especially any self-defeating or clever stories they are telling themselves to justify the status quo.
- “What is it that makes you even consider changing?”
- “If things worked out exactly the way you want, what would be different?
- “What are the pluses and minuses of changing or not changing?”
- “If this change were easy, would you want to make it? What makes it hard?”
Mistake #2: We fail to see why we’re stuck.
Getting someone to make a commitment to change is not the same as getting them to actually change. The problem is that people overestimate the power of their own willpower. They fail to see the risks in front of them. So, they put their heart and soul into an effort, but it’s not enough. They are tripped up by obstacles they never anticipated.
We need to recognize the hidden influences around us, the influences that are keeping us stuck. Once we see them, we can deal with them. We group influences into six sources: three that motivate and three that enable.
- Personal Motivation ..
- Social Motivation ..
- Structural Motivation ..
- Personal Ability ..
- Social Ability ..
- Structural Ability ..
Most stubborn problems persist because of unseen or overlooked influences that are keeping us stuck. Once we see them, we can change them. However, if we don’t change them, we’ll remain stuck.
.. Another mistake is to have favorite solutions, and to use them in isolation. For example, we assume carrots and sticks will solve every problem, or that training or technology will. As a result, we create one-sided solutions that address only a few of the obstacles that are keeping us stuck.
The Three Paradoxes Disrupting American Politics
They didn’t start with Trump, and they won’t end with him.
.. It is comforting to think that Trump is the only thing standing between us and the good old dysfunctional ways of Washington. But I have my doubts. The president’s disruption engine is powered by three paradoxes. Each was made possible by technological innovations. All will endure long after this ringmaster moves his circus to another town.
Paradox #1: More information, less credibility
Today Google processes 61,000 search queries a second. That’s 5.2 billion queries a day.
.. Because the barriers to entry are so low. In the Middle Ages, when paper was a sign of wealth and books were locked up in monasteries, knowledge was considered valuable and creating it was costly.
.. We now live at the opposite extreme, where anyone—from foreign adversaries to any crackpot with a conspiracy theory—can post original “research” online.
.. Last month, a Pew survey found that for the first time, a majority of Republicans had a negative view of American universities.
Paradox #2: More connectivity, less civility
Today nearly half the world is online. By 2020 more people are expected to have cell phones than running water.
Paradox #3: The wisdom of crowds, the duplicity of crowds
Technology has unleashed the wisdom of crowds. Now you can find an app harnessing the experiences and ratings of likeminded users for just about anything. The best taco truck in Los Angeles? Yelp. The highest rated puppy crate? Amazon. Youth hostels in Barcelona? TripAdvisor
.. But the 2016 presidential election revealed that not all crowds are wise, or even real. The wisdom of crowds can be transformed into the duplicity of crowds. Deception is going viral.
.. On social media, one person can masquerade as hundreds, even thousands, with fake personas. Thanks to advances in artificial intelligence, it’s also possible to create armies of automated social media bots to develop, manipulate, and spread deceptive information at speeds and scales unimaginable before now.
The North Korea-Trump Nightmare
It would begin because the present approach of leaning on China to pressure North Korea will likely fail. Trump will grow angry at public snickering at the emptiness of his threats.
.. At some point, U.S. intelligence will see a North Korean missile prepared for a test launch — and it may then be very tempting for a deeply frustrated rogue president to show his muscle. Foreign
.. the country might respond by firing artillery at Seoul, a metropolitan area of 25 million people.
.. a new Korean war could cause one million casualties and $1 trillion in damage.
.. “I do not believe there is any plausible military action that does not bring with it a possibility of a catastrophic conflict.”
.. China’s relations with North Korea aren’t nearly as close as Americans think.
.. In the 1990s, North Korea continued with its nuclear program even as a famine claimed the lives of perhaps 10 percent of the population
.. Instead, she urges greater measures to undermine the regime’s legitimacy at home by smuggling in information about it and the world (as some activists are already doing).
.. pushing for a deal in which North Korea would verifiably freeze its nuclear and missile programs without actually giving up its nukes, in exchange for sanctions relief.