Issue 50

INNOVATION AND CHANGE

How Change Happens (video, 19 minutes)
Whether you want to lose weight, kick an addiction, get a 4.0, lead a team to a championship, raise your kids well, improve your marriage, or transform your company, your school, or your church, permanent change is possible. But trying harder is not the answer.

Serious about Change? Nix the Naysayers (video, 4 minutes) 
It’s brief counsel, but worth watching again and again. If you’ve ever had an important change initiative undermined by die-hard resisters, Professor John Kotter has one simple piece of advice.

A.G. Lafley on Innovation (video, 15 minutes)
Innovation is at the core of Procter & Gamble’s business strategy. How do they do it? Here is a wide-ranging interview with A.G. Lafley, P&G’s former CEO, replete with practical and transferable insights.

Design Thinking for Social Innovation
It’s a revolutionary reframing. “Design thinking” is a widely-used innovation process that is essentially a third way between purely rational and intuitive approaches. Think iPad and IDEO. But think also, as this article does, about the potential to solve the thorniest social problems around the world. From theStanford Social Innovation Review. See also this practical design thinking toolkit.

A Refresher on “Disruptive Innovation” (video, 8 minutes) 
Southwest Airlines, Khan Academy, Skype, Netflix, iTunes, Willow Creek Community Church. They all reinvented their industry and achieved phenomenal results through “disruptive innovations.” Clay Christensen, still one of the world’s most influential management thinkers, summarizes his landmark theory.

Everyday Leadership (video, 7 minutes) 
Each of us has changed someone’s life — often without even realizing it. In this concise and funny talk, Drew Dudley calls on all of us to celebrate leadership as the everyday act of improving each other’s lives.

TOOLKIT: The Obstacles to Growth Survey (24 items, 8 minutes)
What’s in the way of real, lasting change in your spiritual life? The Obstacles to Growth Survey is a tool to estimate that, freely and anonymously. It’s based on Christian theology, but to date the OGS has been used by more than 20,000 people from a broad range of worldviews.