by Chip Heath
Declined from 34% to 1%. The decline in open defecation is from CLTS annual report, 2014–15, and CLTS report “Igniting Action/Asia.”
“The naked truth is out.” Quote from Dan’s interview with Kar.
Scott Guthrie, Microsoft Azure. Story from http://fortune.com/microsoft-fortune-500-cloud-computing/.
Course Design Institute. Dan interviewed Michael Palmer in June 2015 and attended the CDI in July 2015. The teacher quotes are from that workshop. Dan also interviewed Christ (January 2016) and Lawrence (August 2015). The course evaluation data and the “exponentially improved” quote are from http://cte.virginia.edu/programs/course-design-institute/testimonials/.
Chapter 6: Stretch for Insight
Lea Chadwell opens a bakery. Dan interviewed Chadwell in July 2016. Thanks to Brian Kurth of PivotPlanet for the introduction.
Benefits of self-insight. Rick Harrington and Donald A. Loffredo (2011). “Insight, Rumination, and Self-Reflection as Predictors of Well-Being,” Journal of Psychology 145(1). A thank-you to Tasha Eurich for inspiring us to check out this literature. If you find this interesting you should look up Tasha’s book on self-insight (2017), Insight: Why We’re Not as Self-Aware as We Think, and How Seeing Ourselves Clearly Helps Us Succeed at Work and in Life. New York: Crown Business.
Study abroad in Rome. Response to a survey conducted by authors in December 2015
Reflecting or ruminating. See Chapters 5 and 6 of Tasha Eurich’s book Insight (citation above).
Action leads to insight. We were impressed with ourselves when we came up with this snappy action/insight quote but some cursory googling showed us that Steve Chalke was saying it nine years ago.
Michael Dinneen patient suicide. Dan interviewed Dineen about this story in June 2015, and Ridenour in June 2016
Honig Easter Sunday sermon. Honig contributed this story in March 2016 and we followed up in an email exchange in January 2017.
High standards + assurance. The research study is in David Scott Yeager et al. (2014). “Breaking the Cycle of Mistrust: Wise Interventions to Provide Critical Feedback Across the Racial Divide,” Journal of Experimental Psychology 143(2): 804–24.
Six Sigma black belt. This story was originally surfaced in a survey response submitted by Dale Phelps in March 2016 and subsequent interviews by Dan with Phelps and Ranjani Sreenivasan in August 2016.
Blakely, Spanx. Most of the Blakely story, including most of her quotes, are pulled from her chapter in Gillian Zoe Segal (2015). Getting There: A Book of Mentors. New York: Abrams Image. The timeline of events in the case study is drawn from http://www.spanx.com/years-of-great-rears. The “grew immune to the word ‘no’ ” quote is from a talk Blakely gave to Inc. magazine’s Women’s Summit in March 2016. It is both insightful and funny. http://www.inc.com/sara-blakely/how-spanx-founder-turned-5000-dollars-into-a-billion-dollar-undergarment-business.html.
Clinic 3: Panda Garden House. This name was inspired by a Washington Post piece that analyzed the names of almost every Chinese restaurant in the country. As the authors wrote, “Americans have been trained to expect Chinese food at places with names like ‘Golden Dragon Buffet.’ If you were to open a Chinese restaurant named like ‘Dorchester Meadows’ it would probably tank.” From Roberto A. Ferdman and Christopher Ingraham (2016, April 8), “We Analyzed the Names of Almost Every Chinese Restaurant in America. This Is What We Learned,” Wonkblog, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/08/we-analyzed-the-names-of-almost-every-chinese-restaurant-in-america-this-is-what-we-learned/?utm_term=.e32614cde10a.
Chapter 7: Recognize Others
Kira Sloop, singer. The story is from interviews by Dan with Sloop in August 2015 and January 2016.
Cinderellas and ugly ducklings. Gad Yair (2009). “Cinderellas and Ugly Ducklings: Positive Turning Points in Students’ Educational Careers—Exploratory Evidence and a Future Agenda,” British Educational Research Journal 35(3): 351–70.
Four similar studies of workplace motivation. Carolyn Wiley (1997). “What Motivates Employees According to Over 40 Years of Motivation Surveys,” International Journal of Manpower 18(3): 263–80.
Top reason people leave jobs. Bob Nelson (1997). 1501 Ways to Reward Employees. New York: Workman.
Recognition experts have advice. Advice from Luthans Stajkovic (2009). “Provide Recognition for Performance Improvement.” In Handbook of Principles of Organizational Behavior. West Sussex: Wiley, pp. 239–52.
Prepping the backroom/Noticed an error. The two quotes here came from a set of people who signed up on Amazon’s MTurk to participate in research studies.
Keith Risinger, Bose headset. Risinger story from interviews with Chip and Risinger in January 2016 and October 2014, and Dan and Risinger in January 2016. Dan interviewed Hughes in January 2016. Interesting fact about Hughes: He is a professional softball player. A Hall of Famer, in fact. His professional status means he’s banned from playing softball for recreation leagues, so don’t get any ideas for your office team.
DonorsChoose. Dan interviewed Ahmad and Pace in July 2016, and Julie Prieto in May 2016 and September 2016. Barbara Cvenic provided information in October 2016 about the positive effect of thank-yous on subsequent donations. Thanks also to Missy Sherburne and Cesar Bocanegra for additional color.
Roughly a million thank-yous. Julia Prieto email August 2016: “Our fiscal year just wrapped with our total Per outgoing number at 90,422. That total multiplied by the average number of thank-yous in each envelope (11) puts us right at 994,642.”
Seligman letter of gratitude exercise. This version of the exercise is from https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/02/18/martin-seligman-gratitude-visit-three-blessings/.
Glassman letter to his mother. Glassman recorded the exchange, which took place over the Internet, so you can see the emotions that both of them experienced during the call. Transcribed from video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPuS7SITqgY, accessed July 17, 2016. The other facts and the “almost untouchable” quote are from an interview between Dan and Glassman in July 2016.
Gratitude visit participants still happier one month later. M. E. P. Seligman, T. A. Steen, N. Park, and C. Peterson (2005). “Positive Psychology Progress: Empirical Validation of Interventions,” American Psychologist 60: 410–21.
Chapter 8. Multiply Milestones
Couch to 5K. Dan interviewed Josh Clark in May 2016 and Nancy Griffin (Clark’s mom) in July 2016. “The Dreaded W5D3” quote is from a blog post: https://pleasurenotpunishment.wordpress.com/2012/03/17/the-dreaded-w5d3/.
Hundreds of thousands have participated. The hashtag #c25k on Instagram has been used to tag over 225,000 posts. https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/c25k/?hl=en, accessed February 10, 2017.
“Freaking Dragons.” Quote is from Steve Kamb (2016). Level Up Your Life: How to Unlock Adventure and Happiness by Becoming the Hero of Your Own Story. New York: Rodale, p. 65.
Scott Ettl reads presidential biographies. Scott Ettl story from interview with Dan in July 2016
Nine million runners in marathons. Eric J. Allen, Patricia M. Dechow, Devin G. Pope, and George Wu (2014, July). “Reference-Dependent Preferences: Evidence from Marathon Runners,” NBER Working Paper No. 20343.
Cal Newport, “obsession with completion.” Cited in blog: https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2007/10/18/the-art-of-the-finish-how-to-go-from-busy-to-accomplished/.
Chapter 9: Practice Courage
Nashville sit-ins. This case study is based on an episode called “Ain’t Scared of Your Jails,” in the brilliant PBS series Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years (1995). Most of the series, including this episode, can be found on YouTube. Video footage of Lawson’s workshops starts about five minutes into “Ain’t Scared of Your Jails.” The Taylor Branch quote is from his definitive account of the civil rights movement (1988), Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954–63. New York: Simon & Schuster, p. 286. The arrest figures are from page 290. The Lawson quote about the necessity of “fierce dis
cipline and training” is from a documentary about the history of the strategy of nonviolent action by Steve York, “A Force More Powerful,” International Center on Nonviolent Conflict, 1999, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CGlnjfJvHg, accessed March 2, 2017.
Rachman study of bomb-disposal operators. S. J. Rachman (1982, March). “Development of Courage in Military Personnel in Training and Performance in Combat Situations,” U.S. Army Research Report 1338.
Overcoming fear of spiders. Steps 1, 3, 7, and 9 are from Jayson L. Mystkowski et al. (2006). “Mental Reinstatement of Context and Return of Fear in Spider-Fearful Participants,” Behavior Therapy 37(1): 49–60. The two-hours statistic is from Katherina K. Hauner et al. (2012). “Exposure Therapy Triggers Lasting Reorganization of Neural Fear Processing,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 109(23): 9203–08. The “wouldn’t walk on grass for fear of spiders” quote is from http://www.livescience.com/20468-spider-phobia-cured-therapy.html.
Implementation intentions. Peter M. Gollwitzer (1999). “Implementation Intentions: Strong Effects of Simple Plans,” American Psychologist 54: 493–503.
Giving voice to values. Background came from an interview with Dan in June 2010. Quotes from Mary Gentile are from a Q&A on her website: http://www.givingvoicetovaluesthebook.com/about/.
Rabbinical role-play. The case study is from Paul Vitello (2010, February 10). “Rabbis in Training Receive Lessons in Real-Life Trauma,” New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/10/nyregion/10acting.html, and Dan’s interview in February 2017 with Rabbi Menachem Penner. Thanks to Rabbi Naphtali Lavenda for calling our attention to the story.
Failure of D.A.R.E. An accessible popular account of the Wei Pan meta-analysis is in http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-just-say-no-doesnt-work/. Pim Cuijpers’s review (2002) is “Effective Ingredients of School-Based Drug Prevention Programs: A Systematic Review,” Addictive Behaviors 27: 1012.
Plant a tough question. A response to an author survey on November 2016.
85% of workers felt unable to raise issue. Frances J. Milliken (2003). “An Exploratory Study of Employee Silence: Issues That Employees Don’t Communicate Upward and Why,” http://w4.stern.nyu.edu/emplibrary/Milliken.Frances.pdf.
Brave but Wrong Guy study. Charlan Nemeth and Cynthia Chiles (1988). “Modelling Courage: The Role of Dissent in Fostering Independence,” European Journal of Social Psychology 18: 275–80.
Clinic 4: Goldsmith meeting procedure. Larissa McFarquhar (2009, November 21). “The Better Boss,” New Yorker.
Chapter 10: Create Shared Meaning
All-hands meeting at Sharp Healthcare. This story is based on Dan’s interviews with Sonia Rhodes in September 2016 and February 2017 and Chip’s interviews with Mike Murphy in September 2016 and Lynn Skoczelas in June 2016. Special thanks to Lynn Skoczelas, who organized a half day of focus groups with more than twenty attendees for people inside Sharp to talk with Chip about the Sharp transformation. Further background is in a presentation by Rhodes, “Making Health Care Better: The Story of the Sharp Experience,” https://www.oumedicine.com/docs/excel/sharpeexperience--sonia-rhodes-(4-29-11).pdf?sfvrsn=2, accessed March 7, 2017. The “best healthcare system in the universe” quote is from this presentation. The story also uses details from a book by Rhodes and Gary Adamson 2009). The Complete Guide to Transforming the Patient Experience. New York: HealthLeaders Media.
Patient satisfaction scores shot up. The statistics here on patient and physician satisfaction, revenues, etc. were a part of the Baldridge Award application and are also cited in D. G. Lofgren et al. (2007). “Marketing the Health Care Experience: Eight Steps to Infuse Brand Essence into Your Organization,” Health Marketing Quarterly 23(3): page 121.
Laughter is social. Provine study description and commentary is from a Guardian piece he wrote: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/sep/02/why-we-laugh-psychology-provine.
High- and low-ordeal rituals. Dimitris Xygalatas et al. (2013). “Extreme Rituals Promote Prosociality,” Psychological Science 24: 1602. How did the researchers know who gave what, if the donations were “anonymous”? They numbered envelopes and questionnaires so they could match the two while maintaining the anonymity of the participants. The result about “high-ordeal observers” is in Ronald Fischer and Dimitris Xygalatas (2014). “Extreme Rituals as Social Technologies,” Journal of Cognition and Culture 14: 345–55. The result for strangers doing sorting tasks in ice water is in Brock Bastian et al. (2014). “Pain as Social Glue: Shared Pain Increases Cooperation,” Psychological Science 25(11): 2079–85.
Purpose/Passion. Hansen’s purpose/passion material is from an early draft of his forthcoming book Great at Work: How Top Performers Work Less and Achieve More.
“magical entity . . . waiting to be discovered.” This Wrzesniewski quote is from Angela Duckworth (2016). Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. New York: Scribner, p. 153.
Lifeguard study. Adam M. Grant (2008). “The Significance of Task Significance: Job Performance Effects, Relational Mechanisms, and Boundary Conditions,” Journal of Applied Psychology 93(1): 108–24.
Nurses and radiologists. Adam M. Grant (2014), in Morten Ann Gernsbacher, ed., Psychology and the Real World, 2nd ed. New York: Worth.
Hospital janitor combatting patient loneliness. Amy Wrzesniewski, Nicholas LoBuglio, Jane E. Dutton, and Justin M. Berg (2013). “Job-Crafting and Cultivating Positive Meaning and Identity in Work,” Advances in Positive Organizational Psychology 1: 281–302.
Sharp baby shower. This story is from a group interview by Chip in June 2016 that Baehrens attended.
Chapter 11: Deepen Ties
Turnaround at Stanton Elementary. Stanton story drawn from Dan’s interviews in January 2016 with Susan Stevenson, Carlie John Fisherow, Melissa Bryant, and Anna Gregory at District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS). Also documents provided by Stevenson. Suspension and truancy data provided by Flamboyan Foundation and verified by Anna Gregory at DCPS. DCPS provided the definition of truancy. The performance data for subsequent years were in documents by Flamboyan, verified by either Fisherow or DCPS. In particular, reading and math scores are from DCPS: https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/1238775/2014-dc-cas-scores-by-school.pdf.
Responsiveness. H. T. Reis (2007). “Steps Toward the Ripening of Relationship Science,” Personal Relationships 14: 1–23. This paper arose when Reis won a “distinguished scholar” award from a psychological society for researchers who are studying close relationships. This kind of recognition gave him a platform at a professional conference to make a case to his fellow researchers about where the research should go, and this paper is his answer.
Healthier diurnal cortisol. Finding is from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26015413.
Gallup’s six most revealing questions. Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman (1999). First Break All the Rules. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Bisognano’s younger brother, Johnny. Bisognano’s story from interview with Dan in August 2016 unless otherwise noted. The “they’d speak over him” and “I’m not gonna make it” quotes are from http://theconversationproject.org/about/maureen-bisognano/. The “What matters to you?” question is from Michael J. Barry and Susan Edgman-Levitan (2012). “Shared Decision Making—The Pinnacle of Patient-Centered Care,” New England Journal of Medicine 366 : 780–81. Full disclosure: After we wrote about another aspect of the IHI’s work in a prior book, Switch, Dan was invited to give several paid keynotes for the IHI, which is how he met Maureen Bisognano and learned about this story.
Kendra had autism. This story from Dan’s conversation with Jen Rodgers in February 2017.
“Baggage” handling at call centers. Baggage handling data from research document provided by the Corporate Executive Board. Context from Dan’s call with Matt Dixon and Eric Braun in August 2016.
Bus stop high/low intimacy conversations. Z. Rubin (1974). “Lovers and Other Strangers: The Development of Intimacy in Encounters and Relationships: Experimental studies of
self-disclosure between strangers at bus stops and in airport departure lounges can provide clues about the development of intimate relationships,” American Scientist 62(2): 182–90.
Art Aron 36 questions. A. Aron et al. (1997). “The Experimental Generation of Interpersonal Closeness: A Procedure and Some Preliminary Findings,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 23: 363–77.
Mike Elam office conversation. From survey response from Elam in March 2016 and subsequent email exchange in August 2016.
Clinic 5: How Can You Combat the “Silo” Mentality? The Pit Crew experience is not made up—you can hire a vendor to bring the experience to your off-site. Dan has seen it and it’s pretty neat. See more at http://www.bobparker.ca/pitcrewblog/. The “crucial conversations” phrase is based on a popular and useful book by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler (2002). Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High. New York: McGraw-Hill Education.
Chapter 12: Making Moments Matter
MIT acceptance packet. http://toastable.com/2010/lets-get-personal/.
Regrets of the dying. http://www.bronnieware.com/regrets-of-the-dying/.
Julie Kasten. From Dan’s interview with Julie Kasten in June 2015.
Suresh Mistry, Warren and Betsy Talbot, and Nancy Schaufele. Stories were collected August–September 2016 after a newsletter was sent out in early August 2016.
Wendy sees snow. Story drawn from Dan’s interviews with Darcy Daniels, Jessica Marsh, and Cori Fogarty in October 2016 and Darcy’s blog post https://bravefragilewarriors.wordpress.com/2016/04/03/snow-day-in-the-hospital/.
Index
A note about the index: The pages referenced in this index refer to the page numbers in the print edition. Clicking on a page number will take you to the ebook location that corresponds to the beginning of that page in the print edition. For a comprehensive list of locations of any word or phrase, use your reading system’s search function.