99 Ways to Influence Change, #49: Point to the destination

In their book Switch:  How to Change Things When Change is Hard, Chip and Dan Heath explain that in order to change, the logical, planning, control part of our brain needs to know where to go.  Similarly, one of John Kotter’s eight steps in Leading Change is Communicate the Vision.  If you want to influence change, point to the destination.

This necessity is best illustrated in the interchange between Alice and the Cheshire Cat in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll:

One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. “Which road do I take?” she asked. “Where do you want to go?” was his response. “I don’t know,” Alice answered. “Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter.”

Communicate the vision.  Share what the end result of the change looks like.  Point to the destination.  That way, people will know in which direction to change.

What is your destination?

Read more of the 99 Ways to Influence Change.