Quotes About Change

In a time when so much of what we know is subject to revision or obsolescence, the comfortable expert must go back to being a restless learner.

questions challenge authority and disrupt established structures, processes, and systems, forcing people to have to at least think about doing something differently. To encourage or even allow questioning is to cede power

when we want to shake things up and instigate change, it's necessary to break free of familiar thought patterns and easy assumptions. We have to veer off the beaten neural path. And we do this, in large part, by questioning.

replacing, for example, We make the world a better place through robotics! with How might we make the world a better place through robotics?). By articulating the company mission as a question, it tells the outside world, "This is what we're striving for—we know we're not there yet, but we're on the journey." It acknowledges room for possibility, change, and adaptability.

incumbency has an interest in maintaining the status quo. To question well, you must have the ability to say, 'It doesn't have to be that way.

A journey of inquiry that (hopefully) culminates in change can be a long road, with pitfalls and detours and often nary an answer in sight. That's why it can be helpful to approach inquiry systematically, as a step-by-step progression. The best innovators are able to live with not having the answer right away because they're focused on just trying to get to the next question.

When companies are facing disruptive change (and these days, what company isn't?), old habits and traditions can sometimes get in the way of progress. One of the things hypothetical What If questioning can do is remove those constraints, if only briefly, to allow for more fresh thinking.

questions challenge authority and disrupt established structures, processes, and systems, forcing people to have to at least think about doing something differently.

What if our schools could train students to be better lifelong learners and better adapters to change, by enabling them to be better questioners?

It's easier to act your way33 into a new way of thinking than to think your way into a new way of acting.

Death to Core Competency," suggests that whatever a company's specialty product or service might be—whatever got you to where you are today—might not be the thing that gets you to the next level.

Should you find yourself in a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks.

We always live in an uncertain world. What is certain is that the United States will go forward over time.

You know, people talk about this being an uncertain time. You know, all time is uncertain. I mean, it was uncertain back in - in 2007, we just didn't know it was uncertain. It was - uncertain on September 10th, 2001. It was uncertain on October 18th 1987, you just didn't know it.

The investor of today does not profit from yesterday's growth.

The most important thing to do if you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging.

We must have a program to learn the way out of prison.

Tradition:' one of those words conservative people use as a shortcut to thinking.

There's one hole in every revolution, large or small. And it's one word long— PEOPLE. No matter how big the idea they all stand under, people are small and weak and cheap and frightened. It's people that kill every revolution.

Bugger this. I want a better world.

Biology is only the best hint as to what was functional in the past but not necessarily about what will be in the future. The most empowering question we can ask about the future is not "What is the future and how do we adapt?" but "How do we want our future to be and how do we adapt?

The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it

Companies which get misled by their own success are sure to be blind sided.

Leaders must encourage their organizations to dance to forms of music yet to be heard.