Quotes About Progress

the sequence of change is not ANALYZE-THINK-CHANGE, but

People find it more motivating to be partly finished with a longer journey than to be at the starting gate of a shorter one.

Transitions should be marked, milestones commemorated, and pits filled.

Once they've helped patients identify specific and vivid signs of progress, they pivot to a second question, which is perhaps even more important. It's the Exception Question: "When was the last time you saw a little bit of the miracle, even just for a short time?

To pursue bright spots is to ask the question "What's working, and how can we do more of it?" Sounds simple, doesn't it? Yet, in the real world, this obvious question is almost never asked. Instead, the question we ask is more problem focused: "What's broken, and how do we fix it?

Big changes can start with very small steps. Small changes tend to snowball. But this is not the same as saying that change is easy.

To make progress toward a goal, whether it's noble or crass, requires the energy and drive of the Elephant. And

Fill pits, then build peaks.

Simple tweaks of the Path can lead to dramatic changes in behavior.

Rescue—if people are facing a daunting task, and their instinct is to avoid it, you've got to break down the task. Shrink the change. Make the change small enough that they can't help but score a victory. Once

big changes come from a succession of small changes. It's OK if the first changes seem almost trivial. The challenge is to get the Elephant moving, even if the movement is slow at first.

Are you better off now than you were four years ago?" Ronald Reagan famously posed

To change yourself or other people, you've got to change habits

When you engineer early successes, what you're really doing is engineering hope. Hope is precious to a change effort. It's Elephant fuel.

The Springboard. Denning

Once people are on the path and making progress, it's important to make their advances visible. With

These therapists know that the miracle can seem distant to their patients and that they need to keep their patients motivated and hopeful en route to the destination. To do so, they've devised a way of quantifying progress toward the miracle. They create a miracle scale9 ranging from 0 to 10, where 10 is the miracle. In

When you've celebrated moving from 1 to 2, and then from 2 to 3, you gain confidence that you can make the next advance.

When you engineer early successes, what you're really doing is engineering hope. Hope is precious to a change effort.

A small win reduces importance ('this is no big deal'), reduces demands ('that's all that needs to be done'), and raises perceived skill levels ('I can do at least that')." All three of these factors will tend to make change easier and more self-sustaining.

Like a solutions-focused therapist, look for the flashes of success.

Starting small can help you overcome dread.

to create and sustain change, you've got to act more like a coach and less like a scorekeeper. You've got to embrace a growth mindset and instill it in your team.

he invented five milestones en route to the destination, each worthy of celebration.