Many of us have ideas that could change the world, but few of us act on it.
The Originals: How Non-Conformists Move The World by Adam Grant is about exactly this.
As opposed to other books on entrepreneurs and inventors, Grant doesn't focus on the usual suspects of Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, and the like.
Instead, he talks about the guy who helped bring down Slobodan Milosevic in Serbia, the real force behind the women's suffrage movement (Lucy Stone), Carmen Medina (who helped move the CIA into the digital/sharing age), and more.
Then, he shares HOW they did it.
What were the tactics they used?
Including:
- being a "tempered radical" in order to build alliances.
- recognizing that you need both "power" and "status" to make change.
- the requirement to create a "burning platform" for a sense of urgency
- using a "trojan horse," where you don't tell people exactly what you are working on in the larger sense, you just tell them "hey, I need you to build widget x," so they will focus on getting it done.
- renaming a movement from something threatening to something familiar, such as using the term "home protection ballot" instead of "women's suffrage" when trying to build an alliance of supporters
There's a lot more in here, but if you are looking for inspiration to make change (big or small) in your organization or your life, this is a good one.
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