Change Myths - Gibbons, Paul

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Résumé :
Since myths can be hard to test and compare, we get an intellectual free for all that allows bullshit to prosper and propagate, for decades, even when subsequent human science research has overturned it. How humans decide what to believe, in their professional and personal lives, is vital. It applies to our interest area, the myths of organizational change, but also critically to life, such as health and medical decisions, fake news, politics, and more. Once a myth takes root, whether true or false, it sticks. Transmitted by the media and reiterated by gurus, it becomes a cultural truth. Take the idea that people are left-brained or right-brained and that the latter are more creative. Psychologists debunk this claim until they're blue in the face, yet it has mythological stature, including among some change professionals. This idea stickiness is endemic in the organizational change profession. Many of its signature ideas are decades old, yet they have stuck without any re-evaluation as research and knowledge in the human sciences has proved them false. For example, the very first model Paul and Tricia learned as organizational change consultants was the K?bler-Ross grief model which was supposed to describe the organizational change experience. Later, they began to wonder how the emotional experience of the dying became a template for business change of all kinds. Similarly, early writers picked up the unfreeze change refreeze model, and it became paradigmatic, eventually finding its way into harmful ideas such as creating a sense of urgency or burning platform. The Science of Organizational Change, published in 2015 and revised in 2019, took the first stab at identifying myths in the world of change. Each myth in that book deserved a chapter-length exploration that it did not receive. Change Myths does just that. It takes six of the most popular and well-known change myths and gives them the exploration they deserve, applying a scientific and critical lens to their origins and supporting evidence. Some of those myths debunked are the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, Learning Styles, resistance to change, and sense of urgency. Change Mythsbegins a long-overdue conversation: What does it cost businesses to cling to outdated and disproven ideas? Authors Paul Gibbons and Tricia Kennedy do not position themselves as the final arbiters of truth, as if they were a Supreme Court of change ideas, but rather offer critical-thinking tools and research to equip readers to parse their own beliefs. This, more than any dissection of a specific myth, offers an opportunity to transform the world of organizational change toward one more grounded in evidence and critical thinking. Perhaps more than ever, every professional, business leader, worker, citizen, parent, and adult needs better tools to parse and discern the deluge of information they encounter daily to help make decisions where knowledge sources conflict. The tools in Change Myths will help the reader sift through and debunk myths in all walks of life.

Biographie:
Paul Gibbons is a former investment banker, consultant, professor, and CEO (yes, he is that old.) Today, his writing, speaking, and scholarship focuses on how science and philosophy can provide practical solutions to the problems we face in the 21st century. Paul's most recent book Impact gives leaders 21st-century change tools and models that are based on up-to-the-minute research in behavioral sciences, complexity theory, agile methods, information science, and more. Astute leaders know that upskilling, culture change, and mindset are critical ingredients for successful digital change - but do not know how to change those quickly enough to keep up with pace of technological change. Impact is about those upgrades to the human side of organizations, leading, learning, communicating, changing, collaborating, deciding, and engaging. His first book, The Science of Organizational Change, is listed as one of the top-ten organizational change books of all time. The book debunked management double-speak with 21st-century research from the human sciences: philosophy, economics, political science, public health, psychology, neuroscience, sociology, and history. Paul's bigger project could be called humanizing business and change. The most urgent questions for this century, suggests Paul, are two-fold. First, how can we balance the good business does, lifting billions from poverty, allowing collaboration and innovation on a global scale, and commercializing science for the common good, with its potential for great harm consumer fraud, financial bubbles, environmental damage, shattered communities, and corruption of our democracy? Second, how can we use science and reason, and not pseudoscience, myths, gurus, quacks, and dogma, to make better decisions in our lives and for our society? Paul bumper stickers? (1) Change is inevitable, whether it represents progress is up to us. (2) As computers do more of our thinking for us, taking over many of our cognitive tasks, our competitive advantage is in the social domain. (3) In a world where advancing human capability is critical, leaders need to lead learning. His popular practical philosophy podcast, Think Bigger, Think Better can be found on Itunes and Stitcher. In 2017, Paul became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. In 2016, he was named a Top-30 global guru in organizational culture, and in 2008, CEO Magazine called Paul one of two CEO Super Coaches. He has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Guardian, and Independent newspapers. Paul has degrees in biochemistry, philosophy, and psychology, and has taught business ethics and business leadership at some of the world's top business schools. He lives in Colorado with two young sons, serves on the board of Denver's Institute for Enterprise Ethics, and competes in mindsports, chess, bridge, MOBA, and poker.