In This Issue: May 2006

• In Undercover Change, I'm looking at how the slightly weird can be the genesis for change.
• Don't take my word for it collects quotes on difference and deviance from A(pple) to Z(appa).
• Come and browse The Market Place – Check out the new Stuck Busters, as well as my favourite five products that other folk sell.
• Got it going on: see the cool and funky places I'm speaking in the coming months – and drop on in if you happen to be near.

Finch inspiration

Charles Darwin's Theory of Evolution was inspired in part by a bird he saw on the Galapagos Islands. Darwin's Finches have evolved from a single ancestral species into fourteen different species, each adapted to different and specific environments and foods.

Quirks and Quarks, a fascinating radio program on these finches has me musing once again on the process of change. I realise that much of the work I do could be called "accelerated evolution", helping people and teams move towards where they were heading in a faster, more ambitious and more courageous way.

Change now comes standard with life, and we've all experienced times when it's worked and times when we've resisted it. There are many theories of how to best spark change and how to manage it, all of which work much better on paper than they do in practice.

One process I find inspiring and useful is that of "positive deviance." It connects how an individual's Great Work can influence a system that they're in (whether that system is a team, an organization or a community).

In this month's main article, Undercover Change, I'm looking at how people who are doing something a little odd, a little weird, a little untested – but something that works - become the seeds of change.

Know anyone who's a little different? Please forward Outside the Lines (in its entirety please) to anyone you think might be interested. This community grows with your help.

I'd be delighted if you should wish to reprint (for free) any part of Outside the Lines in your newsletters, websites, and message boards. Contact me at michael@boxofcrayons.biz for further details.

Michael Bungay Stanier
Principal, Box of Crayons

P.S. For my Ontario readers, I'm excited to announce I'll be the guest lunchtime speaker at an all day training session on June 16 with Nicholas Boothman, author of How to Connect in Business in 90 Seconds or Less. Nick is fabulous and his material is excellent. You can find out more (including about an Outside the Lines reader discount) here.

Don't take my word for it

"It is not the strongest of the species that survive nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change."
Charles Darwin, scientist

"If you're a truly creative person, you know that feeling insecure and lonely is par for the course. You can't have it both ways: You can't be creative, and conform too. You have to recognize that what makes you different also makes you creative."
Arno Penzias, Noble Prize winner for physics

"Without deviation, progress is not possible."
Frank Zappa, musician

"You have to be deviant if you're going to do anything new."
David Lee, producer of TV show Frasier

"Be daring, be different, be impractical, be anything that will assert integrity of purpose and imaginative vision against the play-it-safers, the creatures of the commonplace, the slaves of the ordinary."
Sir Cecil Beaton, portrait photographer

"Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward.

Maybe they have to be crazy.

How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art?
Or sit in silence and hear a song that's never been written? Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?

We make tools for these kinds of people. While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do."
Apple.com

Undercover Change
(a version of this article was first published as Positive Deviants in April 2005)

In the 1990s, Jerry Sternin was invited by the Vietnamese government to come and battle infant malnutrition. It was a tough task made near impossible by the time frame given: six months. That meant that the traditional systemic approaches to change – fixing water supplies, sanitation, and food distribution patterns – didn't have a chance.

Sternin's approach was based on the observation that in every group there are a minority of people who find better and more successful solutions to the challenges at hand. These are the positive deviants, and even though they have access to exactly the same resources as the rest of the group, their uncommon practices or behaviors allow them to flourish.

A metaphor that sums up the insight behind the Positive Deviance approach is that of the human immune system. Like the immune system, individuals and institutions reject what is perceived as "foreign matter". Strategies for change that are externally generated rather than "invented from within" fail to take hold.

The positive deviant approach builds the solution from within the system so that both the solution and the host share the same "DNA". Those in a community or organization are helped to discover the positive deviants in their midst, understand the strategies they employ and then create among themselves a process for enrolling the larger community in the desired change.

In Vietnam, Sternin worked with four villages and had the women chart infant growth by age and weight. As part of that process, Sternin asked if there were any children who came from poor families but were nonetheless well nourished. This was the "a-ha!" moment for the Vietnamese mothers – they realized that it was possible for a poor family to have well-nourished children.

It became apparent that there were a number of differences in how the positive deviants fed their children:

First, they fed them small but regular meals (as opposed to once or twice a day). Second, they were willing to feed them greens and small crabs, food that the social norms had decreed as low-class and common, even though they were nutritious.

Sternin and his team set up a number of processes where the mothers were exposed to this different approach of feeding their children, processes where the mothers actually experienced the benefits of eating the foods (rather than just being told about them).

A Fast Company article lays out a number of key principles behind the Positive Deviant approach. Three that stood out for me were:

1. Identify conventional wisdom.
You need to know what's "normal" (what you can do, what you can't do) before you can understand what might deviate from it.

2. Identify and analyze the deviants.
Who's behaving in a different way... and succeeding?

3. Let the deviants adopt deviations on their own.
This, Sternin says, is absolutely critical. It's not about reporting on a "best practice", instead set up ways for the news to spread from the "deviants" themselves.

When it's down in black and white like this, it can all sound pretty obvious. So why don't "positive deviants" thrive more often? There are a number of reasons.

First, when things need to change the focus tends to be on what's broken. Rather than relentlessly trying to fix what's broken, the positive deviant approach (which is closely related to the Appreciative Inquiry school of thought) looks to find what's good and what's working, and then seeks to amplify it.

Second, the power of strong social norms. For all the focus on our bold individuality, we still seem to be an animal that finds comfort in the herd. Charles Mackay writes "Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one."

And a third reason to resist deviating is our societal practice to blame those that are different when things go wrong. This is a recognized phenomenon - creating a scapegoat. Its most classic form is when an outsider is brought in to "save the day", only for the organization to turn against them and blame them when the system does not change.

SOMETHING TO PRACTICE

What's the challenge you're facing?

Who is tackling a similar challenge in a "deviant" way... and succeeding?

What are they doing that's counterintuitive... but works?

What ideas can you borrow from them?

How are you "wimping out" because you're bowing to social norms? What would the bold action be?

What would be the cost of doing something different? What's at risk for you?

WANT TO LEARN MORE? HERE ARE SOME USEFUL RESOURCES

The Fast Company article on Jerry Sternin that started it all for me.

Bibliography from the Positive Deviance Initiative.

Blue Ocean Strategy, W. Chan Kim, Renee Mauborgne. A thoughtful book that offers up both theory and stories on how organizations "deviate" - and succeed - in the world of business. [ buy: US CA UK ]

Purple Cow, Seth Godin. If a purple cow isn't deviant, what is? A fun and useful book on the importance of difference. [ buy: US CA UK ]

The Thin Book of Appreciative Inquiry. The perfect starting point for information on AI. [buy: US CA UK ]

The Scapegoat Society, a solid resource for further information on the phenomena of the scapegoat.

Comments? Feedback?
michael@boxofcrayons.biz

The Market Place

You may have seen an email from me earlier this week, announcing the launch of Stuck Busters, a new product based on The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun. I'm very proud of them – they're funky and useful, the best of a greeting card AND a motivational poster.

It's one of a series of products based on The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun movie, and you can see the whole range here.

But it's not all me, me me. There are five people whose products I think are so good and so useful that I promote them on my own site. Molly Gordon and Andrea Lee support people creating and marketing a business. Tom Heck provides terrific resources for teams. And Michael Neill and Marcia Wieder offer ways to get wise and bold about what's possible for you and your life.

I know these people and they're good people creating great products. I'd encourage you to take a browse here.

Got it Going On

In the coming months I'm speaking at public workshops in Connecticut, New York, Portland, Prague and Toronto as well as holding my usual "international" teleforum. Get the details here.

My next open Get Unstuck & Get Going teleforum is on Wednesday May 17 at 2pm EST – you can register here.

As you might be able to guess, I love to speak or run workshops for groups! Read more about the keynote and workshop topics I offer in this PDF.

'The Scribbler'

Look for the next edition in your Inbox on Thursday May 25 with guest writers Roel Dixon-Mahatoo and Chris Barrow.

Michael Bungay Stanier helps people, teams and organizations to get unstuck and get going on the stuff that matters. He is the author of Get Unstuck & Get Going ...on the stuff that matters, a self-coaching tool endorsed by leaders in the coaching and training professions, and creator of The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun, a movie that's taken the internet by storm. He is the 2006 Canadian Coach of the Year. You can find out more at www.boxofcrayons.biz or you can contact him directly at Michael@BoxOfCrayons.biz or +1 (416) 532-1322.

To subscribe to Outside the Lines & The Scribbler click here. If you have any trouble accessing the form, send an email to subs@BoxofCrayons.biz.

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©Box of Crayons 2006. Box of Crayons is a registered trading name of Maida CC Inc.

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