Chip and Dan Heath have written two highly successful books:  Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Thrive and Others Die, and Switch:  How to Change Things When Change Is Hard.  The first, Made to Stick, took Robert Cialdini’s ideas from his classic book Influence and made them more accessible.  The second, Switch, creates a very simple framework for accomplishing change:

• Direct the Rider (provide clear directions for our rational sides),
• Motivate the Elephant (engage our emotions), and
• Shape the Path (make change easier by changing the situation in key ways).

I worked at a couple of management consulting firms that focused on change in the mid-90s, and I can tell you that these ideas were old hat then – but not usually so clearly or simply expressed.

Plainly, the Heath brothers are gifted packagers and storytellers.  You can see them both speaking here: http://bit.ly/Uh2A0 and Dan speaking in a longer excerpt here: http://bit.ly/qlYLl.

What you’ll see in Dan (at least) is a very engaging, relaxed speaker who’s quite good at holding an audience – even after lunch.  He’s a natural teacher, at ease with asking his audience to take a short test and throwing his listeners lots of questions to keep them engaged.

While I have some reservations about the originality of their thinking, I have no reservations in recommending both the books and the speakers for entertaining, concise, and practical summations of some very important ideas.