Seth Kahan on Big Change

What really makes for a leadership mindset? Here are two views into the elusive chief executive’s mental game.

Watch this video to learn about my new online training course, Getting Association Strategy Right. The Beta test for the course begins in January. Contact me if you would like to participate!

I have served the last 18 mo or so on the American Geophysical Union ‘s task force on Affiliation and Engagement. This is an important issue for associations serving rapidly changing member constituencies

Here I explain the kind of innovation that helps you systematically jump the curve to a new level of performance. It includes these topics: identifying and leveraging inflection points, building your organization’s innovation capacity, exploiting disruption, and driving iterative increases in value.

In this short talk on strategy I cover the three benefits of an effective strategy: Growth, Relevance and Leadership. I also lay out the 7 elements required to develop a great strategy.

Almost all successful change depends on support, buy-in and engagement. Here I explain what they are and why they are so important.

It’s not enough to have a great strategy. You have to have great execution, too. And the secret to dynamite execution is turning your strategy into a social movement. Here I explain what that means and a little about how to do it.

I have found that by listening to detractors I can learn a great deal about how to succeed in a change initiative. Not only that but listening usually diffuses 90% of the resisters I engage with. Here are the five gems I get from those who resist change.

Your Most Valuable Players are the people who will help you most with your change initiative. Here I talk about who you can energize, activate and equip them to be their best on your behalf.

In my experience over 90% of the resistance to change can be diffused by listening to the resisters and framing the change in ways that they can understand and support.