Dan Heath delivered School of WOM’s second Keynote address. His new book, Switch, which he co-authored with his brother Chip, breaks down the three steps needed to invoke change.

There are two sides to everyone’s thoughts: Rational and emotional. The rational mind sets the morning alarm clock. The emotional mind hits snooze 10 times. But both prove necessary for change based on a study that Dan cited. Studies were performed on people with damage to the emotional sections of their brains. Researchers predicted this would lead to a Spock-like rationalism. Instead, these poor folks were mired with the inability to make any decisions. The emotional side is needed to go from thinking to doing.

To get both sides moving toward change, three stars need to align:

1. Create a clear direction of change.

2. Motivate everyone involved in the change.

3. Clear the path to change.

Sounds simple, right? The one caveat is that you have to go against your problem-solving nature and harness your success finding skills. The direction of change so often falls on fixing what doesn’t work and completely disregards promoting what does work. Find what works and you have found your direction, motivation source and path.

Learn more about Dan’s book, Swich, at http://heathbrothers.com/