“You cannot think your way into a new way of acting, you have to act your way into a new way of thinking.” ~ Jerry Sternin, Founder of The Positive Deviance Initiative
In this month’s issue of Fast Company, there is an excerpt from Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard by Chip Heath and Dan Heath. The book goes on sale February 16th, and this excerpt provides insights into how to find the bright spots, as small and few as they may be, that lead to radical, large-scale, successful change when replicated. The Heaths take a cue from Jerry Sternin, a professor of nutrition at Tufts University, who, along with his wife, Monique (also a professor at Tufts), gave so much to so many around the world. The Professors Sternin founded the movement of positive deviance and advocated for its use around the world.
There is some societal belief that when someone is exceptional, they’re weird. We think that the exceptional do things that no one else can do when really they just do things that no one is doing. William Kamkwamba in Malawi, whom I wrote about earlier this week, illustrates this point perfectly. If we studied them closely, we would find that a couple of key things that they do are different from the majority, and those few differences can be replicated so that the exception becomes the new norm. Jerry and Monique Sternin believed that if we can find the bright spots, we’ll get more understanding of a situation and greater progress than we ever thought possible.
All day today I’ve been looking for bright spots in specific areas of my life. I’m keeping track of them in my little black book. This idea of positive deviance has had me grinning ear to ear all day. Tomorrow, I’ll be back here to talk about some of these recent discoveries. I hope you’ll join me.
The image above is not my own. It can be found here.
Christa Avampato 
