What Sticks: Why Some Ideas Work

I just read the pre-publication version of this book for the
second time, and just like the first time, my reaction was “This is one of the
most important business books ever written.” What
Sticks is written by a Chip Heath
and Dan Heath,
who are brothers, and will be published by Random House early next year. Chip is a professor at the Stanford Business
School, a social
psychologist by training, and a broad intellectual who is interested in
everything and really cares about using his work to make life better. He is also the most engaging speakers I’ve
seen, mesmerizing in a no-nonsense sort of way. IDEO’s Tom
Kelley is the only person I’ve seen in recent years who is similarly
engaging and inspiring. I don’t know
Chip’s  brother Dan, but Chip tells me he
is a sharp Harvard MBA and is now managing executive education programs at
Duke. Chip also gives Dan a lot of credit for the book’s engaging writing
style.

“What Sticks” is just as useful and just as evidence-based
as great books including Robert Cialdini’s Influence,
Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping
Point, and Steve Levitt and Stephen Dubner’s Freakonomics. I love how the Heath brothers dissect false
stories and myths, (like “you only use 10% of your brain”) to show what kinds
ideas spread and persist, and what kinds don’t. The book focuses squarely on
using this research to help you design your own messages that will stick and
affect what people actually do.

One of my favorites is their analysis of the success of the
“Don’t Mess with Texas”
anti-littering campaign. The Heath brothers show us how, while warm and cuddly
appeals to stop litter had failed in Texas, this simple, unexpected, concrete,
credible, and emotional message – which had a toughness that appealed to
conservative rednecks, not just liberal tree-huggers – quickly became a
favorite bumper sticker, was known and could be recalled by 73% of Texans just
a few months after the campaign was launched, and roadside litter declined in
Texas declined nearly 30% within a year. The campaign was so effective that the
state abandoned other expensive anti-littering campaigns, and five years into
the “Don’t Mess With Texas” campaign, roadside litter had decreased 72%.

And it isn’t just that the Heath brothers tell such great
stories, they show how you – as a manager, a marketer, an organizational change
agent, or a politician – can craft new messages, and evaluate and alter your
current messages to have the greatest impact. What Sticks is an example of  evidence-based
management at its finest, as it draws on the best knowledge that behavioral
scientists have generated and then goes the difficult extra step of showing all
of us how to apply it.

This book deserves to be on
the best-seller list all next year and, as an added bonus, Chip Heath is my
candidate for the next Malcolm Gladwell. Of course, the future is impossible to
predict, but you really owe to yourself to buy the book and to hear Chip talk
about it.