The Heart of Change Field Guide

STEP 6

Create Short-Term Wins

In successful change efforts, empowered people create short-term wins—victories that nourish faith in the change effort, emotionally reward the hard workers, keep the critics at bay, and build momentum. Without sufficient wins that are visible, timely, unambiguous, and meaningful to others, change efforts inevitably run into serious problems.

—from Step 6 of The Heart of Change

Purpose

Short-term wins that are timely, visible, and meaningful are critical to building the credibility needed to sustain the change effort over time. Without tangible evidence that the effort is paying off, stake-holders grow wary that the initiative is absorbing too many resources and skeptics become increasingly difficult to convince. ...