This book offers proven ways of influencing the behaviour of human beings for the better. It deals with change projects both large and small, and in almost any area of activity, but with an emphasis on key topics such as climate change, poverty, obesity, AIDS, and tobacco and drug use. It is aimed at a worldwide audience of people who are acting to make change in their corporations, cities, and neighbourhoods, as well as in their own lives.
Changeology simplifies a vast body of theory and practice into six principles: buzz, hope, enabling environments, sticky solutions, ‘can do’, and ‘the right inviter’. These are explained with compelling real-life case studies and a look at the hard evidence. The book is written in an easy, accessible style, laced with many anecdotes and stories, which readers will find encouraging as well as compelling.
Les Robinson was a social-marketing director who noticed that advertising didn’t seem to change people’s behaviour and decided to find out why. Working for a Sydney-based social-marketing company, he lent communication finesse to citizen campaigns against sand mining, freeways, landfills, and Sydney’s only waste incinerator (now closed), which sparked his interest in social change. He is now Australia’s most experienced and knowledgeable change facilitator — a consultant to government agencies and councils who trains, facilitates, and advises practitioners on how to create behavioural change in areas such as health, sustainability, road safety, and emergency management. He runs his own business, Enabling Change. Les lives on the south coast of Sydney with his wife and young son.