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Howard Gardner. Changing Minds: The Art and Science of Changing Our Own and Other People's Minds. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 2004, 244 pages, $26.95 hardcover.
Howard Gardner is a well-known Harvard psychologist and author of more than 20 books, including Frames of Mind (1993), in which he proposes a theory of multiple intelligences. In his new book, Changing Minds, Gardner draws upon this theory to advance a framework for analyzing the factors that result in individuals and groups changing their minds. According to Gardner, changing minds can be very difficult to accomplish-just ask any CEO who has attempted to change the culture of an organization. He believes, however, that his framework will help us to understand what happens during the process of changing minds, and how we can influence that process.
Although many aspects of organizational behavior involve changing minds, this is not a topic that has been researched very thoroughly. In an effort to rectify this situation, Gardner employs the case study method and cognitive research findings to identify seven factors or "levers" that result in individuals changing their minds. These seven factors are reason, research, resonance, redescription, resources/rewards, real-world events, and resistances. In Changing Minds, Gardner develops these factors using case studies of large-scale change (e.g., in nations, corporations, and schools), and...