Showing posts with label machiavelli. Show all posts
Showing posts with label machiavelli. Show all posts

Monday, July 16, 2007

Machiavelli on Lasting Change

"Nothing is more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than achieving a new order of things."

Niccolò
Machiavelli (from The Prince).

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This is the daunting aspect of change. Making it stick.

I feel that human nature tries to minimize the risk of making it stick by lessening the degree of change that is actually needed. In other words, in order to make a change, we try to change less than we ought, and therefore do not achieve the full change we desire. We feel it is easier to make small change work, but in the end, small change does not get us the necessary change needed to accomplish our goals. (Kotter has made a living explaining this).

In the end, we often dream to small and therefore limit our ability to reach desired goals.