Page 189 - The Power to Change Anything

178 INFLUENCER

In fact, Mike told us that all he had to show for his effort was
good solid data that they were failing.
What Mike didn’t realize until late in the game was that
Jess and his colleagues were not isolated actors making inde-
pendent decisions about how to talk about deadlines in meet-
ings. Lying in order to look good had been reinforced by
managers, directors, and vice presidents. Even Mike had unwit-
tingly played a role in encouraging people to bring only good
news to the table. And since the behavior was created by the
group, the group would have to be involved in changing it. So
how could he make use of this social capital?
To answer this, let’s see how someone else dealt with a sim-
ilar problem. We travel 9,000 miles to South Africa to study
Garth Japhet. No one has thought longer, harder, or more care-
fully about how to build social capital than Garth Japhet. He’s
a master at turning a me problem into a we problem.
Dr. Japhet began his career as a medical doctor, but he
wound a circuitous path to his current position as CEO of
Soul City, a South African media brain trust that has led
successful efforts to fight AIDS, infant mortality, and malnu-
trition. More recently, Japhet has turned his attention to pre-
venting violence against women. Dr. Japhet directed his
attention to this particular problem because, within the borders
of South Africa, the scourge of violence against women is noth-
ing short of horrendous. One in nine women will be raped at
least once in her lifetime. One in five will be physically or emo-
tionally abused by her partner.
Dr. Japhet realized that he wasn’t about to solve this deeply
entrenched problem by teaching women individually to stand
up on their own two feet and eventually overthrow the insensi-
tive men who obviously deserved a comeuppance. Instead,
Japhet realized that he’d have to find a way to include everyone
who was creating the problem in solving the problem.
Japhet also understood that there were many in South
African society who disapproved of the abuse—both women