Page 40 - The Power to Change Anything

Find Vital Behaviors 29

up Delancey. She learned early on that if you’re going to work
with subjects who lack just about every skill imaginable, you
have to limit your scope of influence by identifying only a cou-
ple of vital behaviors and then work on them. Otherwise you
dilute your efforts and eventually fail.
As you chat with Dr. Silbert, she’s quick to point out that
if you want to change ex-cons’ lives, you need to focus on
behavior, not values, homilies, or emotional appeals. Just imag-
ine Mimi Silbert giving a value-laden lesson to James on his
first day at Delancey. James vividly describes what she’d be up
against.
“When residents wake up in their dorm the first morning
and you say, ‘Good morning’ to them, they assault you with pro-
fanity in return.” A pep talk on courtesy just isn’t going to cut
it in this venue.
So Dr. Silbert focuses on changing behavior, not on preach-
ing homilies. And, once again, a few behaviors, not dozens.
During one interview, Silbert explained with a wry smile: “You
can’t succeed by trying to change 20 things at the same time!”
So Silbert made a study of the behaviors that needed changing,
hoping to find a few that would provide focus and leverage in
transforming criminals into citizens. After working with over
14,000 hardened criminals, Silbert is now convinced that just
a couple of behaviors open the floodgates of change. If you focus
on these two, a whole host of other behaviors, values, attitudes,
and outcomes follow. Silbert explains how it works.
“The hardest thing we do here is try to get rid of the code
of the street. It says: ‘Care only about yourself, and don’t rat on
anyone.’ However,” Silbert continues, “If you reverse those two
behaviors, you can change everything else.”
James elaborates: “Helping residents learn to confront prob-
lems is essential. We’ve got Crips, Bloods, white supremacists
boarding with us, and they’re all bunking together. As you might
imagine, the tension runs high. Everything we try to change in
here is about getting rid of the gang culture. So we talk a lot.”