Irresistible Change

A blueprint for change leaders to learn from one of the largest transformations in corporate history

Irresistible Change:A Blueprint for Earning Buy-In and Breakout Success details one of the largest and most formidable transformations in corporate history: to shift the foundations of work for IBM’s nearly 400,000 employees and thousands of interdisciplinary teams across 180 countries and help them become more entrepreneurial, agile, and customer focused. Written by Phil Gilbert, IBM’s former General Manager of Design and architect of this ambitious change effort, this book is part narrative and part field guide. It describes how the choices made at IBM affected the change Program Office’s development at each stage of its growth and provides readers with key insights they need to conduct transformational change within their own organizations.

This book includes insights on:

• Getting buy-in for change, the biggest challenge that holds back even the most ambitious change efforts, by making it something exciting rather than inevitable

• Seeing change as a high-stakes “product” deserving of the same resources and rigor as your top-performing business lines

• Recognizing today’s newly empowered and often skeptical employees who resist authority and value autonomy and stability

Irresistible Changeis an essential roadmap for the next generation of change leaders in organizations of any size. Phil Gilbert, Sr. (Austin, Texas) is best known for leading IBM’s transformation as their General Manager of Design. After selling his third startup to IBM in 2010, Phil was asked by IBM in 2012 to use Design Thinking, coupled with Agile, to update how IBM’s teams worked. The transformation became the subject of an HBS Case Study, the documentary The Loop and feature articles in the New York Times and Fortune Magazine.

“Phil Gilbert helped redefine how we thought about change at IBM—treating change like a product people chose to adopt, rather than a mandate to follow. Irresistible Change distills that approach into a powerful, practical playbook.”
GINNI ROMET T Y- Former Chairman, President, and CEO of IBM, and bestselling author of Good Power

“When embarking on a technology-related change at scale, it seems natural to get focused on the tech when success is actually about the people. They need an appetite and path to change the way they think and work. Phil’s change-as-a-product mindset, experience and stories can help anyone build a more effective approach to transformation, one that results in real, practical outcomes.”
DOUG McMILLON- President and CEO, Walmart

“Irresistible Change is Phil Gilbert’s brilliantly insightful account of his time leading and driving IBM’s move towards a new way of operating—nothing less than turning a battleship against headwinds and currents. His success was not serendipitous, but instead the product of thoughtful planning, careful communication, and relentless pursuit of doing what works. Less complicated than difficult, change demands deft, committed leadership, and a deep understanding of both the challenge and criticality of adapting.”
STAN McCHRYSTAL- General, US Army (Retired), Founder and Chairman/CEO of McChrystal Group, and bestselling author of Team of Teams

“This is simultaneously the most radical and most pragmatic story of transformation you will come across anywhere. It would appear ridiculously ambitious to attempt to change the culture of a company the size of IBM and yet Phil Gilbert helps us truly understand what it takes to drive large scale cultural change through design thinking. Anyone with similar ambition should take careful notes.”
TIM BROWN- Chair Emeritus of IDEO, and bestselling author of Change By Design

The transformation of IBM into a design thinking organization is probably the most amazing corporate transformation in the history of American business. When Phil Gilbert came to Stanford, I told him it was impossible—and I was dead wrong. Read this book to understand how he did it, and how you can make change irresistible.”
BILL BURNET T- Executive Director of the Life Design Lab, Stanford University, and bestselling author of Designing Your Life

In Irresistible Change, Phil Gilbert shares bold, carefully uncomfortable moves—like flying stakeholders in on a Sunday and banning laptops on Monday—to surface hidden resistance early. By designing for discomfort, he transforms skepticism into belief and makes lasting change truly irresistible.”
JOHN MAEDA- VP of Artificial Intelligence and Design, Microsoft Corporation, and bestselling author of The Laws of Simplicity