Book Review: The Power of Moments

Defining Moments

Chip and Dan Heath’s The Power of Moments: Why Certain Experiences Have Extraordinary Impact is a valuable (and light) read for anyone in the service industry, the hospitality industry, the education or religious field, an agency, or the home. In short, if you interact with people and want to improve how you interact with them, teach them, make them feel special, or simply hope to make an impact on, you should read this book.

NOTE: If you don’t want to read this, watch this 20-minute talk that summarizes some key points, or this 4-minute video that unpacks a key message from the book to pique your interest — both videos are by the authors.

The book summary is as follows: “A defining moment is a short experience that is both memorable and meaningful” (p. 12), and when we learn what makes a defining moment effective, we can create them for others. Think about important weddings, graduations, baptisms, quinceañeras, 25-year employee ceremonies, etc. — what if we could learn what made them so special, and could replicate it?

Now don’t worry, this goal of the Heath brothers is not to make “everything epic” (which they specifically argue against). They’re not suggesting that more programming and more hullaballoo and more celebrations and more birthday gifts etc. are the point of life.

Far from it.

Rather, the point is that when we look at our goals as parents, employees, employers, peers, and siblings, we see that we may have goals, mission and vision statements, and ideals, but rarely do we take time to think through how we can reinforce these things with thoughtful, intentional, impactful moments. In short, they challenge us to make these “defining moments” for others, not just try to make “everything epic.” Or, to quote them in the final chapter,“…that’s the charge for all of us: to defy the forgettable flatness of everyday work and life by creating a few precious moments” (pg. 265).

“…that’s the charge for all of us: to defy the forgettable flatness of everyday work and life by creating a few precious moments.”

Ultimately, this book is a worthy addition to Chip and Dan Heath’s works (though not my favorite), and is worth the read (or 6.5 hr. audiobook) for anyone who cares about making moments and experiences matter for others.

Below I’ll list 5 stories that stuck out, and then provide a very short chapter summary for each chapter, as well as a key quote or two from each.

Some Stories That Stand Out

The book is full of all kinds of stories and research that reinforce their findings. There’s so many good stories. I (legitimately) laughed out loud several times and got visibly emotional during several as well. The stories are relatable, empowering, and thought-provoking. In this book, you’ll find such stories as…

• The industrial designer who realized his MRI machine may have served its proper purpose, but it terrified the poor children that had to use it. (TED Talk attached… so good) (pg. 29–33)
• Dr. Kamal Kar, who helped the rate of open defecation in the country of Bangladesh decrease from 34% to 1% (and it’s not by simply telling people that they’re being unhealthy). (pg. 97–102)
• James Lawson, a Methodist Minister who went to India to travel to learn the techniques of nonviolent resistance from the disciples of Mahatma Gandhi, who trained black leaders of the civil rights movement to courageously stand their ground in whites-only stores in Nashville. (pg. 177–181)
• Carlie John Fisherow, and how she was assigned to turn around one of the worst elementary schools in the country… and did it by visiting the houses of the students and simply asking their parents questions. (pg. 223–231)
• Maureen Bisognano, who learned the value of asking her 7-year-old Autistic patient “what matters to you?” and learning the power of letting people speak for their needs and desires. (pg. 235–238)

Chapter Summaries

The book breaks down the four types of defining moments, each with several chapters attached.

Part 1: Moments of ELEVATION

Chapter 3: Build Peaks: Too often we focus on “fixing the potholes” of life, user experience, customer critiques, etc. It can be more valuable to a customer, child, or employee if we move the 7’s of their life to a 10 than it is to move their 2’s to a 3. Use your energy building peak moments, not fixing every single problem.

“Beware the soul-sucking force of ‘reasonableness.’”

Chapter 4: Break the Script: If we want to make moments special, we’ve got to catch people off guard with “strategic surprises” (pg. 72). Think about Southwest Airlines, who surprises their passengers by making them laugh during the safety announcements.

• “‘We feel the most comfortable when things are certain, but we feel most alive when they are not’” pg. 86 (quoting the book Surprise: Embrace the Unpredictable and Engineer the Unexpected)

Part 2: Moments of INSIGHT (my favorite section)

Chapter 5: Trip Over the Truth: For someone to receive insight into their own lives, it’s not enough to preach at them and tell them how to live. Rather, create a situation where they can discover something true about themselves, their company, or their life.

• “[Guthrie] doesn’t share his feelings… he creates a situation where they can replicate his discovery. It becomes their own insight, and as a result, they’re motivated to act… It’s so much more powerful when [the insight] happens inside them. pg. 105

Chapter 6: Stretch for Insight: If people want to grow and change, it will be a stretch. As parents, mentors, and employers, we need to be prepared to help them stretch beyond what they think is possible for themselves (and there’s a helpful formula to do it (pg. 123).

• “Better to take a risk, try something, and distill the answer from experience rather than from navel-gazing. Action leads to insight more often than insight leads to action.” pg. 117
• “If you’re always in a life vest, you don’t know if you can swim. Sometimes you have to take the life vest off — with someone still standing by to offer support and rescue — and say, “Let’s see what happens.” pg. 126 (quoting Dale Phelps)

Part 3: Moments of PRIDE

Chapter 7: Recognize Others: Our words and actions have the power to change the trajectory of the life of another: recognition truly is a powerful gift.

• “While recognition is a universal expectation, it is not a universal practice. ‘More than 80% of supervisors claim they frequently express appreciation to their subordinates, while less than 20% of the employees report their supervisors express appreciation more than occasionally.’” pg. 146 (Quoting Carolyn Wiley)

Chapter 8: Multiply Milestones: Creating miniature moments make it possible to achieve something far bigger than they thought they could achieve (think Couch to 5K — full of “mini-milestones”).

• “To experience more defining moments, we need to rethink the way we set goals.” pg. 162

Chapter 9: Practice Courage: “You can’t manufacture ‘moments of courage.’ But in this chapter, we’ll see that you can practice courage so that, when the moment demands it, you’ll be ready.” (pg. 182)

• “Someone who has committed to drink less alcohol, for instance, might resolve, “Whenever a waiter asks if I want a second drink, I’ll ask for sparkling water.’ And that person is far more likely to turn down the drink than someone else who shares the same goal but has no preloaded plan. pg. 186
• “There is power is in preloading a response.” pg. 186
• “…people often know what the right thing to do is. The hard part is acting on that judgment.” pg. 186

“…people often know what the right thing to do is. The hard part is acting on that judgement.”

Part 4: Moments of CONNECTION

Chapter 10: Create Shared Meaning: When a group of people knows they aren’t alone in a mission but are instead part of a team, they are more motivated to try new things, take a personal commitment to their work, and improve organizations and groups for the better.

• “The presence of others turns abstract ideas into social reality.” pg. 213
• “Passion is individualistic. It can energize us but also isolate us, because my passion isn’t yours. By contrast, purpose is something people can share. It can knit groups together.” pg. 218

Chapter 11: Deepen Ties: Taking opportunities to intentionally deepen relationship with others brings change that everyone longs for… but aren’t willing to initiate on their own.

• “We are accustomed to thinking about relationships in terms of time: The longer the relationship endures, the closer it must grow. But relationships don’t grow in steady, predictable increments. There’s no guarantee that they will deepen with time.” pg. 230
• “Intimacy escalates with turn-taking.” pg. 243
• “Relationships don’t deepen naturally. In the absence of action, they will stall.” pg. 246