Being stuck in current patterns can feel hopeless, but in Adam Alter’s latest book, he explains how to break free from success-stopping habits.
Key Details
- Feeling stuck is a common experience, whether stuck in a dead-end job, a difficult relationship, or suffering from a creative block.
- In Anatomy Of a Breakthrough: How To Get Unstuck When It Matters Most, Alter shares with readers how to identify these patterns holding them back and how to break free from them.
- Over two decades of study, Alter has evaluated the differences between those who stay stuck and those who succeed and determined a formula to help others break free.
Why it’s important
During his study, Alter and other researchers have found common traits among those who manage to get themselves out of unprofitable patterns. The process is something Alter calls a friction audit. Following this procedure, readers can evaluate why an individual or an organization is stuck and what can be done to get things moving again.
Alter explains that three forms of friction cause a person or organization to get stuck: Heart (unhelpful emotions), head (unhelpful patterns of thought), and habit (unhelpful behaviors).
After identifying which friction issue is causing the problem, Anatomy Of a Breakthrough identifies the “unstickers” that are sometimes hidden in plain sight. Alter shares stories of people and organizations that have found the key to getting “unstuck” and found success again, including his personal story.
Using scientific studies, interviews, and anecdotes, Alter teaches the reader how to identify the problems causing him to be stuck and how he can use that friction to his advantage.
Alter is a professor of marketing at the New York University’s Stern School of Business. In 2017, he was among the Poets and Quants 40 Best Professors Under 40. He has also written two New York Times bestsellers: Drunk Tank Pink and Irresistible.
Anatomy Of a Breakthrough was published by Simon & Schuster on May 16, 2023.