Years ago, I was working with advocates to boost Christians’ acceptance of LGBT people. It sounds difficult now, so think of how impossible it felt back then. Except it wasn’t impossible — but it did require a new approach to social-change communications.

Working with my colleagues in public-opinion research and psychology, our research uncovered a conflict that many Christians feel: they cared about the LGBT people in their lives, but they worried about staying true to their church’s teachings.

The traditional approach to communications hammers audiences with messages that ignore this conflict, eventually writing conflicted audiences off as a lost cause. We were able to create a messaging strategy that helped Christians manage their conflict, bringing them to our side and garnering wins on issues like the freedom to marry for same-sex couples.

I founded Wonder to help other changemakers make progress on complex social issues using the same approach. Using smart research, we can uncover our audience’s conflict, help them manage it, and make the impossible suddenly become possible. — Robert