You can avoid changing shortdateformat, dateseparators, etc. if you use ScanDateTime function which can be found in Dateutils unit.
uses DateUtils, ...
var MyDateTime: TDateTime;
MyDateTime := ScanDateTime('YYYY/MM/DD hh:nn:ss', '2014/10/30 13:53:12');
I find it shorter, as it's a single line, and it ignores regional preferences of the user or system regional default.