Although you may not be conscious of them, you have powerful beliefs that affect what you want and whether you get it. In Mindset, Carol S. Dweck argues that your attitudes about your abilities and intelligence determine the course of your life, starting as early as your preschool years.
Dweck is a psychology professor at Stanford University and has received numerous awards for her work in social and developmental psychology. She holds a Ph.D. in psychology from Yale University.
(Shortform note: Mindset is an outgrowth of the age-old nature vs. nurture debate (that is, how much of our ability and personality are hardwired into us, and how much is the result of how we’re raised?). Recent studies suggest nurture is more important than nature—that growing up in a safe, secure, and inspirational environment outweighs innate abilities and behaviors. Dweck agrees with this assessment: The crux of her argument in Mindset is that we can continue to improve throughout our lives by nurturing our growth, and that doing so far outweighs whatever natural talents we do or don’t possess.)
Dweck begins by saying that your mindset shapes your entire personality, and it helps or hinders you from reaching your potential. It dictates how you interpret success, failure, and effort, as well as how you approach school, sports, work, and relationships.
Dweck says that you learn one of two mindsets from your parents, teachers, and the media you consume: a fixed mindset, or a growth mindset.
1. Fixed mindset: Personal qualities such as intelligence and personality are innate and unchangeable. Many of us are trained in this mindset from an early age and have heard some version of the following during our childhoods:
If you have a fixed mindset, you feel you must constantly prove yourself: If people are born with a set amount of intelligence or ability, then you want to prove that you have a lot, even though you secretly worry you were shortchanged.
Superhero Stories Reinforce a Fixed Mindset Mentality
Popular superheroes often perpetuate the notion that you must be gifted to do great things. For example, most Marvel superheroes can only fight against evil because they have innate abilities far beyond what any ordinary person is capable of. For example:
Thor is an alien warrior prince with godlike powers.
Hulk has incredible (no pun intended) strength and durability.
Captain Marvel can fly and shoot energy blasts from her hands.
Iron Man is a super-genius; entire teams of scientists and engineers can’t replicate his inventions.
2. Growth mindset: People can change and improve. When you have a growth mindset, you believe the abilities you’re born with are only a starting point—you can get smarter and improve yourself with hard work, persistence, and the right learning strategies. You have a passion for learning and welcome mistakes as opportunities to learn, and you seek challenges to push yourself.
Learn How to Learn
Brain and memory coach Jim Kwik's career is based on the growth-oriented premise that you can learn anything and improve your skills in any area. In his self-help book Limitless, he describes three aspects of learning:
Mindframe: Before you can learn, you must believe that it’s possible to do so (a growth mindset).
Drive: Once you know that you can learn something, you have to want to learn it. Your drive for learning could either come from a natural interest in the subject or an outside motivation, such as career aspirations or personal goals.
Techniques: Once you’re ready to learn, you’ll need effective methods of absorbing information quickly and retaining it permanently.
Kwik believes that mastering these three things allows you to learn about any topic more quickly and easily than you thought possible. In fact, he credits his own success to this system of learning.
Dweck says that in the fixed-mindset world, success is about proving to yourself and others that you’re smart and talented. Any type of setback is a failure: a bad grade, losing a competition, or not getting the job or promotion you wanted. Furthermore, if you have a fixed mindset, you take this type of failure to mean you’re not smart or talented enough; therefore, setbacks are intolerable and you’re likely to quit trying.
Conversely, success in the growth mindset world is about pushing yourself, learning, and improving. Failure means not seizing an opportunity to learn, not striving for what’s important to you, or not reaching for your potential.
Review Your Definition of Success
The definition of success varies from person to person, and how you define it is ultimately rooted in your ideology.
Many people (not to mention the Merriam-Webster Dictionary) have rigid definitions of success: A person is successful if he achieves wealth, fame, or respect (all of which come from others), or if he accomplishes a predetermined desired outcome. According to Dweck, these common definitions come from fixed mindsets: Success means a good result, and the amount of effort that went into that result is irrelevant. By this measure, many of us feel like failures if we’re not wealthy, or if our projects don’t turn out the way we wanted.
However, if success is defined by your personal ideals, then only you can decide how successful you’ve been. If you’re not successful according to your own ideals, then you need to either revisit your actions or your ideals to determine where you’re falling short. In other words, do you feel like a failure because you’re not living up to your ideals, or are the ideals themselves flawed? For example, if your ideals are based on a fixed-mindset definition of success, then reviewing your ideals and redefining success may be the key to a happy and fulfilling life.
Dweck says that, for people with fixed mindsets, perfection is essential. Since they don’t believe in growth, they have to prove their natural talents by grasping everything immediately and perfectly. For example, when researchers asked students what made them feel smart, fixed-mindset students said it was when they could do something quickly without making any mistakes. This also illustrates that, to the people with a fixed mindset, effort is a negative—a crutch for those without natural talent.
However, growth-minded students said they felt smart when they tried hard and made progress, or they were able to do something they couldn’t do before. To the people with a growth mindset, effort is a positive—these students felt accomplished when they saw improvement, rather than when they proved their abilities.
(Shortform note: We’ve already discussed how people with fixed mindsets feel a need to show superiority to bolster their self-esteem—but, ironically, the perfectionism that comes with a fixed mindset is actually detrimental to self-esteem. In her book The Gifts of Imperfection, researcher and bestselling author Brené Brown tells us that perfectionism is dangerous because it’s based on unrealistic expectations: It’s impossible to be perfect, or even to seem perfect. Unfortunately, the perfectionist mindset doesn’t allow you to realize that you set impossible goals; instead, you shame and berate yourself for not being good enough to live up to them.)
Dweck warns us that children can develop mindsets as early as three years old. At this age, children are listening and watching all of the adults around them and they absorb modeled behavior of fixed and growth mindsets.
Fixed mindsets slow or shut down children’s innate drive to learn. Some children begin rejecting challenges because they fear failure (or having people see them fail). As a result, fixed-mindset children become non-learners. By contrast, children who have growth mindsets embrace challenges and relish becoming smarter, which lays the foundation for lifelong learning.
(Shortform note: In First Things First, Stephen Covey says that learning is one of four essential human needs—desires that we have to fulfill in order to feel happy and accomplished. Covey writes that this need encompasses not just formal education, but constant, lifelong learning. Therefore, a child who becomes afraid to take on challenges and learn new things runs the risk of becoming an unhappy, unfulfilled adult.)
Dweck explores two behaviors that can instill and reflect a fixed mindset in children: praise and bullying.
Parents and teachers typically try to build children’s self-confidence by praising their performance, but Dweck warns that this can be harmful. Praising performance sends a two-part message: Adults value ability, and they determine the child’s ability based on his or her performance. This promotes a fixed mindset.
Instead, she suggests applying a growth mindset: Praise children for what they’ve achieved through good study strategies, practice, effort, and persistence. Show interest in how they succeeded or improved, and by how much, rather than on the result or performance itself. For instance, you might comment, “That was much better than last time—your practice is really paying off,” or, “It’s great how you kept trying different tricks to remember all those facts.”
The best way for parents to help their children build confidence is to teach them to welcome challenges, to learn from mistakes, and to continually try new learning strategies.
(Shortform note: Praise is a form of positive reinforcement: a reward for something that you want that person to continue doing. Behavioral psychologists currently believe that the best way to change a person’s behavior is to use positive reinforcement in combination with extinction, or ignoring unwanted behavior. For example, if a student brags about how smart he is (demonstrating a fixed mindset), you would ignore those comments and instead praise how hard he worked for his grades (a growth mindset). Although Dweck focuses on praise for children, this behavior-changing method works on people of any age.)
Dweck believes that bullying can cause victims to develop fixed mindsets. Victims come to believe that they really are inferior in some way, and therefore must deserve the bullying. This is especially true if no one else stands up for them.
Dweck adds that victims with fixed mindsets are more likely to have revenge fantasies—to want to strike back and hurt the bully, either to prove their own superiority or because they see the bully as a bad person who deserves to be punished. Conversely, victims who have growth mindsets (despite the bullying) are more likely to want to understand, help, and ultimately reform their aggressor.
Furthermore, Dweck argues that bullying not only causes but is also caused by fixed mindset thinking: The bullies judge vulnerable kids as inherently less valuable. Bullies prove their superiority by singling out others as inferior because of some real or perceived difference.
(Shortform note: Some child and adolescent psychologists believe that taking a growth-mindset approach to helping and rehabilitating bullies is the right idea. Research suggests that bullies act the way they do because they lack the social and self-regulatory skills to interact with their peers in a healthy way. If that’s true, then punishing bullies is ineffective because they don’t know how to do better. Therefore, anti-bullying efforts should focus instead on teaching them the skills they lack.)
Dweck says that your mindset is the basis of your thoughts, actions, and experiences. It impacts every aspect of your life. Here are a few examples:
Fixed-mindset thinking is often found in the world of sports, where the child who is “a natural” is expected to achieve and the others aren’t.
Naturals do exist in sports, but Dweck believes that talent becomes a drawback for people with fixed mindsets. These kids tend to not push themselves—either because they already feel superior, or because they’re terrified of failure. Furthermore, fixed-mindset athletes tend to put individual performance ahead of teamwork because they’re preoccupied with their own success.
In contrast, Dweck says that athletes with growth mindsets find defeat motivating, rather than discouraging or frustrating. They define success as learning, improving, and doing their best. Athletes with growth mindsets also understand the importance of working with their teammates; they don’t look down on people whom they see as less talented than themselves because they believe in their ability to improve.
Practice Widens Talent Gaps
While Dweck acknowledges that some people are more talented in certain areas than others, she may be understating how impactful that difference is.
The Sports Gene discusses a study from the early 1900s where adults practiced multiplying three-digit numbers together, and researchers tracked their improvement. The study found that the adults who were more skilled at the beginning of the study also improved more quickly—in other words, practice widened the gap rather than narrowing it. The takeaway: People who are naturally talented actually benefit the most from practice.
This effect can be compounded for early bloomers, who benefit from additional opportunities to nurture their natural talent. Because of this, one study suggests that the difference between the effects of talent versus hard work might not be as clear-cut as it seems. Here’s how it works:
At a young age, someone is identified as “gifted” in a particular area (say, football).
Adults nurture those “gifts” through special attention and extra training. For example, they encourage the child to attend training and workout sessions, and to try out for the football team.
Thanks to this extra work, the student advances in that area more than his peers—the perceived talent has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. For instance, the student has become a skilled football player through hard work, all while believing that he’s just naturally gifted at it.
Dweck believes that the mindset of a company’s leader is a key determinant of whether a company fails or succeeds. Fixed-mindset leaders tend to believe they’re geniuses who don’t need strong executive teams, just underlings to implement their ideas. They’re concerned with looking superior and enhancing their own reputations, rather than serving the company’s best interests. Dweck explains that their egos drive them to belittle their employees and ignore or deny their own mistakes, which can run their companies into the ground.
In contrast to the companies with fixed-mindset leaders, the atmosphere in a company with a growth-oriented leader is positive and energized. They believe in everyone’s ability to learn and develop. Dweck says that instead of using their company as a tool for self-promotion, growth-minded leaders focus on improving the company and employees. Most industry-leading companies (regardless of the industry) operate with growth mindsets.
Incorporate a Growth Mindset Into Meetings
In Playing to Win, former Procter & Gamble CEO A.G. Lafley uses the terms “advocacy” and “inquiry” to describe different meeting styles, each of which reflects Dweck’s two mindsets:
Advocacy—fixed mindset: Lafley says that the traditional strategy meeting has someone presenting an idea and then defending it against his or her colleagues. Rather than working together to come to the best solution, this approach is about the presenter proving that he’s “right” and that his idea is “good.” As is characteristic of a fixed mindset, if he’s not able to defend his idea and achieve the desired result, that’s seen as a failure and a sign that he’s not good at his job.
Inquiry—growth mindset: In contrast, Lafley pushes for a system of open inquiry when designing company strategy. In this system, the presenter asks for ideas and feedback from the audience. The purpose isn’t to prove that he’s correct—and therefore smart and talented—but to come up with the best possible strategy for the company. As with a growth mindset, this system recognizes that every employee has the potential to contribute, every idea has the potential to be better, and that even a talented and experienced strategist may have overlooked something.
Dweck believes that having a fixed mindset can lead to relationship problems. In a fixed mindset, you believe that your traits and your partner’s are unchangeable. As a result, you also believe your relationship is unchangeable: You’re either “meant to be” and will live happily ever after, or you’re doomed to a life of misery and an eventual breakup.
Dweck points out that people with fixed mindsets have counterproductive beliefs about relationships. For example: Partners should be so in sync that they can read each other’s minds, they should have the same views on everything, and relationship problems stem from unchangeable character flaws or unresolvable disagreements.
Conversely, Dweck says people with growth mindsets believe that you can have problems and still have a good relationship. To the person with a growth mindset, flaws and disagreements can be worked through using clear communication, and doing that work with your partner is an opportunity to get closer to each other.
Growth Begins With Acceptance
One way to bring a growth mindset to relationships is to practice what Tara Brach calls Radical Acceptance. Briefly, Radical Acceptance means that you take each moment as it comes, and accept your experiences for what they are without trying to judge or change them. Brach believes that this practice allows us to stay in control of ourselves, consider each situation with a calm and rational mind, and determine the best way to handle it.
In relationships, Radical Acceptance means approaching problems and disagreements with recognition and compassion. For example, instead of saying that your partner is wrong about something, you might say, “Clearly we disagree about this” (recognition). Then you would attempt to understand your partner’s point of view and respect it—even if you can’t agree with it (compassion).
Brach adds that this process applies to all relationships, not just romantic ones.
Dweck believes that learning about the two mindsets and how they affect you can prompt you to start making changes. However, completely changing your habitual thought patterns takes time and work. Often, the fixed mindset hangs around and competes with the growth-oriented ways of thinking that you’re trying to adopt.
Your fixed-mindset beliefs about being smart, athletic, talented, or ambitious might be your source of self-esteem, and it can be difficult to give up those beliefs for more challenging ideas about developing yourself through effort and mistakes.
Dweck warns that when you reform your mindset, you may temporarily feel like you’re losing your sense of who you are. However, the growth mindset ultimately frees you from constantly judging yourself so you can be authentic and explore your full potential. In other words, you won’t be so concerned about who you are, because you’ll be focused on who you can become.
Mindset Begins With Values
One way to change your mindset is to examine your values and determine whether they support a growth mindset. In The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson argues that our thoughts and actions—and, ultimately, our happiness—begin with our values.
Manson describes three criteria for healthy values, two of which strongly align with a growth mindset:
They’re fact-based. Positive values stem from concrete and provable facts, rather than feelings or opinions. For example, honesty is a positive value, while happiness—a feeling not rooted in anything concrete—is a negative one. While natural talent may be quantified through a measure like IQ, you can also gauge values like hard work and diligence through how much you practice and improve in a skill.
They’re constructive. Positive values benefit you and those around you. For example, discipline is a positive value, while power—which relies on pushing others down in order to elevate yourself—is a negative one. A growth mindset is inherently constructive, since it pushes you to improve yourself.
They’re within your control. Positive values don’t rely on external factors. For example, fame is a negative value because it’s based on other people’s opinions of you. Fixed-mindset values such as intelligence and talent fall under this category—they rely on being born with those qualities, which is something that you cannot control.
Achieving a growth mindset is a journey—you won’t get there all at once. Dweck suggests following these steps toward developing a growth mindset:
1. Accept that you have a fixed mindset. Even when you’re on a path to growth, you have lingering fixed-mindset beliefs. In fact, everyone has a mix of fixed and growth-oriented beliefs. You can acknowledge this reality without accepting the negatives a fixed mindset causes.
(Shortform note: Dweck echoes the cliche that the first step toward making a change is admitting you have a problem. However, that’s actually a misquote of the first step of the Alcoholics Anonymous program, which is admitting that your problem has made your life unmanageable. Just as the 12-step program of AA doesn’t stop after step one, it’s not enough to simply realize that something is wrong; making a major change requires you to recognize and acknowledge that something is causing real, immediate, and serious harm to your life. In other words, you won’t be able to change your mindset unless you believe that doing so is absolutely necessary.)
2. Create a fixed-mindset persona and identify her triggers. Ask yourself what triggers this part of you to come out. For instance, do you slip into a fixed mindset when you take on a difficult project or encounter a setback? After identifying your triggers, give your fixed-mindset persona its own name and think of them as “her” triggers—doing so will remind you that this isn’t who you want to be.
(Shortform note: Studies show that thinking in the third person—talking to yourself as if you were talking to someone else—can help you think more clearly and deal with difficult situations more effectively. Giving your fixed mindset its own name and persona serves the same purpose: Mentally separating yourself from the problem helps you control your feelings and engage your rational mind, as if you were giving advice to a friend rather than trying to solve a personal issue.)
3. Confront your fixed mindset. When your fixed mindset materializes, have an imaginary conversation with it. For example, if your first attempt at a new skill doesn’t go well, your fixed-mindset way of thinking might tell you that you’re not good at it and should give up. However, you can remind yourself that mistakes and failures are opportunities to learn and grow.
Meet Your Fixed Mindset With Compassion
In Radical Acceptance, Brach tells the story of Buddha confronting Mara, the god of illusion and deceit. This parable about how to confront your own doubts and shortcomings offers insights into how to counter your fixed-mindset thoughts.
Whenever Mara would appear and try to dissuade the Buddha from his spiritual path, the Buddha—instead of trying to fight him off or shut him out—would acknowledge the god with a simple, “I see you, Mara.” Then he would invite Mara in for tea and talk to him like an old friend. Mara, whose powers were based on tricks and deception, was unable to overcome the Buddha’s open acceptance and compassion; he would eventually leave with no harm done.
In the same way, you could see your fixed-mindset persona as your own version of Mara. Instead of trying to force down that persona through frustration and disgust, try greeting it as an old friend. Meet its arguments about your limitations and natural talents (or lack of them) with respect and conviction. Eventually, your personal “Mara” will exhaust itself and leave you in peace.
Although you may not be conscious of them, you have powerful beliefs that affect what you want and whether you get it. In Mindset, psychologist and researcher Carol S. Dweck argues that one belief in particular can determine the course of much of your life, starting as early as your preschool years.
You learn one of two mindsets from your parents, teachers, and coaches — that personal qualities such as intelligence and ability are innate and unchangeable (a “fixed” mindset) or that you and others can change and grow (a “growth” mindset). Regardless of which view dominates your thinking, it shapes your personality and helps or hinders you from reaching your potential.
Understanding how your mindset plays out can change your career, relationships, the way you raise your children, and your overall satisfaction in life.
Throughout much of history, experts have debated the roles of nature and nurture in determining people’s personal characteristics, asking which has the bigger impact — genetics or environmental factors including background, experience, and education.
Today, most researchers agree that nature and nurture work together. People start with certain genetically determined characteristics — different traits and aptitudes — but experience, education, and effort determine where you can go with them. In fact, science is discovering that our brains have a greater capacity for ongoing development than once thought.
Dweck’s research shows that, on a personal level, whether you believe that your traits are innate and unchangeable or that you can grow your intelligence and skills affects you profoundly.
You typically live by either a fixed mindset or a growth mindset, which shapes how you learn, cope with setbacks, and relate to others. We’ll start with a comparison of the two mindsets. Later examples will flesh out the descriptions and show how the mindsets work. It’s important to know that even if you have a fixed mindset now, you can learn the growth mindset, which can transform many aspects of your life.
When you have a fixed mindset, you believe your abilities are unchangeable. You were born with certain traits and a certain amount of intelligence and that’s that. Many people are trained in this mindset from an early age — for instance, by a teacher who believed your IQ determines everything: You’re either smart or you’re dumb; you can learn or you can’t.
When you view your abilities as unchangeable, you feel you must constantly prove yourself. If people get only a set amount of intelligence and a certain character, you want to prove you have a lot, although you secretly worry you were shortchanged. You don't want to look stupid or fail. You feel you’re being judged or rated in every situation and must measure up. Children inculcated with this mindset often fear losing their parents’ or teachers’ approval and love if they fail.
When you have a growth mindset, you believe the abilities you’re born with are a starting point you can build on with hard work, persistence, and the right learning strategies. You have a passion for learning, welcome mistakes as opportunities to learn, and seek challenges so you can stretch. You also have a greater ability to survive difficult times.
The author first encountered the growth mindset as a young researcher while studying how children coped with failure. She gave kids a series of puzzles to solve, progressing from easy to difficult ones. She was surprised to find that some children loved attempting the hard puzzles, relishing the challenge and opportunity to become smarter. Until then, the author had viewed intelligence and problem-solving as fixed abilities, but watching kids learn from failure changed her mind.
Believing in the ability to learn and grow doesn’t mean believing anyone can become an Einstein or believing anyone can do anything they aspire to if they apply enough effort. But the growth mindset recognizes that you can’t predict someone’s potential or how far their passion, work, and learning can take them.
Predictions have little value. Many people whom we consider geniuses today — for instance, Darwin, Tolstoy, and Mozart — were ordinary as children. Golfer Ben Hogan was unathletic as a child.
However, many teachers believe IQ tests accurately predict students’ potential, even though the creator of the test, Alfred Binet, didn’t intend for it to be used that way. He believed education and practice could change intelligence (which he defined as memory, judgment, and attention). He created the IQ test as a way of identifying children who were having problems — so they could be helped to improve.
The author’s grade school teacher seated students in order of their IQs, entrusting only the highest-IQ students with tasks such as carrying the flag. This created an atmosphere in which the children’s number one goal was to look smart or avoid looking stupid. It took the joy out of learning.
Simply put, mindsets are beliefs. This book shows how mindsets or beliefs dictate people’s aspirations; how they alter the way people see success, failure, and effort; and what that means in school, sports, work, and relationships. It also shows how mindsets can be changed.
Here’s an example comparing the fixed and growth mindsets. Imagine you’re a young adult who is having a bad day. You receive a C+ on a paper for an important class. When you return to your car at the end of the day, you find a parking ticket. When you call a friend for sympathy, she seems to brush off your tale of woe. The author presented her students with this scenario and asked how they’d react.
Those with a fixed mindset said they’d feel like a failure and would interpret the three events as confirmation that they were worthless, others were out to get them, and no one cared about them. They said they’d react by not putting so much effort into the next class assignment, breaking something to let off steam, or withdrawing and getting drunk. Although the events were hardly earth-shattering, they led to feelings of failure and paralysis in the students with fixed mindsets.
In contrast, the students with growth mindsets shrugged off the setbacks, saying they’d work harder in the class and be more careful about where they parked. Regarding the friend’s rebuff, they suggested the friend could be having a bad day or might be preoccupied with something. The students with growth mindsets didn’t label themselves negatively and withdraw. They chose action — for instance, studying differently, paying the parking ticket, and being more careful.
Stressing persistence and effort isn’t anything new. We have many sayings and stories intended to show the value of effort: Rome wasn’t built in a day; try, try again; “The Little Engine that Could.” However, researchers discovered that people’s beliefs about effort are more complicated. They come directly from mindset.
People with fixed mindsets don’t believe in persistence or effort. They think: If at first you don’t succeed, then you don’t have what it takes. They avoid effort because if you try and fail, you’ll demonstrate your inadequacies, which you want to avoid.
When the researchers encourage people to accept a fixed mindset, in which they believe abilities are predetermined, they’re afraid of challenge and effort that might unmask them. But when people are taught a growth mindset that emphasizes development, they appreciate challenges and value effort.
You might think that people with a growth mindset, who believe they can develop, would have an exaggerated view of their abilities (“I can do anything”). In fact, people with a growth mindset are more realistic about their strengths and weaknesses than those with a fixed mindset.
When you believe you have the capacity to learn, you’re more open to honest feedback and criticism than if you believe you have a finite amount of intelligence. People with a growth mindset understand that you need accurate information about how you’re doing in order to improve. Fixed mindsets distort this information, either blowing it out of proportion or making excuses and minimizing it.
Researchers have found that exceptional people (much like those with a growth mindset) know their strengths and weaknesses, and can turn failures into eventual successes, which is a key element of creativity.
What’s your mindset? People can have a mix of the two mindsets, or they can apply a fixed mindset in certain situations and a growth mindset in others. You may have fixed beliefs about your intelligence but a growth mindset (believing you can improve) when it comes to other qualities. However, one mindset or the other — fixed or growth — tends to dominate your life.
To review, you have a fixed mindset if you believe your intelligence or abilities are innate and can’t be changed (I’m just not good at math); that you’re a certain kind of person, like it or not. In contrast, you have a growth mindset if you believe you can get smarter by learning and changing fundamental things about yourself, such as becoming more caring or better in social situations.
You can learn to change your mindset. Tips and exercises at the end of each chapter will show you how.
You have a fixed mindset if you believe your intelligence is innate and can’t be changed (I’m just not good at math); that you’re a certain kind of person. You have a growth mindset if you believe you can learn and change basic things about yourself.
Think of a situation that challenged your abilities — for instance, being asked to give a speech or having to take a test. With which mindset did you approach it? Which was your first inclination: worry about being judged or anticipation for what you could learn?
What would your thoughts and actions have been if you had approached the above situation with the opposite mindset? How would the outcome be different?
Do you have a characteristic that you’ve always thought of as set in stone? What is it? Thinking of it from a growth perspective, how could you change it?
The two mindsets are different worlds where the same things have different meanings for the inhabitants of each world. Most important is how people with each mindset — fixed or growth — define and interpret success and failure.
In general, in the fixed mindset world, success is about proving to yourself and others that you’re smart and talented. It’s about validation. If you fail, it means you’re not smart or talented, therefore failure is intolerable. Failure is any type of setback: a bad grade, losing a competition, not getting the job or promotion you want, being rejected. Effort is a negative — if you need it, that means you’re not smart.
In the growth mindset world where you can change, success is about stretching yourself, learning, and improving. Failure is not seizing an opportunity to learn, not striving for what’s important to you, not reaching for your potential. Effort is a positive — it helps you get smarter and increase your abilities.
Remember, mindsets are beliefs — although they’re powerful, you can change them.
When you start out in life, success is about learning. You’re born with a drive to learn. Babies learn and stretch themselves every day. They don’t worry about failing or quit. For instance, they don’t decide walking is too hard and give up or fear falling. They just keep trying.
As early as preschool age, however, children develop mindsets or beliefs about their ability. Fixed mindsets slow or shut down the intense drive to learn. Some children become fearful of not being seen as smart; they begin rejecting challenges. Others, with a growth mindset, embrace challenges and relish becoming smarter. Fixed mindset children become non-learners.
For instance, the author and her research team offered four-year-olds a choice of redoing an easy puzzle or trying a new, harder one. Children who believed in fixed traits wanted to redo the easy puzzle (the safe choice), while children with growth mindsets wondered why anyone would want to keep redoing the same thing when they could try something else. In other words, children with a fixed mindset wanted to make sure they succeeded, as they believed smart people always do, while those with a growth mindset wanted to get smarter.
Over time, people with fixed mindsets and growth mindsets come to view the nature of success differently.
Here’s a range of examples about how fixed- and growth-minded people behave differently.
College Classes
At the University of Hong Kong, everything is taught and learned in English, which means strong English skills are essential to a student’s academic success. Students have varying English skills when they arrive. Researchers measured incoming students’ mindsets, then asked those with poor English skills whether they would take a course to improve their English if it were offered. Fixed-mindset students weren’t interested, while growth-mindset students said “yes” enthusiastically. The fixed-mindset students were willing to risk their academic careers for the short-term value of seeming smart.
Another study measured the brainwaves of students of each mindset as they answered hard questions and got feedback. Their brainwaves showed their level of attention to and interest in the feedback. Fixed-mindset people paid attention to feedback on whether their answers were right or wrong (reflecting their ability), but weren’t interested in information that could help them learn — they weren’t even interested in learning the right answer when they got something wrong. In contrast, growth-minded people wanted to learn and paid attention to information that would help.
A last study observed pre-med students facing a difficult chemistry course. Researchers found that fixed-mindset students only stayed interested in the course if they did well immediately. Those who struggled with it at the outset lost interest — it didn’t validate their intelligence. In contrast, for growth-minded students, the challenging nature of the course drove their interest and motivated them.
Fixed-Minded vs. Growth-Minded CEOs
Chrysler CEO Lee Iacocca was successful at first in introducing new initiatives in the struggling company. But after his initial success, he lapsed into a fixed mindset of seeking validation rather than improvement. He kept bringing back the same models of cars each year, although consumers were rejecting them for more innovative Japanese models. He got rid of his critics and elevated people who fed his ego, which was a road to failure (more on his experience follows in Chapter 5).
Growth-minded CEOs aren’t afraid to acknowledge a need to learn through questioning and receiving critical feedback — as a result, they grow and their companies do too. For example, when Lou Gerstner was hired to turn IBM around, he ignored Wall Street and focused on the long term, although he was criticized for not immediately boosting stock prices.
Sports
Sports offers numerous examples of growth-minded athletes who constantly stretched themselves. In fact, stretching, rather than winning, is what motivated them.
For example, as a child, soccer player Mia Hamm pitted herself against older, more experienced players to improve her skills. At age ten, she joined the eleven-year-old boys’ team. She continued this approach in her college career, joining the top college team in the U.S. She tried to “play up” to the level of better players and as a result, she improved faster than she had thought possible.
Relationships
Whether you choose validation or improvement can shape your relationships as well as your performance at work.
For instance, when asked to describe their ideal mate, fixed-mindset people wanted someone who would validate them — put them on a pedestal and make them feel perfect. Growth-minded people wanted a mate who could see their flaws and help them improve, and encourage them to try new things.
One reason people with a fixed mindset feel they have to be perfect is that they see every test or evaluation as a permanent measure of their ability.
For example, in a study of fifth graders, researchers told them that a certain test could measure their ability. Although the researchers provided no other information about the test, the fixed-mindset students concluded that it could not only measure how smart they were, but it could also measure how smart they’d be as adults, essentially defining them forever. Growth-minded students didn’t believe a test could measure how smart they were, nor did they believe it could predict how smart they’d be in the future because their intelligence was always growing.
Fixed-mindset educators do in fact believe you can measure someone’s ability and determine their potential. But those who’ve tried to do that have been wrong repeatedly. Examples of people who were told they lacked potential include Charles Darwin, Marcel Proust, Ray Charles, Elvis Presley, Lucille Ball, and Jackson Pollock.
By definition, you can’t predict potential, if it’s understood as the capacity to develop over time with effort and training. It’s impossible to be certain of how far anyone can go with effort and training. For example, many of artist Paul Cezanne’s early paintings were terrible. He needed time and effort to develop.
Ability to grow may be a more important indicator for future achievement than current success:
A fixed-mindset person’s need to believe they’re smart can evolve into a sense of entitlement or specialness. Not only are they smart, they’re smarter or more talented than anyone else. Their need for validation is constant. The self-esteem movement bolsters this belief, for instance by encouraging you to remember your specialness with daily affirmations.
Tennis player John McEnroe is an example of both an entitled attitude and the pitfalls of a fixed mindset. He believed only in talent. Because he didn’t learn, he didn’t improve or grow as a player.
In terms of feeling entitled, McEnroe acknowledged that he needed to be the center of attention. He expected people to cater to him. Further, he believed that because he was better than others, he had a right to abuse them. He often blew up at people over small things, like the coarseness of the sawdust provided to him at courtside for drying his hands.
In contrast, basketball player Michael Jordan was growth-minded. He found public admiration embarrassing because he didn’t consider himself to be better than others — he’d developed his skills by working at them and always had room to improve.
Mindset drives how people define and cope with failure. For people with a fixed mindset, failure is an identity that they fear and try to avoid, rather than something that happens.
For example, as a child, the author refused to participate in spelling and French competitions, although she excelled at those subjects, because she was afraid of losing and being defined as a failure. Golfer Ernie Els felt the same way. When he won a tournament for the first time in five years, he explained what had been at stake: he said that if he had lost again, he’d have become a different person in his mind — a permanent loser. Similarly, every spring, thousands of young people feel they’re failures when they get rejection letters from their top choices for college.
Failure is hard for growth-minded people too, but they don’t let it define them. They see it as something to confront and learn from. For example, Minnesota Viking Jim Marshall didn’t let a spectacular failure define him. He grabbed a loose ball and ran into the wrong end zone, scoring for the opposing team, the 49ers, on national television. Rather than sitting out the rest of the game and feeling ashamed, he went back in and played well during the second half, contributing to a win for his team. After the game, he continued to use the experience in a positive way, answering letters and speaking to groups about coping with failure, while he also worked to improve as a player.
In contrast, confronting failure with a fixed mindset doesn’t give you any constructive way to overcome it. When you’re a failure, then what? Some of the negative ways people with a fixed mindset try to shore up their self-esteem include giving up, cheating, and blaming.
Researchers asked seventh graders how they’d respond to a poor grade on a test in a new course. Predictably, the growth-minded students said they’d study harder for the next one. But the fixed-mindset students said they’d study less — because what’s the point if you lack the ability? Instead, they said they’d consider cheating.
Sometimes, people with fixed mindsets try to make themselves feel better by focusing on others who are worse off. In a college study, researchers allowed students who did poorly on a test to look at others’ tests. Those with a growth mindset looked at the tests of others who’d done better because they were looking for ways to improve. Students with a fixed mindset looked at the tests of those who’d done worse in order to feel better about themselves.
Alternatively, people with fixed mindsets may blame others or make excuses. Every time he lost a match, John McEnroe had an excuse — he had a backache, he overtrained, he ate before the match, or he was a victim of unfair expectations. In contrast, when growth-minded CEO of General Electric Jack Welch made poor decisions leading to poor results, he personally phoned top colleagues to deliver the news and take the blame.
As UCLA basketball coach John Wooden noted, you can’t learn from your failures if you deny them by blaming someone else.
Mindset also plays a role in how people handle depression. In a study of college students, those with a fixed mindset had worse depression than those with a growth mindset. The fixed-mindset students obsessed over problems and failures, which made them feel worthless. The more depressed they felt, the more paralyzed they became — they didn’t do anything to address their problems, such as doing class assignments or studying. In contrast, the more depressed that growth-minded students felt, the more determined they were to take action. They tried harder to keep up with their classwork and obligations.
To instill in children the value of effort, we teach them such stories as “The Tortoise and the Hare” and “The Little Engine That Could.” The lesson is to keep trying and you’ll succeed: Slow and steady wins the race.
But those with fixed mindsets take away a different lesson: Effort is for those who lack talent. They’d rather be the faster, more talented hare than the tortoise, who only succeeded because the hare messed up. A smarter hare would beat a no-talent tortoise.
Stories like “The Tortoise and the Hare” suggest an either/or dynamic: you have talent or you put in a lot of effort. Author Malcolm Gladwell has suggested that society values accomplishment that seems effortless over achievement through work and practice. We like superheroes with extraordinary abilities to easily surmount obstacles.
The downside of this belief can be costly. A Duke University study found anxiety and depression among female students who aspired to “effortless perfection” in appearance and in their academics. In contrast, growth-minded people believe that no one is perfect. No matter how talented you are, you have to work and improve to fulfill your potential.
If you believe you’re supremely talented, you have more to lose by trying than untalented people have. Effort is scary for people with a fixed mindset because:
Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, a talented young violinist who debuted at age ten with the Philadelphia Orchestra, almost derailed her career when she reached Juilliard and refused to expend any effort out of fear of failing. When she arrived there and faced stiff competition, she lost confidence. She had many bad habits, including the way she held her violin, but she wouldn’t change them. She stopped bringing her violin to lessons until the teacher confronted her. Afraid of losing the teacher, she made a turnaround and trained seriously for a competition, which she won, having learned the value of effort.
Fear of effort can stymie relationships too. For example, a woman who was accustomed to short-lived relationships with inconsiderate boyfriends was unsettled when she started dating a considerate man. She really liked him but feared putting effort into the relationship because she’d be a failure if it didn’t work out. So she didn’t take the risk and lost out on a potentially rewarding relationship.
In contrast, for a growth-minded person, failure is not making the effort to pursue something you really want. Tennis great Billie Jean King said that when you look back on your life, you can say one of only two things: “I gave my all” or “I could have been…” Growth-minded people believe in giving their all.
Why do fixed-mindset people feel they must prove their superiority repeatedly — isn’t once enough?
New and bigger challenges are always coming up. Yesterday’s performance may not be good enough today. The baseball you play in the minor leagues isn’t the same level of baseball you need to play in the majors. Even though you’ve proven your ability before, you’ll keep finding yourself in the position of having to do it again. The only way to break the cycle is with a growth mindset that embraces effort and the risk of failure.
When people fail, is it their fault for not trying hard enough?
People can fail through no fault of their own — maybe they had fewer advantages, such as resources, a strong support system, or educational opportunities, than the next person. Those with the most resources and the fewest hurdles usually have the greatest chance of succeeding in their efforts. Those facing hurdles such as illness or financial setbacks can be sidetracked more easily. Effort is important, but it isn’t the only thing.
Workaholics seemingly have a fixed mindset, yet they put in a lot of effort despite the risk of failure. Does that mean they’re not really fixed-minded?
Generally, people with fixed mindsets prefer to succeed through ability rather than effort. But they may be willing to expend great effort for long-term goals. Also, they may not share every fixed-mindset belief, for instance that smart people don’t need to apply effort. However, they may have other fixed mindset beliefs such as feeling superior and not tolerating criticism.
If you’re comfortable with a fixed mindset — with your abilities and performance — why should you change?
No one has to change. But you have the choice of changing your fixed mindset if it’s not serving you well — for instance, if you’re miserable because you feel like a failure. You may also be depriving yourself of opportunities for success in new areas by not trying something new. In the areas where you’re comfortable, you may find that relying on talent without effort has limits — it takes you only so far.
Do people with fixed mindsets avoid challenge simply because they lack confidence?
People with fixed mindsets can have as much confidence as growth-minded people have to start out with. But fixed-mindset people can lose confidence when they have setbacks. When that happens, like John McEnroe, they feel the need to protect their confidence and self-image by blaming and making excuses for failures.
People with growth mindsets don’t really need confidence to try something challenging or new because their goal is learning rather than validation. Teen golfer Michelle Wie wanted to learn what it was like to play in a tournament against the best players. So she entered a PGA tournament against the best male players. She learned she could play at that level, although she needed to improve.
People with fixed mindsets (the belief that abilities are unchangeable) may be reluctant to take on challenges for fear of failing. In contrast, those with a growth mindset see failures as opportunities to learn.
Think of a time when you failed at something. How did you feel? How did you interpret the failure?
What did you learn from your failure? How did it affect the way you approached other challenges?
Think of a time when you had a choice to stretch yourself or not. What was your choice and why? What were the results?
What will you tell yourself next time you have such a choice?
Many people have wrong ideas about ability and achievement. For instance, they picture Thomas Edison working long hours alone in a small lab, when he suddenly invents the lightbulb in a “Eureka!” moment..
But that’s not how it happened. He had dozens of assistants working for him in a large corporate-funded lab. The successful lightbulb was the end result of a string of inventions, to which chemists, physicists, engineers, and many others contributed. Edison had a true growth mindset and drive to learn and tackle new challenges.
While ability helps, achievement comes through learning and effort. Likewise, Darwin’s book, The Origin of Species, was the product of numerous drafts and conversations with countless colleagues over many years. Mozart worked more than ten years before producing notable work.
This chapter explains what achievement really takes and why some people achieve more and others less.
Achievement in school starts with mindset. Researchers measured students’ mindsets as they transitioned to junior high school, which is a particularly challenging time for adolescents, then followed them for two years.
The students started out with similar grades but after the transition with its new challenges, the grades of fixed-mindset students declined, while those of growth-oriented students improved.
The fixed-mindset students tried to rationalize their poor grades with explanations such as “I’m no good at math” or they blamed the teacher. They viewed the change to junior high as threatening because it could expose them as failures. They protected themselves from failure by not trying (the low-effort syndrome), as the young Juilliard violinist did by not taking her violin to class.
In contrast, the growth-minded students faced the tougher environment by doubling down and working harder. They welcomed the opportunity to learn what they like and might achieve.
Aside: A famous example of doubling down is the experience of George Danzig, a math graduate student at Berkeley. Once, he arrived late as his math class was ending and hurriedly copied two problems from the blackboard that he assumed were the assignment. They were quite difficult and it took him days of effort to solve them. It turns out that they weren’t intended to be homework problems, but were two famous problems no one had ever solved.
The transition to college is another crisis point in young people’s development. They go from being top students in their high school to having to prove themselves among top students from many high schools.
Anxiety is especially high in the pre-med classes. In the study of pre-med students facing the gateway chemistry course, there were big differences in how students with each mindset approached the course and in their achievement.
Everyone studied, but the two groups studied differently. The students with fixed mindsets studied the way many students have learned to study: they re-read the text and their notes and memorized as much as they could. They believed they’d done everything possible — maybe they just weren’t good at chemistry. But instead of memorizing the material, the growth-minded students looked for themes and principles across lectures. They worked to understand their mistakes — they wanted to learn, not just to excel on a test.
As a result, the growth-oriented students got higher grades than the fixed-minded students. The more difficult the material became, the harder they worked, motivating themselves and staying positive.
Mindset clearly can have a huge impact on learning and achievement.
Ability is also a factor. All children aren’t created equal — some have greater ability and become prodigies by building on their ability, seeking challenges and pursuing a love of learning. However, everyone has interests that can grow into abilities if nurtured. As noted previously, no one really knows anyone else’s potential. While abilities vary, your mindset determines where you go with them.
There are many examples of great academic achievement by children with few resources, who were thought to have dead-ended until a growth-minded teacher showed them that they could learn. For example, as recounted in the movie Stand and Deliver, teacher Jaime Escalante taught advanced calculus to inner-city Hispanic high school students in Los Angeles.
Other teachers had concluded they couldn’t learn, while Escalante asked himself how they could learn and how he could teach them. His students ultimately excelled and more of them took advanced placement tests than did students from elite science high schools. Escalante’s experience raises the question of how much is lost when we underestimate students’ potential.
Researcher Benjamin Bloom, who studied outstanding achievers, concluded that almost all people can learn under the right conditions, including support, commitment, and motivation.
A German research study showed that teachers with different mindsets get different results. Fixed-mindset teachers thought abilities were set in stone. They believed they knew their students’ intelligence and potential. In their classrooms, students ended the school year in the same ability group they started in.
In contrast, teachers with a growth mindset believed all students could improve. Their students all improved no matter which ability group they started in. As the year progressed, group differences disappeared.
Teaching from a fixed mindset hinders student achievement and puts teachers in the role of judging students, rather than of allies helping them to learn and succeed.
We often think of artistic ability as a gift, rather than something that can be learned like verbal or logical thinking skills. However, Betty Edwards, author of Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, showed that drawing ability can be developed. Her book showed before and after self-portraits drawn by students of her five-day course. The “after” portraits were much better. Edwards taught students to see such aspects as relationships, light and shadow, and spaces and to combine them into a whole.
Edwards’ work shows that while some people have a natural ability to do something without training, others can nonetheless do it with training, sometimes even better.
A commitment to working to improve your skills is also important, and can be the difference between a great artist and an average one. Choreographer and dancer Twyla Tharp argued in her book, The Creative Habit, that creativity comes from work and commitment. She didn’t believe in “natural” genius.
American artist Jackson Pollock exemplified Tharp’s premise. He had little innate artistic talent but became a great painter, transforming modern art. He excelled because of his single-minded dedication to art — he painted all the time and sought out mentors, from whom he learned basic techniques. He ultimately invented a technique of his own called “poured” painting, in which paint is first poured onto a canvas, then manipulated by the painter.
While labeling people negatively according to their perceived potential is often inaccurate and can hinder their development, positive labeling and praise can also be detrimental.
Parents and teachers typically try to build children’s self-confidence by praising their ability, but this can be harmful. Praising their ability sends the message that adults value ability and can determine a child’s ability from his or her performance. This is a fixed mindset. Here’s how it plays out.
Researchers gave early adolescent students ten problems to solve, then praised their performance in two different ways: some students were praised for their ability (“You must be smart at this”), while another group was praised for their effort (“It looks like you worked really hard”).
Praising students for their ability pushed them into a fixed mindset. When offered another difficult task that they could learn from, they rejected it, not wanting to show any cracks in their talent by failing. However, the students who were praised for effort (a growth-minded approach) wanted to take on the new challenge.
Researchers then gave all the students new problems, on which they didn’t do well. The children praised for ability began feeling like failures — they’d been told that their earlier success meant they were smart so now they felt stupid. Their performance steadily declined. In contrast, the students who were praised for effort tried harder and their performance continued to improve.
What’s more, when asked to write a report on the experience, almost 40 percent of the children praised for their ability lied about their performance. Telling children they were smart hurt their performance and turned them into liars.
A fixed mindset that stereotypes groups of people with negative labels undercuts their performance. For instance, this affects girls who are told they’re bad at math and science, and African Americans who are stereotyped as less intelligent.
A study showed that checking a box indicating your race or sex before taking a test can remind you of the stereotypes surrounding those labels and lower your score if you have a fixed mindset. In growth-minded students, the stereotype doesn’t affect performance. Further, the study showed that students perform equally when no stereotypes are invoked.
Researchers theorized that the stereotypes distracted and worried fixed-minded students, detracting from their ability to concentrate on the test. It also suggested a growth mindset can help students counteract negative labels when they encounter them.
Stereotypes also hinder people’s development by making them feel they don’t belong — in a certain college, program, course, or occupation. Many women and minorities drop out of environments where they feel they’re not fitting in, especially if they have a fixed mindset.
Besides dealing with stereotyping, many girls and women struggle with others’ opinions in general. The reason is that when girls are young, adults praise them for being cute or perfect, which teaches them to trust others’ opinions of whether they’re good or bad. They carry this trust into adulthood — even women at top universities say other people’s opinions are a good way to know their abilities.
Often, boys are less susceptible to others’ opinions because adults criticize and scold boys more than girls, and many boys are also accustomed to insulting and calling each other names (slob or idiot). Consequently, boys learn to shrug off the opinions of others.
The gender gap in math and science is no doubt widened by fixed mindsets as well as stereotyping. These fields need to be more friendly to women — and women would benefit from learning a growth mindset to overcome negative messages and labels about girls’ abilities to succeed in these fields.
When kids accomplish something, adults often praise them for their abilities in an effort to boost their confidence. However, research shows this kind of praise makes children reluctant to take on challenges because it reinforces the notion that abilities are fixed. Children are afraid that trying something and failing will call their abilities into question.
What were you praised for as a child? What were you criticized for?
What message did the above interactions send you about your abilities? What do you believe about your abilities today?
Is there something you’ve never tried because you doubted you have the ability? What could you learn if you went ahead and tried it?
If you have a child, what was the last accomplishment you praised him or her for? Did you praise for ability or for a process of effort, strategies, and perseverance? How did the child react?
The concept of being “a natural” comes from sports. It’s the belief that someone who’s effortlessly athletic — who displays talent — has all it takes to succeed. When looking for recruits, many scouts and coaches focus on talent alone: they look for naturals.
Golfers used to believe they shouldn’t train — physical training could hurt your natural swing — until Tiger Woods started winning with stringent workouts and practice routines. In some cultures, athletes who trained were derided — you were supposed to accept what nature had given you. But in sports, like academics and business, you can’t succeed indefinitely on talent alone. You need the right mindset: a growth mindset.
In the book Moneyball, author Michael Lewis tells the story of baseball player Billy Beane, who had great natural talent but lacked the mindset necessary to become a champion. His fixed mindset, with its belief in natural talent, held him back. When things went wrong, he fell apart because he couldn’t tolerate failure. He couldn’t address his problems because he felt that expending effort shouldn’t be necessary and, in fact, would be an admission of weakness.
While watching a less talented player, Lenny Dykstra, who was undeterred by failure, Beane realized that mindset was more important than natural ability. While he didn’t develop a growth mindset as a player, Beane did apply that mindset to recruiting when he became a major league executive. As general manager of the Oakland Athletics, he led the 2002 team to a near-record for consecutive wins with the second-lowest payroll in baseball. He focused on recruiting for mindset rather than talent.
In sports, many naturals don’t make it, while other athletes with deficiencies do. For instance, Pete Gray, with only one arm, made it to the major leagues; successful golfer Ben Hogan was an uncoordinated child; and the runner Glenn Cunningham’s legs were badly burned. The many obvious examples of failed naturals and successful, though flawed, athletes should have debunked the myth of talent, but it hasn’t.
Here are more examples of mindset trumping pure talent:
Naturals do exist in sports, but for some talented athletes with fixed mindsets, like Billy Beane and John McEnroe, talent can be a drawback. They become enamored with their superior ability and never stretch themselves or learn to work and handle failure. They don’t develop character, which is the ability to persevere despite challenges that grows from mindset.
An example is Pedro Martinez, a pitcher with the Boston Red Sox, who memorably demonstrated his lack of character by throwing a tantrum in game 3 of the American League playoffs against the New York Yankees in 2003. Martinez, who was the team’s hope, pitched well at first, then started falling behind and acting out because he couldn’t cope. He hit a batter with a ball, threatened the Yankees catcher, then knocked down the 72-year-old Yankees coach. The Yankees won the game and the playoff.
In contrast, here are two athletes who showed character in overcoming setbacks:
Some natural athletes — for instance, Mike Tyson, Darryl Strawberry, and Martina Hingis — make it to the top on talent, but they can’t stay there because while they have ability, they lack character, which stems from a growth mindset.
Following is a look at how champions embody the growth mindset, especially in the ways they view success and failure.
Researchers studied student athletes’ beliefs on athletic ability. Students’ with the growth mindset expressed views matching those of champion athletes. In other words they shared a champion’s mindset:
1) They define success as learning, improving, and doing their best. Jackie Joyner-Kersee said improvement was more important to her than winning. She wasn’t bothered by losing if she saw improvement and felt she’d done her best. She just went back to work. Tiger Woods and Mia Hamm loved to win, but the effort they’d made was more important to them. Basketball coach John Wooden said he enjoyed the games his team had prepared well for and played well as much as he enjoyed championship games. In contrast, athletes with a fixed mindset focused on winning to prove their superiority.
2) When they experience failures or setbacks, it motivates them. They learn from failures and treat them as a wake-up call. Michael Jordan wasn’t afraid of failures. He acknowledged them and practiced harder. In an advertisement, he noted that he’d missed over nine thousand shots, lost nearly three hundred games, and failed to make a game-winning shot 26 times. Conversely, athletes with fixed mindsets are humiliated by losses and setbacks.
3) They learn to take control of and manage all aspects of the game or sport. As Michael Jordan aged, he worked on conditioning and also worked to become a more well-rounded player, rather than relying on a few key shots. Tiger Woods worked on his swing at a young age, but he also learned about course strategy and keeping his mind focused and shutting out distractions. He managed his motivation by making practice fun. Athletes with a fixed mindset, like John McEnroe, don’t take control — they blame outside forces when they fail.
While fixed-mindset athletes put individual performance ahead of teamwork, those with a growth mindset understand the importance of teamwork. Michael Jordan noted that stars can win games but it takes teamwork to win championships.
One fixed-minded player who didn’t get this was Keshawn Johnson, who played football for the Jets. He argued that he was a team player, but an individual first. He claimed he couldn’t help his team if he weren’t the number one player carrying the ball. The Jets soon traded him and his career didn’t last much longer.
In fact, every sport, including individual sports, is a team effort. Everyone requires coaches, trainers, caddies, and support staff. The long-distance swimmer Diana Nyad needed large teams to help her try for open water swimming records. Her team included guides, divers, watercraft operators, NASA nutrition experts, and trainers. She had a team of 51 people helping her when she set her record of 102.5 miles.
The mindset of a company’s leader is a key determinant of whether a company fails or succeeds.
One of the most spectacular business failures in recent years was the collapse of the energy giant Enron in 2006. At the heart of Enron’s failure was a fixed mindset, an obsession with talent that blinded the company’s leadership to serious problems, and blinded investors and outsiders to the fact that the business was a house of cards destined to fall.
Business gurus of the time were insisting that corporate success required hiring with a “talent mindset.” It was touted as the key to beating the competition. Enron’s culture was built on this thinking. The company recruited big talent and paid handsomely for it. But because the company celebrated talent, employees felt they had to always appear highly talented in order to survive. Basically, everyone was forced into a fixed mindset, intent on proving their superiority.
Since people with fixed mindsets can’t admit flaws, the company couldn’t acknowledge and correct its mistakes, which spelled its doom. Even after its failure, CEO Jeff Skilling never admitted there was anything wrong, instead blaming others for not getting it.
In Jim Collins’ study of great companies in his book Good to Great, he found that the average companies that he included for comparison typically had CEOs with fixed mindsets. Fixed-mindset CEOs believed they were geniuses who didn’t need a strong executive team, just underlings to implement their ideas. These CEOs needed to be the big fish and to feel superior to everyone else.
They were concerned with looking superior and enhancing their reputations. Two-thirds had huge egos that held their company back or led to its failure.
Here’s a set of CEOs whose fixed mindsets caused them to sacrifice their companies for their egos.
Lee Iacocca was tapped to turn Chrysler around in the 1980s. He’d been fired by Henry Ford II, which left him angry and determined to prove himself through saving Chrysler. In his first few years, he made good hires, introduced new car models, and sought bailout loans. In his autobiography, he bragged that he was a hero.
However, Chrysler soon got into trouble again, while Iacocca focused on polishing his image. He spent money on things that would boost Chrysler’s stock to impress Wall Street instead of investing in new car designs and manufacturing efficiencies. He got rid of ambitious, intelligent people he felt threatened by.
Rather than responding to Japan’s innovative new cars with better ones, he made excuses and demanded the U.S. retaliate with tariffs. He spent lavishly on a corporate suite while morale in the company plummeted. The board finally grew fed up and got rid of him.
Albert Dunlap considered himself a superstar who saved dying companies, such as Scott Paper. He compared himself to Michael Jordan and Bruce Springsteen in star power. His fixed mindset developed in childhood when his family was poor and he felt the need to prove his worth. In his career, he used shareholder profits to do that. This short-term goal was his only measure of success. He had no interest in strengthening companies for the long term, only in boosting the stock enough to sell them for a profit.
After taking over Sunbeam in 1996, he fired 6,000 people and cut most stores. But in a sense, he was too successful — stock prices rose so much that the company was too expensive to sell. So he was stuck with running it. Instead of working hard and learning, he inflated revenue numbers, fired critics, and covered up the real numbers. In less than two years, the company failed and he was ousted.
What happens when two superstar CEOs with fixed mindsets combine their companies? Steve Case of AOL and Jerry Levin of Time Warner both felt superior, liked to intimidate, took others’ credit, refused to hear complaints, and fired critics. When they merged their companies, AOL was near ruin, but instead of working together to salvage it, they competed for power. Levin failed first and Case refused to work with the new CEO because he didn’t want to share power and credit — he’d rather let the company fail. When he finally was forced to resign, he denied responsibility for any problems. By the end of 2002, AOL Time Warner had lost nearly $100 billion in market value, the largest annual loss in U.S. history.
As noted, Iacocca, Dunlap, Lay/Skilling and Case/Levin put their personal interest in looking good above corporate interests at key points. Paradoxically, as their companies barrelled toward disaster, they felt invincible and entitled. As their companies faced real threats, they lived in an alternate reality.
For instance, while getting millions in compensation, Lay took huge personal loans from the company and used corporate jets as his personal family air service. Iacocca threw Christmas parties for the company elite, at which he presented himself with an expensive gift at company expense. In their worlds, they felt validated while their companies burned. Facing and addressing the problems would have entailed risks of failure they were unwilling to take.
Fixed-minded bosses also have a penchant for abusing employees. In his book, Brutal Bosses, Harvey Hornstein says that abusing others shores up a boss’s feelings of superiority, competence, and power. Skilling denigrated others, while those who worked with Levin compared him to Caligula. A former CEO of Sunbeam-Oster, Paul Kazarian, threw things at his executives. Fixed-mindset CEOs excuse this behavior by claiming to be perfectionists or wanting to keep people on their toes. Pleasing the boss becomes the employees’ priority.
In Good to Great, author Jim Collins examined what separated good companies from the best. He studied eleven companies over five years, whose stock had soared and who had stayed at the top of their industries for at least fifteen years. Each was compared with an average company in the same industry.
A key factor for success was that the leaders of great companies led with a growth mindset. They shared characteristics such as:
Alan Wurtzel, CEO of Circuit City, was an example of a growth-minded leader. He held debates in his boardroom. Rather than trying to impress his board members, he used them to learn. He constantly questioned everything in order to understand where the company needed to go. He considered himself a workhorse rather than a star. He was able to turn around a company that had been near bankruptcy.
In contrast to the fear and denial permeating companies with fixed-mindset leaders, the atmosphere in a company with a growth-oriented leader is positive and energized.
Growth-minded leaders believe in their own and others’ ability to learn and develop. Instead of using their company as a tool for self-promotion, they focus on growing the company and employees.
Here’s a look at three leaders who transformed their companies with a growth mindset.
Jack Welch took over as CEO of General Electric in 1980, and in twenty years its value increased from $14 billion to $490 billion. He was one of the most admired CEOs of the era, but unlike many superstars, he was self-effacing and made a point of listening and nurturing.
He often visited factories and assembly lines to listen to front-line employees. He emphasized teamwork. In his autobiography, he noted that he disliked using “I” when speaking because most of what he’d done in his life had been accomplished in working with others. He felt others made him look better and made the work enjoyable.
At several earlier points in his career, Welch had been arrogant or overly confident, which led to mistakes that he learned from. As a young engineer at GE, he caused a chemical explosion that blew off the roof. He expected a reprimand and punishment, but instead received support and understanding. This made him realize the importance of helping good employees overcome failures.
While in the running with several other candidates for CEO, he emphasized his ability to grow. When he got the job, he set up channels for feedback, asked questions about what needed changing, and discouraged elitism. He hired for mindset rather than talent and preached the importance of growth, mentoring, and teamwork over individual accomplishment.
After turning down the job several times, Lou Gerstner took over IBM in 1993 at the request of the board of directors, who realized the company was in trouble. To create a culture that fostered growth, he created communication channels, visited company operations and met with employees, de-emphasized hierarchy, and sought everyone’s input, including outside expertise.
To boost teamwork, he eliminated people who played politics, bad-mouthed others, or self-aggrandized. Instead, he rewarded people who helped others. One problem in the company was that deals were begun but not followed through, so he focused on execution. He also focused on customers’ needs by cutting prices and integrating systems.
His long-term focus didn’t impress Wall Street, though, and stock prices remained static. He persisted and by 2002, stock value had increased by 800 percent and IBM was the industry leader in hardware, enterprise software, and custom computer chips.
In 2002, when Anne Mulcahy took over as CEO, Xerox had $17 billion in debt, a terrible credit rating, and abysmal stock prices. The company was struggling to sell its copy machines and hadn’t diversified. Within three years, Mulcahy turned the company around.
She started in a personal growth mindset with the goal of learning every part of the business. For instance, she pored over the finances to understand how each decision would affect the bottom line. She found ways to get answers when executives couldn’t tell her where things stood, and she told employees the truth—that the company wasn’t viable. She cut payroll 30 percent, but took to heart the impact on employees and worried even more about the potentially greater impact the company’s failure would have on employees and retirees.
She focused on morale and employee development and rewarded people who went above and beyond for the good of the company. With short-term changes, the environment grew more positive. But these changes also positioned the company for success in the long run.
A drawback of a fixed mindset in CEOs and organizations is groupthink, a term popularized in the 1970s for situations where everyone thinks alike — no one disagrees, raises issues, or criticizes. It can lead to disastrous decisions.
Groupthink can develop when:
When making important decisions, it’s essential to be in a growth mindset because it fosters full discussion of both positives and negatives, resulting in better decisions.
When children who are praised for their talent and intelligence grow up and join the workforce, they can be challenging employees. They demand constant affirmation and can’t tolerate mistakes or critical feedback.
Some companies have responded by giving monthly or quarterly bonuses instead of yearly bonuses, and by providing an array of perks and morale-boosting events to make employees feel valued.
A better approach would be to maintain a growth-oriented work environment emphasizing that it’s everyone’s responsibility to learn and develop personally and to help grow the company. Managers also must teach the growth mindset to employees — for instance, by giving rewards for taking initiative rather than having the smartest idea, for overcoming an obstacle or setback, or for applying criticism and improving.
Companies spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to teach managers how to coach and motivate employees, but it has little impact. The reason may be that many managers don’t believe people can change. Studies show that they look for talent first and foremost, trust their first impressions, and make little effort to develop employees. Many don’t notice when employees do improve.
In contrast, growth-oriented managers view talent as a starting point to build on. They believe in developing themselves and their employees and notice improvement. Managers can be taught this mindset. Without a belief in development, training in feedback and boosting performance accomplishes little.
A company’s mindset has a strong effect on employee efficacy and morale. Researchers found that employees in growth cultures:
Fixed-mindset CEOs and organizations are prone to groupthink, in which everyone thinks alike — no one disagrees, raises issues, or criticizes. It can lead to disastrous decisions.
Can you recall an instance of groupthink in your company or organization? What was the result?
Why do you think dissenters failed to speak up? How could a diversity of views be encouraged in the future?
Does your organization have a fixed (“you either have it or you don’t”) or a growth mindset (“you can grow with effort and mentoring”)? How can you tell?
How does your organization’s mindset make you feel day-to-day at work?
Whether you have a fixed or growth mindset affects the course of your personal relationships. Mindset helps explain:
The road to satisfying relationships is marked with disappointments, mistakes, and most devastating of all, rejection. When they experience setbacks, some people are able to heal and move on to better relationships, while others remain stuck or scarred. The difference is mindset.
Researchers recruited 100 people to describe their experience of rejection. The study compared how those with fixed mindsets handled it versus those with growth mindsets:
As an example of a growth-oriented response to an extreme rejection, one woman described being stood up at the altar on her wedding day — the groom had taken off on their planned honeymoon trip to Tahiti by himself. She decided to go ahead with the reception and dinner anyway, with the support and fellowship of her guests. To cap the evening, she danced solo to the song, “I Will Survive.” The evening helped her start the healing process. A few years later, she married in the same wedding dress at the same church.
We’ll cover more examples of how fixed and growth minded people deal with relationship problems in the rest of this chapter.
Because having a fixed mindset means you believe traits are set in stone, you have several beliefs about your relationship:
If you have a growth mindset, you believe the opposite — that you, your partner, and your relationship can grow.
Of course, everyone wants to believe their relationship is unique and special. There’s nothing wrong with that — if you avoid the following pitfalls and myths of fixed-mindset thinking.
People with fixed mindsets believe that if two people are right for each other, their relationship should always be smooth sailing. Compatibility means everything should come naturally and you shouldn’t have to work on your relationship. If you have troubles, then the relationship wasn’t meant to be. (Relationship experts say this is one of the most harmful beliefs you can have in a relationship.)
In contrast, the growth-minded view is that they’ll work together to learn relationship skills, solve problems, and grow. Success comes from work and commitment, not magic.
People with fixed mindsets believe partners should be so in sync that they can read each other’s minds. Of course, this is impossible. You need to communicate, not try to read minds. It’s easy to misinterpret what the other person says or means.
For instance, when the author’s partner asked for more space, she thought he was talking about changing or ending the relationship. But he only wanted more room where they were sitting.
In addition to mind-reading, many fixed-mindset people believe two people in a relationship should have the same views about everything. A study showed how this works. Researchers asked couples to discuss their views of the relationship. People with fixed mindsets felt threatened and irritated when even tiny discrepancies in how they each saw the relationship came to light.
However, it’s impossible to share the same beliefs and assumptions about everything. It takes effort to communicate honestly and accurately, to understand each other’s views, and to resolve conflicts. You can live “happily ever after,” but it takes work.
Those with fixed mindsets see problems as a sign of a character flaw. When conflicts occur, they look for something to blame — often their partner’s personality. They can become angry and disgusted with their partner, an attitude they extend to the whole relationship. Since they believe traits are set in stone, the problem is unsolvable. Or, to avoid believing the relationship can’t be fixed, they may deny problems instead.
Some people keep dating one person after another because they’re trying to find the perfect person. For instance, one woman from the study, Penelope, dated a string of men but always broke up when she discovered what she considered to be a flaw, such as watching too much television. These flaws were small things that could have been addressed with tolerance or communication, but she preferred to move on because she believed there was someone out there who was already perfect.
Everyone has flaws or things that look like flaws to us. Problems are normal occurrences in relationships. Growth-minded people accept flaws — they believe a person or relationship can still be good without being perfect. They also believe people can grow.
For example, after a special prosecutor uncovered Bill Clinton’s relationship with an intern, which he had lied about to his wife, Hillary Clinton had to decide whether his lying was a fixed trait or whether he could improve with help and commitment. She believed he could change and they went to counseling one full day a week for a year.
In a fixed mindset where you have to keep proving yourself, it’s easy to get into a competition with your partner over who’s more talented or intelligent. Here’s an extreme example: Cynthia always felt competitive and had to outdo her partners in the areas most important to them. For instance, when she developed a relationship with an actor, she started writing successful plays. These actions chased the men away. She didn’t allow them to have their own identity. She said she was just showing interest in their interests, but in reality, she needed to equal or surpass them at everything.
In healthy relationships, partners are on the same side, not competing or battling constantly. They develop the skills to handle differences — both partners grow and the relationship grows. Each helps the other achieve and become the person they want to be.
For example, Laura encouraged Jack in his plans to start a business, and Jack encouraged Laura to pursue her dream of writing a children’s book. When they were first married, Laura was prone to yelling and being defensive, but Jack didn’t take it personally and helped her learn to handle things constructively. A relationship is an opportunity for two people to help each other grow.
Friendships are also relationships in which people can help each other grow and develop. A friend can give you the courage to take big steps. Friends validate each other (“You did the right thing”) and affirm each other’s positive qualities. Despite the danger of praising someone’s traits, everyone needs reassurance at times that they’re inherently OK.
However, a fixed mindset can interfere with a friendship if someone needs to prove themselves at another’s expense. Researchers studying adolescent boys found that when boys with a fixed mindset endorsed negative stereotypes about girls, their self-esteem rose. Thinking that girls were stupid made them feel superior. Another kind of fixed-mindset friend who could be harmful is someone who makes you feel bad about yourself; they build themselves up by establishing your inferiority.
Shyness can keep people from developing relationships. It affects people with fixed mindsets as well as those with growth mindsets, but shyness is a bigger problem for fixed-mindset people. They fear others’ judgment more. But research shows that moving to a growth mindset can help shy people handle anxiety-producing social situations better.
Researchers who watched shy people interact found that shy people with fixed mindsets had more difficulty with social interaction than shy people with growth mindsets did. Both had difficulty in the beginning of a conversation with a stranger, but after the first five minutes, shy growth-oriented people became more comfortable and enjoyed the interaction more. The reason is that the growth-oriented shy people viewed the interaction as a challenge. Although they felt anxious initially, they focused on the potential benefits of meeting someone new.
The lesson is that growth-minded shy people can take control of their shyness, despite being nervous. Shyness doesn’t stymie them the way it does people with fixed mindsets who are afraid of making mistakes.
People with fixed mindsets believe that if two people are right for each other, their relationship should always be smooth sailing. The growth-minded view is that it’s not magic — they’ll work together to learn relationship and problem-solving skills.
When you first started thinking about relationships, what was your view of how they should be? How did your view change as you got older?
Do you or your partner have any fixed-mindset views about your current relationship — for instance, that women aren’t good with money or that your partner should know what you want? When/how do those views come up? How do you handle them?
In what area could you help your relationship by focusing on growth-minded thinking?
Experiencing rejection is painful for an adult, but imagine how it feels to a child. Children experience rejection daily in schools. Starting in grade school, some kids are victimized, attacked, or ridiculed. Ongoing bullying makes some children’s lives a nightmare and can evolve into years of depression and anger.
Schools may be reluctant to act because they don’t see the bullying or it’s done by favorite students. Sometimes the authorities decide that the victims rather than the bullies are the problem. Nonetheless, as a society, we’re paying more attention to bullying today because of school shootings. The boys who shot classmates at Columbine High School in 1999 had been bullied for years. Bullying is suspected to have played a role in other mass shootings as well.
Bullying in school is about powerful kids judging vulnerable kids as less worthy or less valuable human beings. Once they identify victims, bullies torment them constantly. Judging and humiliating others gives bullies a rush, as well as social status and power: others may look up to them or at least fear them.
Bullies apply fixed-mindset thinking. They prove their superiority by singling out others as inferior because of some difference. Eric Harris, one of the Columbine shooters, was a typical victim. He had a chest deformity and was short, in addition to being a computer nerd and an outsider not from Colorado.
A fixed mindset not only drives bullies, it can also affect how victims of bullying respond. Many fixed-minded adults respond to rejection with thoughts of revenge and violence. Kids who are constantly bullied may be even more susceptible to revenge fantasies.
Researchers gave eighth graders a scenario about bullying and asked them to imagine it was happening to them. When asked to write down how they’d feel and react if they were taunted on a daily basis, students with a fixed mindset said they’d feel judged (“I would think I was weird or a nobody”). They also wanted to strike back — to hit the bullies or run over them. They strongly agreed with the statement, “My number one goal would be to get revenge.”
Students with a growth mindset were less likely to feel judged or labeled as less worthy by bullying. They saw it as the bully’s problem — a way for them to feel better. They wanted to confront or question the bully about why they needed to hurt others. The growth-oriented students wanted to forgive and reform the bully.
If a bullying victim doesn’t have a fixed mindset, ongoing bullying can push them into one. A victim may begin to believe they’re inferior and deserve the bullying, especially if no one else stands up for them. Victimization can lead to depression, suicide, and sometimes even violence.
Brooks Brown, who was a classmate of the Columbine shooters, was also bullied but came to adopt a growth mindset. He believed people had the potential to change, and even reached out at one point to Eric Harris after the two had had a serious run-in in school. As an adult, Brown is now an anti-bullying advocate. He believes school shooters aren’t monsters but people much like everyone else, who need help.
Schools can stop bullying by promoting a growth-mindset culture. Most schools have fixed-mindset cultures — the authorities often believe in fixed traits, that some children are superior while certain others will never fit in. In contrast, some schools have greatly reduced bullying by fostering an atmosphere of self-development and cooperation rather than judgment.
Therapist and consultant Stan Davis has developed an anti-bullying program that does three things: 1) It reforms bullies, 2) supports victims, and 3) encourages students to help victims. Here’s an instance in which it worked. Darla, an awkward, overweight third grader was hit and taunted by classmates. But several years after Davis’s program was instituted, the bullying had stopped. Darla had supporters, including some who’d originally bullied her. When she moved on to middle school, classmates from her elementary school helped her make friends and protected her from harassment. The anti-bullying program works by establishing consistent discipline, helping but not judging bullies, and praising efforts and progress toward improving the atmosphere.
As a society, we no longer accept attacks on minorities, women, and those with disabilities as normal. Yet many school cultures accept the abuse of some children by more powerful or privileged children. This not only fails the victims, it fails the bullies by not believing they’re capable of meeting a high standard of behavior and helping them achieve it.
Parents want to help their kids to succeed in school and life, yet their comments, actions and attempts to be helpful often send the wrong message.
Words and actions from adults tell young children, students, and athletes what to think about themselves. They can convey a fixed-mindset message that children’s traits are permanent and they’ll be judged for them. Or they can convey a growth-oriented message that children (and all people) are continually developing and adults are committed to helping them in this process.
Children are extremely sensitive to these messages. They’re concerned about how they’re being tested/judged and what will happen if they fall short.
Children with fixed mindsets hear judgment from their parents — it feels as though their abilities are always being measured.
To understand children’s thinking, researchers asked them several questions. Here are the responses from both the fixed-minded and growth-oriented kids.
Question #1: Imagine that your parents are happy when you get a good grade. Why would they be happy?
Question #2: Imagine that your parents talked with you about your performance when you did poorly. Why would they do this?
Question #3: Imagine your parents were upset when you didn’t share. Why would they feel this way?
Normal kids often misbehave (actually, every three minutes) — it can be an opportunity either to judge them as having failed or to help them grow.
Children pick up these lessons from an early age, even as toddlers. They learn either that mistakes merit judgment and punishment or they can bring suggestions and help for how to do better. Teaching rather than judging is what helps children learn.
Children are eager to pass on things they’ve learned. This includes messages from either mindset.
For example, researchers asked children what advice they’d give to a child who was having trouble with math. Children with a growth mindset said they would advise the child to read the problem again, think harder, or maybe ask the teacher for help. Children with fixed mindsets had no help to offer since they viewed ability as a fixed trait. For instance, one child just said, “I’m sorry.”
When children do something well, most parents want to encourage them or build their confidence, but often they’re not helping the way they think they are. Here’s how many parents respond — and what their kids hear:
These examples show that praising children’s intelligence hurts their motivation and performance. Children getting fixed-mindset praise develop resistance to difficult challenges that might show they’re not so smart or talented. If they try and fail, they further lose motivation and confidence. They believe the message that their performance — success or failure — reflects who they are: If success means they’re smart, failure means they’re dumb.
The best way for parents to help their children build confidence is to teach them to welcome challenges, to want to understand mistakes, to enjoy effort, and to continually look for and try new learning strategies.
The research findings on the de-motivating effects of praise don’t mean praising children is bad and we shouldn’t do it. Children love praise and need adult approval. The key is to avoid praise that judges their intelligence or ability, which implies you’re proud of them for an inherent trait rather than for their effort and improvement.
Applying a growth mindset, praise them for what they’ve achieved through good study strategies, practice, and persistence. Show interest in how they succeeded or improved, in their efforts and choices. For instance, you might comment, “You really studied hard and it paid off. I can see how much you improved. Outlining the important points was a good strategy.” Or, “It’s great that you kept trying different ways of solving that math problem until you got it.”
For a student who worked hard and didn’t do so well, a helpful response would be: “Everyone learns differently. Let’s try to find a way that works for you.” (This approach is especially helpful for children with learning disabilities.) Or, “I like your effort. Let’s work on it some more and figure out where you’re having trouble.”
For a student who did something quickly without mistakes, avoid praising speed and perfection, which will get in the way of tackling challenges. It would be more constructive to say something like, “You finished that assignment so quickly that it must have been too easy. Let’s try something else that you can really learn from.”
Sometimes parents use growth-oriented language with their children, but then undercut it by expressing judgments (fixed-mindset statements) about other people, which the kids overhear. For instance, they might remark, “Some have it and some don’t” or “What a lame-brain.” When children hear things like this, they wonder whether those judgments apply to them too. Remember, they’re always listening.
Teachers also can easily fall into the trap of praising children in ways that kill motivation. For example, praising great mathematicians as geniuses is a subtle reference to a fixed mindset. It would be better to describe mathematicians as people who developed a passion for math, worked at it, and made big discoveries.
When children are preparing to take a challenging test, it’s natural for parents to want to reassure them by saying something like, “You can do this — you know you’re smart.” This usually has the opposite effect of raising the stakes and making them even more afraid of failing. Instead, sympathize with the pressure they feel for potentially being judged. Reassure that you’re not judging them —you care about their learning, and are proud that they’ve worked hard and continued to improve.
Society tells parents that the way to boost children’s self-esteem is to protect them from failure — for instance, by minimizing a loss or blaming the coach or teacher. This might make children feel better temporarily, but it’s harmful in the long run because they don’t learn to handle life’s inevitable setbacks. They react poorly to feedback, saying it undermines their confidence, and want only to hear about how talented they are.
Growth-minded parents take an interest in their child’s failure, seeing it as an opportunity to learn. They don’t get upset or concerned about the child’s ability, or whitewash the failure.
Imagine how you might respond when your nine-year-old daughter, a budding gymnast, performs reasonably well at her first gymnastics meet but doesn’t win a ribbon. She’s crushed because she was confident she’d win. Here are typical, but fixed-mindset, ways to console her:
Here’s how a growth-minded father actually responded in the above scenario. He told her he understands how disappointing it is when you have high hopes and do your best but don’t win. However, he also pointed out that she hadn’t really earned a win yet, since she was just starting in gymnastics and had a lot to learn. Other girls on the team had worked harder and longer. She’d have to do the same if she really wanted to excel. He told her that doing a sport just for fun is fine too, but excelling requires a higher level of commitment. With this feedback, the girl worked harder, especially on weaknesses, and won five ribbons and was overall champion at a bigger competition.
Everyone thinks the criticism they give their children is constructive. But while they intend it to be helpful, often it isn’t. To be constructive, criticism must help a child fix something or do something better. Most often, what they hear from parents isn’t constructive — it’s judgmental.
For example, when a child does incomplete or sloppy work, a frustrated parent might say, “You mean this is all you can do? Are you stupid or lazy?”
Instead, constructive or growth-oriented criticism would sound like, “It upsets me when you don’t finish an assignment. When can you finish this?” Or, “This looks like an assignment that requires a lot of concentration and effort. Let’s talk about how you apply concentration skills.”
When parents judge and punish children, they’re usually trying to teach them something — but children may learn an unintended lesson. For instance, when parents punish a child for doing something wrong (making a bad decision), they’re teaching the child not to go against the parents’ rules and wishes. Instead, what they should be teaching is how to think through a situation and make a better decision next time. Growth-oriented parents set high standards and teach children how to meet them rather than judging and punishing them for falling short.
It’s natural for parents to have high aspirations for their children, but sometimes parents allow their desires to take precedence over what’s best for the child or what the child wants.
For example, Mark was exceptional in math and wanted to go to Stuyvesant High School for its advanced math curriculum. But his parents made him go to a different school because they’d heard that it would be hard for him to get into Harvard from Stuyvesant. They didn’t care about his interests, only about theirs. They wanted him to succeed, but on their terms. Their message was, “We’ll love you only if you go to Harvard.”
Many children pick up this type of message. Researchers studied children age six to college-age and found that those with fixed mindsets believed they had to fulfill their parents’ expectations in order to be loved and respected.
John McEnroe’s father put tremendous pressure on him to excel at tennis when he discovered the boy was good at it. As a result of the pressure, McEnroe didn’t enjoy playing tennis. He liked being at the top for the money and fame, but he never liked the sport.
In contrast, Tiger Woods’ father, although ambitious, fostered his son’s love of golf and raised him to focus on growth and learning. He once said he’d have been happy if his son had chosen another occupation, such as being a plumber, as long as he applied himself.
When parents force fixed-mindset ideals and aspirations on their children, they eliminate any room for failures or for their child’s individuality. However, when they adopt a growth mindset and encourage their children’s development of interests or passions, neither will be disappointed.
Along with growth-oriented parents, children need growth-minded teachers and coaches to help them learn to develop and succeed. Famous teachers Marva Collins and Rafe Esquith taught from a growth mindset. They believed in the growth of ability and intellect, and they loved both learning and fostering development and learning in their students. They created a nurturing environment in which they emphasized standards and hard work.
Marva Collins taught Chicago children who had reached a dead end. For instance, one boy had attended thirteen schools in four years and another had been kicked out of a mental health center. On her first day, Collins told the students: ‘Welcome to success. But success is not coming to you, you must come to it.”
Her students worked all day with only a short lunch break. They wrote every day and, as their skills grew, they tackled increasingly difficult material. When 60 Minutes did a program on the school, the children expressed pride in working hard. One student told reporter Mike Wallace that he liked the hard work “because it makes your brain bigger.”
Similarly, Rafe Esquith taught Los Angeles second graders form high-crime areas. Many had family members with drug, alcohol, and emotional problems, so the children didn’t get much support at home. To emphasize the value of effort, Esquith regularly reminded them of how much they’d learned and how difficult concepts had gotten easier with practice. He told them he wasn’t any smarter than they were, but knew more because he worked at learning. His motto was, “There are no shortcuts.”
Collins set extremely high standards.
For instance, three- and four-year-olds used a vocabulary book for high school students; seven-year-olds read The Wall Street Journal. However, she also created an atmosphere of love and concern. She also told the children she would love them even when they didn’t love themselves.
A caring, nonjudgmental learning environment is important for performance. Researchers who studied 102 high-achieving musicians, artists, athletes, and mathematicians found that their first teachers were warm, accepting, and committed to teaching them.
Like Collins, Esquith maintained an atmosphere of affection and personal commitment to his students, while setting high standards. He decried what he viewed as slipping standards in many schools, noting that educators don’t help children when they gloss over deficiencies — they consign them to continued failure and a lifetime of low-wage jobs. His fifth grade reading assignments included: Of Mice and Men, Native Son, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, A Separate Peace, and To Kill a Mockingbird. He required his sixth graders to pass an algebra final that eighth and ninth graders in most schools would struggle with.
Besides setting high standards, growth-minded teachers show students how to meet them. Collins didn’t just tell her students to read Shakespeare’s MacBeth. She and her students read and talked about each line together. Esquith spent considerable time planning passages for each student to read in class, so that a shy child would succeed and a more advanced student would be challenged. He met with students before and after school and even on vacation. His goal was for students to be able to learn and think on their own.
Coaches are teachers too, but their students’ failures and successes are more public. The mindset they bring to the job can have an enormous impact on student athletes’ success on the field and in life.
Contrast two famous college basketball coaches: Bobby Knight, a fixed-mindset coach; and John Wooden a growth-minded coach.
Indiana college basketball coach Bobby Knight had a fixed mindset and could be extremely harsh. He took every defeat personally, feeling that it made him a failure and ruined his identity as a superior coach. He demanded perfect games. He couldn’t tolerate mistakes and was legendary for blowing up on the court.
Knight was so obsessed with winning that he humiliated players who contributed to losses. For instance, when the team lost, he prohibited those who’d played poorly from traveling home with the rest of the team. Instead of improving under his guidance, some players succumbed to his humiliations and lost their love for the sport. He motivated players through fear. He claimed to be trying to toughen them up, but he was using them to validate his greatness.
Some players escaped by transferring to other schools or going early to the pros. Even his best player, Isaiah Thomas, was ambivalent. He said there were times he wanted to hug Knight and times he’d have shot him if he’d had a gun.
UCLA basketball coach John Wooden, winner of 10 NCAA championships, was Knight’s polar opposite in coaching style and philosophy. His strategy was constant training in basic skills, conditioning, and adopting a new mindset. As a growth-oriented coach, he demanded that each player commit himself to improving a little each day, which would add up to great improvement over time. While Knight’s goal was a perfect game, Wooden’s was that each player be fully prepared and give full effort. He didn’t accept laziness or coasting and would end practice if players weren’t trying hard. His philosophy was that when you do your best, you might be outscored, but you won’t lose.
Wooden wasn’t the best when it came to strategy, but he excelled at understanding and motivating his players. For him, helping them fulfill their potential, not just in basketball but in life, was more rewarding than winning games. Years later, players expressed appreciation for the values he taught, which they applied throughout their lives. None of them had thought about shooting him.
Some parents, coaches, and teachers who want to do the right things for children nonetheless misunderstand or misapply the growth mindset. It’s deceptively simple — a growth mindset means believing people can develop their abilities. This chapter looks at some misconceptions and explains how to start developing a growth mindset and pass it on to children.
Misconception #1: Having a growth mindset means being open-minded. People who are flexible and open-minded often think they have a growth mindset. They sometimes call it an open mindset. But being open-minded is different than being committed to developing your own and other people’s abilities, which is hard work rather than simply a commendable attitude.
Misconception #2: A growth mindset is only about effort, especially praising effort. It’s much broader than that. Effort is important but it’s part of a process of growth that also includes effective learning strategies, focus, perseverance, and asking for help when you need it. Progress and learning come from the whole process, not just effort or one of the other components.
There are several pitfalls to praising effort alone, rather than the development process:
Misconception #3: The growth mindset means praising the process. You should praise the process, but also connect it to the outcome — what children have learned, progress they’ve made, or specific achievements. The message to children needs to be that the process enabled them to achieve their goals.
Misconception #4: A growth mindset means telling children they’re capable of doing anything. This doesn’t help kids grow. It puts the responsibility for learning entirely on them. The way to help children grow is by showing them how to develop the skills to move toward their goals.
Beware of overpraising. Also, don’t criticize children for having a fixed mindset. It’s your responsibility to teach a growth mindset and help children develop.
Grow Your Mindset: Tips
When parents or teachers criticize children, they intend it to be helpful, but often it isn’t because they’re being judgmental, not constructive. To be constructive, criticism must help a child fix something or do something better.
Think of a time recently when your child made a mistake. How did you react? What did you say? (If you don’t have a child, think of someone you give feedback to, like a team member or a friend.)
How did the child react to your feedback? Was it the reaction you wanted?
How did your criticism help the child to do better next time? How could you have restated it to make it more helpful?
Your mind is constantly monitoring and interpreting what’s happening around you. Your mindset guides how you interpret things.
A fixed mindset sets up a mental monologue focused on judging — you feel judged and you judge others. For instance, you might think, “This means I’m a failure,” “What a bunch of losers,” “I’ll never be good at handling money.”
Growth-oriented people don’t constantly judge themselves and others this way. Like people with fixed mindsets, they keep a running mental account of events and feelings, but their interpretations of what’s going on focus on learning and action. They think, “This situation is painful, but what can I learn to avoid repeating it?” and “How can I improve?”
This chapter is about changing from a judging monologue to a growth-oriented one — a mindset based on a belief in change and development. Often, just learning about the two mindsets and how they affect you can prompt change. However, completely changing is hard. The fixed mindset hangs around, competing with the growth-oriented ways of thinking that you’re trying to adopt.
Your fixed mindset beliefs about being smart, ambitious, superior, and super-competent may be your source of self-esteem, which makes them difficult to give up for more challenging ideas about developing yourself through effort, taking on challenges, making mistakes, and learning through constructive criticism.
You may temporarily feel that you’re losing your sense of who you are. But the growth mindset frees you from constantly judging yourself so you can be authentic and explore your full potential.
People can have a mix of the two mindsets, or they can apply a fixed mindset in certain situations and a growth mindset in others.
It’s important to do some self-analysis and discover what puts you into a fixed mindset — it could be an event or situation, such as a disappointment, setback, or fear that makes you believe you’re incapable or someone else is incapable of something. Everyone has a fixed mindset persona that reminds us of past failures and problems. The key is learning to keep that persona from preventing us or our children from growing.
Changing your thinking patterns takes practice. To help you learn new approaches to problems, here’s a series of scenarios in which potential fixed-mindset responses are compared with growth-oriented responses.
Imagine you applied to just one graduate school — the one you preferred above all others — and you were confident you’d be accepted. But you were rejected. In a fixed mindset, you start by rationalizing: The process was extremely competitive; they probably had more top applicants than they could accept. This evolves into: I’m mediocre; I’m not worthy of being accepted.
Choosing growth: In a growth mindset, focus on your goal of graduate school study and how you can remain on track. What concrete steps can you take, such as researching and applying to other schools? What can you learn from the rejection about improving your application? In the real-life version of this scenario, the applicant called the school that rejected her to get information on how to improve. The admissions officer was impressed and decided to accept her application after all.
Tip: People often come up with plans in response to a problem but don’t follow through. You vow to do it tomorrow, but that rarely happens. To succeed, you need to make a concrete, growth-oriented plan with specific implementation steps for when you’ll do what — for instance, tomorrow during my break, I’ll get coffee, close my office door, and call X, following this script. Visualize yourself going through the steps. Then take action, regardless of how you feel.
Imagine you’re a promising quarterback and are the top draft pick of the Philadelphia Eagles. While this is what you’ve dreamed of, you’re seized with performance anxiety. What if you can’t live up to everyone’s expectations — yours, the team’s, the media’s, your friends’ and colleagues’? You’re so anxious that you lose focus and perform poorly. In a fixed mindset, you feel like a failure. You keep to yourself, avoiding teammates and the media. You disappear after each game.
Choosing growth: Remind yourself that playing in the pros is a totally new experience requiring a big adjustment. You have a lot to learn, which you couldn’t be expected to know at the outset. Ask yourself how you can find out what you need to know. You spend time with veteran players, asking questions and reviewing tapes. You talk about your adjustment process and they empathize and give you advice for adjusting mentally and physically. You begin feeling like you’re part of an organization committed to your development.
Imagine starting start a new job at the bottom rung of the ladder. You feel the work is demeaning but your boss thinks you have a bad attitude and passes over you for promotion or additional responsibility. Your fixed-minded reaction is that she’s threatened by you. Your talents are obvious and should be rewarded, and you’re entitled to what you want. It’s the organization that needs to change, not you.
Choosing growth: Instead of fixating on your superiority, you look for cues on how the company works and how others get ahead. You realize that many CEOs had to start at the bottom too. You notice that effort counts, so you begin working harder. But just working hard doesn’t guarantee success, so you also focus on learning, building relationships, and helping colleagues grow.
You think everything is perfect: You have a great career, marriage, and kids. But you’re missing some signs of trouble in your marriage. Your partner wants more communication and intimacy, but you’re in denial that anything needs to change. As a result, your partner begins pulling away from you emotionally. When you finally wake up to what’s going on, your fixed-minded reaction is to feel worthless because the person closest to you doesn’t want you anymore.
Choosing growth: You start rethinking your marriage and yourself. Your marriage didn’t suddenly fail — it was evolving until you stopped nurturing it. You realize that you took your partner’s request for a deeper relationship as criticism. You can learn to be less judgmental and develop relationship skills. If you can’t save your current relationship, you can move on without feeling bitter and build better future relationships.
Your daughter is at the top of her class and studying the flute. You’re proud of her and sure that she’ll excel. But she begins feeling ill with an upset stomach before school each day and is diagnosed with an ulcer. A counselor tells you she is feeling too pressured and you need to ease up on her and make sure she gets more sleep.
Choosing growth: You need to work out a concrete plan you can all follow. You think about how you can help her develop a growth mindset so she can ease up and enjoy life. You put the flute lessons on hold. You allow her to practice when she wants to, but only for fun. She gets a tutor to teach her how to study to learn. And everyone talks to her about progress and learning, not grades.
When your family violates one of your rules (take out the garbage each week), you feel personally betrayed and start criticizing. You progress to insults, then rage. Your targets flee. Your fixed-minded reaction is to feel at first that you were right to be angry. Then you realize you went too far and feel guilty. You pledge not to slip again. But you don’t create any strategies, and it happens again.
Choosing growth: Your first step is to explore why you get so worked up. It seems to happen when you feel disrespected, as though your wishes are trivial. The next time you feel slighted, you plan to calmly tell your family how you feel. You plan to leave the room when you feel you’re losing control, write down your thoughts, and reinterpret what’s happening. Maybe you can ease up on some of your rules, and stop using them as a test for others’ respect for you.
Tip: Willpower isn’t enough to sustain a major change. You need to develop workable strategies and practice them. For instance, to make a diet work, you can plan things like keeping desserts out of the house. You can think in advance what to order at a restaurant. You can develop an exercise plan. The inevitable setbacks are an opportunity to learn.
Achieving a growth mindset is a journey. You don’t get there all at once — you have to take one step at a time. Here are the beginning steps.
1) Accept having a fixed mindset. Even when you’re on a path to growth, you have lingering fixed-mindset beliefs. In fact, everyone has a mix of fixed and growth-oriented beliefs. You can accept this reality without accepting the negatives a fixed mindset causes.
2) Learn what prompts your fixed mindset. When is your fixed-mindset persona likely to materialize? Possibilities include: when you take on a challenge, when you face obstacles or fail at something, or when a friend or colleague achieves something you envy.
3) Name your fixed-mindset persona. This can help you identify when you’re acting with a fixed mindset and remind you that’s not who you want to be. Pay attention to what happens with this persona is triggered.
4) Confront your fixed mindset: When your fixed mindset materializes, have an imaginary conversation with it. For instance, if you’re about to take on a new challenge, your fixed-mindset way of thinking may prompt you to worry about failure and want to quit. However, you can be ready to counter these beliefs when they come up by reminding yourself that risk is inherent in growth and failures are opportunities to learn.
Since everyone has a fixed-mindset persona, we should have empathy for others who struggle with the limitations of perfectionism, a sense of failure, or a need to always feel superior. Everyone is on a journey. You can learn to recognize and replace fixed-mindset thinking with a belief in your ability to grow and in others’ ability to change too.
Here’s a summary of the two mindsets. Review it daily to remind yourself of the differences and stay in a growth mindset. Ask yourself what opportunities you have today for growth and how you’ll embrace them.