Measure success by the amount of progress made and distance traveled against odds, rather than initial abilities or final performance, to avoid premature discouragement and realize hidden potential.
Invest in learning and honing character skills like dependability, determination, discipline, proactivity, and pro-social tendencies, as they are learnable in adulthood and more influential than cognitive skills for achieving goals and improving relationships.
If you doubt yourself but others believe in you, consider that your self-doubt might be a biased internal view, and their objective belief in your capacity for growth may be more accurate.
Do not wait until you feel completely ready to pursue a goal or take a leap, as the act of taking the leap itself is often what builds readiness and confidence.
Focus on building three key character skills: being a discomfort seeker (embracing challenges), a sponge (absorbing and filtering advice), and an imperfectionist (knowing when ‘good enough’ is sufficient).
Intentionally put yourself in uncomfortable situations, even those where you might fail or be judged negatively, to stretch yourself, overcome weaknesses, and accelerate personal growth.
Actively wrestle with ideas that make you uncomfortable or that you find abhorrent, as this process is crucial for improving critical thinking skills and refining your own assumptions and views.
Avoid exclusively relying on your preferred learning style; instead, mix up your modalities (e.g., reading physical books if you’re an audiobook person) to stretch your mind, concentrate more, and absorb information better.
Cultivate the skill of knowing when to strive for excellence and when ‘good enough’ is sufficient, avoiding rumination on minor imperfections to prevent tunnel vision and allow for broader improvement.
For significant creative projects, establish a target quality rating (e.g., 9/10) and ask a few trusted individuals for an honest 0-10 rating, which helps calibrate whether major or minor changes are needed and when the work is ready.
When seeking input, ask for ‘advice’ rather than ‘feedback’ to receive more constructive, targeted suggestions about what you can change next time, focusing on actionable steps to move forward.
To filter out noise and identify true areas for improvement, ask several people (e.g., five to seven) independently for their advice, then focus your energy on the common suggestions that emerge across multiple sources.
View coaching and mentorship as temporary scaffolding: seek specific, short-term support to overcome an obstacle or learn a skill, then internalize the learning and move on without permanent reliance.
When seeking a guide or mentor, prioritize individuals who are one or two steps ahead of you, as they can offer more relatable and actionable advice than top experts, and also seek those who genuinely love teaching and sharing knowledge patiently.
Actively use online platforms like YouTube, Khan Academy, or Wikipedia as personal scaffolding to learn and develop new skills, especially when access to traditional coaching, training, or opportunities is limited.
To identify hidden potential in others, shift focus from raw talent or initial abilities to their trajectory of progress and how much they have improved over time.
Incorporate ‘do-overs’ or practice opportunities into job interviews, such as giving candidates a chance to redo a challenge or prepare pitches in advance, to assess their motivation and capacity for learning and improvement.
When interviewing or evaluating others, reframe your goal from simply hiring or judging to actively identifying where a person’s hidden potential lies, even if they’re not a match for the current role.
Before or during an interview, ask candidates to share their passions, skills they’ve developed, or strengths they want to showcase, providing a more comprehensive view of their potential beyond job-specific requirements.
Combat the tendency to make quick judgments based on cognitive shortcuts, bias, or credentialism by intentionally cultivating patience in forming conclusions about people’s potential.
If you fail at one specific endeavor, calibrate your efforts and pivot to a related area where you have potential to grow, rather than overgeneralizing and giving up on an entire domain.
When seeking discomfort for anxiety, consider an incremental approach (systematic desensitization) for extreme physiological responses or disorders, but for normal anxiety, a ‘flooding’ approach might accelerate the process.
Recognize that teaching a growth mindset is especially impactful for underprivileged students, but it must be coupled with teachers who also believe in their potential and school systems that provide the necessary resources and opportunity structures for actual growth.
Visit adamgrant.net to take the ‘hidden potential quiz’ to assess your current character skills (discomfort seeking, sponge, imperfectionist) and identify areas you might want to develop further.
Download the 10% with Dan Harris app for a 14-day trial to access guided meditations for stress, anxiety, sleep, focus, self-compassion, and more, plus weekly live Zoom sessions and ad-free podcast episodes.