The power of a growth vs. fixed mindset

Recently, I read an article about how Stripe will open up its payment processing solutions to quite literally every business, among many other user-centric enhancements, such as AI-powered features to combat fraud. They’re essentially saying, even if your business is processing payments with a rival company, we’ll still offer you our suite of financial solutions. And while Stripe’s online payment processing services are inherently innovative, this announcement signifies a shift in strategy that shows they’re actively listening to customers.

Stripe’s approach perfectly exemplifies an organization adopting a growth mindset. Rather than being satisfied with meeting “enough” of their market’s needs with current approaches, they encouraged curious minds to think and act creatively to make online financial solutions more accessible to more businesses, based on those businesses’ individual needs.

The many positive effects of adopting a growth (vs maintaining a fixed) mindset were popularized over the past decade, thanks to psychologist Carol Dweck’s bestselling book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. If you’re unfamiliar with her work, this 10-minute TED Talk succinctly captures the power of believing you can improve.

This concept is about continuously learning, seeing the opportunity in a setback, supporting new ideas and challenging “status quo” beliefs. ?Those approaches foster resilience, transformation and innovation – both at the individual and organizational level.

If you’ve worked with me, you’ve likely heard me encourage my team not to overthink it and, instead, test our idea in a pilot and “fail fast.” The idea of failing fast isn’t necessarily about failing – it’s about learning what worked and what did not, so we can improve going forward.

That notion is easy to understand in theory, but it can be hard to put into practice. Why? Because you have to be aware of where you went wrong, willing to accept that you didn’t get everything right and then take targeted action. It also requires a fair amount of risk tolerance. People often get stuck defending the choices they made – why it should have worked, instead of poking holes in the plan and then adapting it.

Innovation also requires situational awareness – the ability to seek examples in other places that can be applied to your challenge. As demonstrated by Stripe, innovation is not defined by re-inventing the wheel. Instead, innovation is about finding new uses for the wheel or looking for a new solution to an existing problem. No “invention” needed.

By unbundling their services, their team will gain knowledge from testing this new, more inclusive concept. And there’s no doubt that knowledge will help shape what’s next in the FinTech world.

How are you encouraging a growth mindset at your organization?

#growthmindset #fixedmindset #continuousimprovement #innovation