Why We All Need to Think Again

I had a ‘pinch-me moment’ last week and the HUGE pleasure of hosting a roundtable for a small number of our customers with the acclaimed organisational psychologist and New York Times bestseller Adam Grant. I’m a long-time fan of Adam’s, having listened to his podcasts and watched his Ted Talks (his latest one 'What frogs in hot water can teach us about Thinking Again') And he’s just released his latest book Think Again which, in Bill & Melinda Gates words “is a must-read... In an increasingly divided world, the lessons in this book are more important than ever.”

Languishing

Adam is the sort of person you could talk and listen to for hours, with his depth of understanding of people and how to optimise the right culture and environment for organisations to succeed. Discussing his recent article published in The New York Times last week, he managed to perfectly put into words that ‘meh’ feeling that we’ve all experienced over the course of the past 12 months. It’s called languishing; “the neglected middle child of mental health” with burnout at one end of the scale and ‘flourishing’ (the peak of well-being) at the other. Feeling “somewhat joyless and aimless”. Recognising it is the first step, and as leaders within our organisations we discussed how we can help our people overcome this.

As leaders, it means opening up the conversation as well as being open with our teams that this is something that we feel/have felt too. Failing to talk about it can lead to emptiness and stagnation and impact overall productivity. And to combat this, Adam talked about getting to that place when we’re ‘in the flow’ which, is when we’re really into the depths of a piece of work, all distractions are turned off (phone notifications/email/Slack). The more flow we can maintain, the less languishing builds-up. And changing-up our environment (getting out/doing a walking meeting/standing as opposed to sitting at our desks as we’re 34% more productive if we’re standing!) are all steps that can help with this.

Don’t let your ideas become your identity

In the book, Adam talks about a number of personas that we tend to emulate, when challenged on our beliefs; The Preacher (treat their view as ‘gospel’), The Prosecutor (focused on proving the other side wrong), The Politician (allow views to be swayed by popularity other than accuracy) and The Scientist (base their opinion on evidence). And it’s The Scientist that Adam urges us to try and think like in terms of using data to help inform our decisions as well as update our views based on new data.

“We’re swift to recognise when other people need to think again... when it comes to our own knowledge and opinions, we often favour feeling right over being right” Adam Grant, Think Again

And when reverting to any of the other three places (sometimes the most comfortable place for us to be if that's how we've always operated), we need to ensure that an idea or belief that we’ve held onto or a goal that we’ve set doesn’t morph into who we are. This is known as identity foreclosure - where we’ve invested either a considerable amount of time or money on an endeavour, that we don’t want to admit that we might have made the wrong decision in embarking on it in the first place. Certainly a place probably all recognise as having been at some point in our lives/careers.

But how do we admit that we were wrong in a culture where grit to achieve a goal is revered? Where confidence and conviction is often valued over competence? It’s about getting into the habit of trying to look at things in a different way or inviting different points of view. Or at times, as Adam says in his Ted Talk: “sometimes the best kind of grit is gritting your teeth and packing your bags”

The faster you can admit that you’re wrong, the faster you can get it right

The ability to be able to change our point of view, no matter how ingrained it may be, is a key skill that Adam talked about us all being able to develop. And that the best organisations have those who can adapt/pivot quickly when they need to (with many examples of those businesses who didn’t, to their detriment). Even reflecting back on the past 12 months in how we’ve all had to change our best laid plans and goals, in order to adapt to a changing work and world environment has meant that there has been opportunity in crisis.

Diversity of Thought

We know that diversity of thought is the key to problem solving at every level. By having more points of view and greater access to data from these points of views, we can make more informed decisions. However Adam talked about the dangers of the HIPPO (Highest Paid Person’s Opinion), and that in order to ensure that group-think doesn’t occur, the HIPPO should ask the opinion of everyone else in the room first, before stating theirs. Sounds obvious on the face of it but takes conscious effort to execute. Don’t be the dangerous HIPPO who inadvertently takes a good discussion of opposing and valid opinions off-course by wading-in too early with yours.

As leaders, we need be regularly questioning our beliefs (some of which will have been ingrained over decades) and to model this behaviour by being able to say “I got it wrong”. And that that shouldn’t be a scary thing to do. In fact, Adam discussed that modelling it from the highest levels means that it will quickly cascade through the organisation and people will build the muscle for themselves - leading to an all round more successful organisation.

I’ll leave you with one of my favourite quotes from Adam on re-thinking: “Rethinking is a skill-set but it’s also a mindset. We already have many of the mental tools we need. We just just have to remember to get them out of the shed and remove the rust”

I’d love to continue the conversation with you. Is this is something that you do easily and regularly or something that you struggle with? Let me know in the comments below.