Mindset of success

If you manage any people, if you're a parent, an athlete, a teacher, a leader, etc. you need to read this piece The Effort Effect by Stanford psychology professor Carol Dweck. The article examines her thirty-year study of why some some people excel and others don’t. She postulates that people have two kinds of mindsets: growth or fixed. People with the growth mindset view life as a series of challenges and opportunities for improving. People with a fixed mindset believe that they are “set” as either good or bad. The issue is that the good ones believe they don’t have to work hard, and the bad ones believe that working hard won’t change anything. The view we adopt of ourselves profoundly affects the way we lead our lives. It also reveals that your mindset can determine whether you become the person you want to be, and whether you accomplish what you are truly capable of. Dweck also released a book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success that expands and further details this topic. I definitely plan on reading it!

Here's a sidebar from the article called “What Do We Tell the Kids?” You have a bright child, and you want him/her to succeed. You should tell her how smart she is, right? That’s what 85 percent of the parents Dweck surveyed said. Her research on fifth graders shows otherwise. Labels, even though positive, can be harmful. They may instill a fixed mind-set and all the baggage that goes with it, from performance anxiety to a tendency to give up quickly. Well-meaning words can sap children’s motivation and enjoyment of learning and undermine their performance. While Dweck’s study focused on intelligence praise, she says her conclusions hold true for all talents and abilities. Interesting....