ADAM GRANT

The best approach to changing someone’s mind is to help that person make the change on their own. 

Three key techniques are used:

• Asking open-ended questions.
• Engaging in reflective listening.
• Affirming the person’s desire and ability to change.

Performance accountability evaluates projects, individuals and teams based on outcomes. Good outcomes aren’t always the result of good decisions.

“Focusing on results might be good for short-term performance, but it can be an obstacle to long-term learning.”

Rethinking is fundamental to scientific thinking.

“You’re expected to doubt what you know, be curious about what you don’t know, and update your views based on new data.”

Changing your...

Psychological safety: The ability to take risks without fear of punishment or reprisal.

In environments with psychological safety, teams will report more problems and errors. Psychologically unsafe settings hide errors to avoid penalties.

“Psychological sa...

The author recommends twice-a-year personal checkups: opportunities to reassess your current pursuits, whether your current desires still align with your plans, and whether it’s time to pivot.

The overview effect: Astronauts who experience space travel gain a unique understanding of humanity. After seeing Earth from above, their perspective changes and they see the commonality of our existence.

Counterfactual thinking: considering alternative rea...

Cognitive bias: Seeing what we want to see.

Desirability bias: The tendency to act in a manner that enhances your acceptance or approval from others.

Instead of searching for reasons why we are right, search for reasons why we are wrong.

• Plan ahead to determine where they can find common ground.
• Present fewer reasons to support their case. Weak arguments dilute strong ones.
• Express curiosity with questions like “so you don’t see any merit in this proposal at all?”
• Express their feelings about the proc...

Relationship conflict: Personal feuds and arguments

Task conflict: Arguments over specific ideas and opinions

Task conflict can be beneficial and generate better outcomes.

Challenge network: A trusted group of peers t...

“The person most likely to persuade you to change your mind is you. You get to pick the reasons you find most compelling, and you come away with a real sense of ownership over them.”

Stop trying to convince others about the right answer. Open their mind to the poss...

The rethinking cycle: Humility-Doubt -Curiosity-Discovery

The overconfidence cycle: Pride- Conviction - Confirmation and Desirability Biases-Validation

Totalitarian ego: Psychological term for the mental gatekeeper that keeps threatening information out of our heads. Our mini internal dictator.

Two types of detachment:

Detaching your present from your past.

Detaching your opinions from your identit...

We identify with our group or tribe. We distinguish ourselves from our adversaries—they are everything we are not.

We preach the virtues of our side.

We prosecute the vices of our rivals.

As social beings, we are motivated to seek belonging and ...

Adversarial approach: Common tendency to go into preacher or prosecutor mode without listening to the other party.

Collaborative approach: Leads with humility and curiosity. Invites the other party to think like scientists.

Logic bully:

Three steps to thinking more critically:

• Interrogate information instead of simply consuming it.
• Rank and popularity are not proxies for reliability.
• The sender of information is often not its source.

Binary bias: The human tendency to seek clarity by reducing a spectrum of categories to two opposites.

Presumes the world is divided into two sides: believers and non-believers. Only one side can be right because there is only one truth.

The antidote is to “co...

Phil Tetlock’s (political scientist) mindset model: Preachers, prosecutors, and politicians.

Preachers: We pontificate and promote our ideas. Changing your mind is a sign of moral weakness.

Prosecutors: We attack the ideas of others, ...

Every individual possesses cognitive tools and accumulated knowledge that they regularly rely upon. But we rarely question or consider this knowledge which includes beliefs, assumptions, opinions, and prejudices. One of the solutions to this is what Adam Grant tells in this book as "rethinking". ...

Conventional view: intelligence is the ability to think and learn.

Alternative view: intelligence is the ability to rethink and unlearn.

Grant argues these cognitive skills are essential in a turbulent and changing world.

Anton’s syndrome is a condition whereby an individual is oblivious to a physical disability due to damage to the occipital lobe of the brain.

Armchair quarterback syndrome: Phenomenon where confidence exceeds competence.

Imposter syndrome: