400 Best Adam Grant Quotes To Inspire Your Leadership (2023)
1. “How frequently I’m comfortable asking for advice and how often I do it is the single best predictor of effectiveness, which is pretty remarkable. I think there’s a pretty strong case to be made that organizations need helping and giving behaviors in order to be productive.”
2. “This explains why we often undercommunicate our ideas. They’re already so familiar to us that we underestimate how much exposure an audience needs to comprehend and buy into them. When” ― Adam M. Grant
3. “If you want your children to bring original ideas into the world, you need to let them pursue their passions, not yours.”
4. “The least favorite students were the non-conformists who made up their own rules. Teachers tend to discriminate against highly creative students, labeling them as troublemakers. ” ― Adam M. Grant,
5. “When people are depending on us, we end up finding strength we didn’t know we had.”
6. “If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse.” Instead, creators ought to build a car and see if customers will drive it.”
7. “Negative relationships are unpleasant but predictable.”
8. “Givers characterize success as individual achievements that have a positive impact on others. They see success in terms of making significant, lasting contributions to a broad range of people. Taking this definition of success seriously might require dramatic changes in that organizations hire, evaluate, reward, and promote people. It would mean paying attention not only to the productivity of individual people but also to the ripple effect of this productivity on others. If we broadened our image of success to include contributions to others, people might be motivated to tilt their professional reciprocity styles toward giving.”
9. “Knowledge is best sought from experts, but creativity and wisdom can come from anywhere.”
10. “If knowledge is power, knowing what we don't know is wisdom.”
11. “When you develop a reputation for being responsive and generous, an ever-expanding mountain of requests will come your way.”
12. “People underestimate the givers in their midst. Why? When we try to predict others’ reactions, we focus on the costs of saying yes, overlooking the costs of saying no. It’s uncomfortable, guilt-provoking, and embarrassing to turn down a small request for help. Plus, workplaces and schools are often designed to be zero-sum environments with forced rankings and required grading curves that pit group members against one another in win-lose contests. In these settings, it’s only natural to assume that peers will lean in the taker direction, so people hold back on giving. This reduces the actual amount of giving that occurs, leading people to underestimate the number of people who are interested in giving.”
13. “The principle of optimal distinctiveness: we look for ways to fit in and stand out. A popular way to achieve optimal distinctiveness is to join a unique group.... Studies show that people identify more strongly with individuals and groups that share unique similarities. The more rare a group, value, interest, skill, or experience is, the more likely it is to facilitate a bond. And research indicates that people are happier in groups that provide optimal distinctiveness.”
14. “When a salesperson truly cares about you, trust forms, and you're more likely to buy, come back for repeat business, and refer new customers.”
15. “When we use the logic of consequence, we can always find reasons not to take risks.” ― Adam M. Grant
16. “In 1993, Craig Newmark moved to SF for a job. As a single guy new to the Bay Area, he was looking for ways to spice up his social life. In early 1995, he start emailing friends to share info about local art and tech events. Word of mouth spread, and people began to expand the postings beyond events to feature job openings, apartments, and miscellaneous items for sale. By June, the email list had gown to 240 people. It was too large for direct email, so Craig moved it to a listserv. In 1996, a website was born, and it was called Craigslist. By the end of 2011, there were Craigslist sites in more than 700 locations around the world and it’s one of the top ten most popular sites in the U.S. and top 40 in the world.”
17. “In the deepest sense of the word, a friend is someone who sees more potential in you than you see in yourself, someone who helps you become the best version of yourself.” ― Adam M. Grant
18. “Procrastination may be the enemy of productivity, but it can be a resource for creativity.” ― Adam M. Grant
19. “Saying no frees you up to say yes when it matters most.”
20. “One of the Latin roots of humility means ‘from the earth’ - It’s about being grounded: Recognizing that we’re flawed, and fallible.
21. “Every time we interact with another person at work, we have a choice to make: do we try to claim as much value as we can, or contribute value without worrying about what we receive in return?”
22. “Reasoning does create a paradox: it leads both to more rule following and more rebelliousness. By explaining moral principles, parents encourage their children to comply voluntarily with rules that align with important values and to question rules that don’t. Good explanations enable children to develop a code of ethics that often coincides with societal expectations; when they don’t square up, children rely on the internal compass of values rather than the external compass of rules.”
23. “When young women get called bossy, it's often because they're trying to exercise power without status. It's not a problem that they're being dominant; the backlash arises because they're overstepping their status.”
24. “When people join a group, they look for cues about appropriate behavior. The visibility of giving can affect reciprocity styles significantly. In many domains of life, people end up taking because they don’t have access to info about what others are doing. A team of psychologists surveyed more than 800 Californians about their energy consumption. They asked the Californians how important the following factors were in shaping their decisions to save energy — it saves money, it protects the environment, it benefits society, a lot of other people are doing it. The Californians consistently reported that the most important factor was protecting the environment and following the lead of other people was last. The team wanted to see if people were right about their own motivations, so they visited nearly 400 homes in San Marcos and randomly assigned them to receive door hangers around each of the four topics. When asked how motivating the door hangers were, the residents whose hangers emphasized joining their neighbors reported the lowest motivation. But when the team looked at the residents’ energy bills, they found that the residents were wrong about what motivated them. The residents whose door hangers emphasized joining their neighbors actually conserved the most energy. Subsequent door hangers that provided feedback on whether residents were consuming less or more than their neighbors motivated electricity takers to significantly reduce their consumption — but the effect grew stronger the closer and more similar the group was to the residents.”
25. “When people have to work closely together, powerless speech (hesitations like “well” “um” yeah” “kinda” “probably” “I think,” disclaimers like “This may be a bad idea, but,” Tag questions, “That’s interesting, isn’t it?” “That’s a good idea, right?” and Intensifiers, “really” “very” “quite”) is actually more influential than powerful speech. Powerless speech signals that you’re a giver. By talking tentatively, you show a willingness to deter to the other person, or at least take their opinion into consideration, and earn greater respect and influence.”
26. “Originals are nonconformists, people who not only have new ideas but take action to champion them. They are people who stand out and speak up. Originals drive creativity and change in the world. They’re the people you want to bet on.”
27. “In a study, executives who got board seats were more likely to seek advice along with a compliment. When praising a director’s skill, the advice-seeking execs asked how she mastered it. When extolling a director’s success in a task, the execs asked for recommendations about how to replicate his success. When execs asked for advice in this manner, the director was significantly more likely to recommend them for a board appointment.”
28. “Highly successful people have three things in common: motivation, ability, and opportunity. If we want to succeed, we need a combination of hard work, talent, and luck.”
29. “Psychologists discovered that there are two routes to achievement: conformity and originality. Conformity means following the crowd down conventional paths and maintaining the status quo. Originality is taking the road less traveled, championing a set of novel ideas that go against the grain but ultimately make things better.”
30. “Originality brings more bumps in the road, yet it leaves us with more happiness and a greater sense of meaning.”
31. “We have many identities, and we can’t be authentic to them all. The best we can do is be sincere in our efforts to earn the values we claim.”
32. “Seriously, companies: instead of buying sexual harassment insurance, stop promoting sexual harassers into power.”
33. “Takers believe in a zero-sum world, and they end up creating one where bosses, colleagues and clients don't trust them. Givers build deeper and broader relationships - people are rooting for them instead of gunning for them.”
34. “When a salesperson truly cares about you, trust forms, and you’re more likely to buy, come back for repeat business, and refer new customers.”
35. “When medical students focus on helping others, they're able to weather the slings and arrows of long hours and devastating health outcomes: they know their colleagues and patients are depending on them.”
36. “Rethinking depends on a different kind of network: a challenge network, a group of people we trust to point out our blind spots and help us overcome our weaknesses. Their role is to activate rethinking cycles to push us to be humble about our expertise, doubt our knowledge, and be curious about new perspectives.”
37. “Originality is not a fixed trait. It is a free choice.”
38. “Success doesn’t measure a human being, effort does.”
39. “We often favor feeling right, over being right.”
40. “When we shift our emphasis from behavior to character, people evaluate choices differently. Instead of asking whether this behavior will achieve the results they want, they take action because it is the right thing to do. In the poignant words of one Holocaust rescuer, “It’s like saving somebody who is drowning. You don’t ask them what God they pray too. You just go and save them.”
41. “Creating different versions of a drawing of story can encourage kids the value of revising their ideas. Getting input from others can also help them to continue evolving their standards. They might learn to embrace confusion and stop expecting perfection on the first try.”
42. “If an organization values innovation, you can assume it's safe to speak up with new ideas, leaders will listen, and your voice matters.”
43. “Successful givers secure their oxygen masks before coming to the assistance of others. Although their motives may be less purely altruistic, their actions prove more altruistic, because they givemore."
44. “Advice seeking has four benefits: learning (gaining new info), perspective taking (encouraging others to take our perspectives), commitment (since the person has invested time in you now), and flattery (showing them we respect and admire their insights).”
45. “Having a sense of security in one realm gives us the freedom to be original in another.
46. “Successful givers secure their oxygen masks before coming to the assistance of others. Although their motives may be less purely altruistic, their actions prove more altruistic, because they give more.”
47. “Timing accounted for 42% of the difference between success and failure.”
48. “That’s the nature of Power, today: Change, or be changed. Learn to Thrive in a networked world, or Fall.”
49. “Teams need the opportunity to learn about each other's capabilities and develop productive routines. So once we get the right people on the bus, let's make sure they spend some time driving together.”
50. “When I think about voting, I can skip it and still see myself as a good citizen. But when I think about being a voter, now the choice reflects on my character. It casts a shadow.”
51. “An employee made a mistake that cost the company $10 million, he walked into the office of Tom Watson, the C.E.O., expecting to get fired. ‘Fire you?’ Mr. Watson asked. ‘I just spent $10 million educating you.”
52. “To become original, you have to try something new, which means accepting some measure of risk.”
53. “Being a giver is not good for a 100-yard dash, but it’s valuable in a marathon.”
54. “Authenticity is a virtue. But just as you can have too little authenticity, you can also have too much.”
55. “By admitting your inadequacies, you show that you're self-aware enough to know your areas for improvement - and secure enough to be open about them.”
56. “Gaining insight and perspective is not about the number of years you've lived. It's about the number of lessons you've learned.”
57. “Practice makes perfect, but it doesn’t make new.” ― Adam M. Grant
58. “Practice makes perfect, but it doesn’t make new.”
59. “Chip Conley, the renowned entrepreneur who founded Joie de Vivre Hotels, explains, “Being a giver is not good for a 100-yard dash, but it’s valuable in a marathon”
60. “The culture of a workplace—an organization’s values, norms and practices—has a huge impact on our happiness and success.”
61. “Complex problems like pandemics, climate change, and political polarisation call on us to stay mentally flexible."
62. “En el modo predicador, cambiar de opinión es un signo de debilidad moral; en el modo científico, es una señal de integridad intelectual. En el modo fiscal, dejar que otros nos convenzan de algo es admitir la derrota; en el modo científico, es un paso que conduce a la verdad. En el modo político, damos un giro de ciento ochenta grados cuando nos ponen delante el palo y la zanahoria; en el modo científico, cambiamos de idea cuando nos encontramos con un proceso lógico más exacto y unos datos más sólidos.”
63. “Chip Conley, the renowned entrepreneur who founded Joie de Vivre Hotels, explains, “Being a giver is not good for a 100-yard dash, but it’s valuable in a marathon.”
64. “When we hear a powerful persuasive message, we get suspicious. In some cases, we’re concerned about being tricked. In other situations, we just want to make our own free choices, rather than having our decisions controlled by someone else. So if I tell you to go out and vote, you might resist. But when I ask if you’re planning to vote, you don’t feel like I’m trying to influence you. It’s an innocent query, and instead of resisting my influence, you reflect on it. You’ve been convinced by someone you already like and trust: yourself.”
65. “From a motivation perspective, helping others enriches the meaning and purpose of our own lives, showing us that our contributions matter and energizing us to work harder, longer, and smarter.”
66. “Progress always involves risk. You can’t steal second and keep one foot on first base.”
67. “Reconnect with dormant ties. Once a month, reach out to one person with whom you haven’t spoken in years. Find out what they’re working on and ask if there are ways you can be helpful.”
68. “From a motivation perspective, helping others enriches the meaning and purpose of our own lives, showing us that our contributions matter and energizing us to work harder, longer and smarter.”
69. “Overall, on average, happier people earn more money, get higher performance ratings, make better decisions, negotiate sweeter deals, and contribute more to their organizations. Happiness alone accounts for about 10 percent of the variation between employees and job performance.”
70. “Minority viewpoints are important, not because they tend to prevail but because they stimulate divergent attention and thought, " finds Berkeley psychologist Charlan Nemeth, one of the world's leading experts on group decisions. "As a result, even when they are wrong they contribute to the detection of novel solutions and decisions that, on balance, are qualitatively better".
71. “Being a magician taught me how powerful the element of surprise can be. In each book, I've tried to work that in - an unexpected twist in a story that reveals an insight, a counter intuitive study that turns your beliefs upside-down.”
72. “Most people assume that self-interest and other-interest are opposite ends of one continuum. Yet I’ve consistently found that self-interest and other-interest are completely independent motivations; you can have both of them at the same time.”
73. “If we communicate the vision behind our ideas, the purpose guiding our products, people will flock to us.” ― Adam M. Grant
74. “Sean Parker, and Half.com founder Josh Kopelman—not to”
75. “The psychologist James Pennebaker coined a term the joy of talking. Years ago, he divided strangers into small groups and gave them 15 minutes to talk to strangers about a topic of your choice. After the 15 minutes were up, they rated how much they liked the group. It turns out the more someone talked, the more they liked the group and the more they talked, the more they thought they’d learned about the group. By dominating the conversation, you believe you’ve actually come to know the people around you, even though they barely spoke. It is givers, by virtue of their interest in getting to know us, who ask us the questions that enable us to experience the joy of learning from ourselves. And by giving us the floor, givers are actually learning about us and from us, which helps them figure out how to sell us things we already value.”
76. “Timing accounted for forty-two percent of the difference between success and failure.”
77. “Even if your organization doesn’t currently embrace critical upward feedback, holding an open season on leaders might be an effective way to begin changing the culture.”
78. “When we’re experiencing doubts on the way toward achieving a goal, whether we ought to look backward or forward depends on our commitment:
79. “The file exists” error (1)
80. “Our companies, communities, and countries don’t necessarily suffer from a shortage of novel ideas. They’re constrained by a shortage of people who excel at choosing the right novel ideas.”
81. “The most promising ideas begin from novelty and then add familiarity.”
82. “Highly successful people have three things in common: motivation, ability and opportunity. If we want to succeed, we need a combination of hard work, talent and luck.”
83. “I want my children to know that we often become resilient for others.”
84. “I believe that the most meaningful way to succeed is to help other people succeed.”
85. “In a study, happiness increased when people performed five giving acts all in a single day, rather than doing them one per day. Researchers speculate that ‘spreading them over the course of a week might have diminished their salience and power or made them less distinguishable from participants’ habitual kind behavior. By chunking your giving into weekly blocks, you can experience your impact more vividly, leading efforts to feel like more than a drop in a bucket.”
86. “Confidence is a measure of how much you believe in yourself. Evidence shows that's distinct from how much you believe in your methods. You can be confident in your ability to achieve a goal in the future while maintaining the humility to question whether you have the right tools in the present. That's the sweet spot of confidence.”
87. “Who you are should be a question of what you value, not what you believe.”
88. “las personas se inspiran para obtener el mayor rendimiento cuando los líderes describen una visión y luego invitan a un cliente para que le dé vida con una historia personal.15 El mensaje del líder proporciona la visión general para poner en marcha el coche y la historia del usuario ofrece un atractivo emocional que presiona el acelerador. En Skype, Josh Silverman sabía que la mejor manera de activar el acelerador no era solamente con sus palabras. Después de hablar sobre cómo Skype permitía que sus hijos tuvieran una relación personal profunda con sus abuelos a pesar de tener ocho zonas horarias entre ellos, dio vida a la visión cediendo la palabra a usuarios de Skype en todas sus reuniones generales. Una pareja de casados compartió cómo había sobrevivido una separación de un año durante su compromiso “gracias a las conversaciones diarias por Skype”. Un soldado habló de cómo Skype le había permitido mantener una estrecha relación con sus hijos mientras estaba de servicio en Irak; incluso abrieron los regalos de Navidad juntos. “Traer al cliente a la habitación los conectaba con la misión y llegaba a sus corazones y mentes”, dice Silverman. “Eso ayudó a los empleados a ver el gran aporte que podríamos hacerle al mundo”.”
89. “Being original doesn’t require being first. It just means being different and better.”
90. “Influence is far more powerful if you change people’s behaviors first, and their attitudes often follow. To turn takers into givers, it’s often necessary to convince them to start giving. Over time, if the conditions are right, they’ll come to see themselves as givers.”
91. “’Dissenting for the sake of dissenting is not useful…But when it’s authentic, it stimulates thought; it clarifies and emboldens.’ Genuine dissenters challenge people to doubt themselves.”
92. “The people who wait until the last minute are so busy goofing off that they don't have any new ideas. And on the flip side, the people who race in are in such a frenzy of anxiety that they don't have original thoughts either.”
93. “When we're determined to reach an objective, it's the gap between where we are and where we aspire to be that lights a fire under us.”
94. “To get real diversity of thought, you need to find the people who genuinely hold different views and invite them into the conversation.”
95. “In a study, when firefighters experienced signs of burnout, they were more likely to go out of their way to help colleagues with heavy workloads, share new knowledge with supervisors, give advice to newer colleagues, and even listen to colleagues’ problems. Why would burnout increase their giving? UCLA psychologist Shelley Taylor has discovered a stress response that differs from fight or flight. She calls it tend and befriend. ‘One of the most striking aspects of the human stress response is the tendency to come together in groups to provide and receive joint protection in the threatening times.’”
96. “Procrastinate strategically. Procrastination may be the enemy of productivity but it can be a valuable resource for creativity.”
97. “In a study, participants with unusually high trauma scored high on a questionnaire measuring ‘other-directedness.’ These other-directed people operated like givers. By constantly overriding their selfish impulses in order to help others, they had strengthened their psychological muscles, to the point where using willpower for painful tasks was no longer exhausting. Other studies have shown that givers accrue an advantage in controlling their thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. Over time, giving may build willpower like weightlifting builds muscles. Of course, we all know that when muscles are overwhelmed, they fatigue and sometimes even tear — this is what happens to selfless givers.”
98. “Stop asking kids what they want to be when the grow up. They don't have to define themselves in terms of a career. A single identity can close the door to alternatives. Instead of trying to narrow their options, help them to broaden their possibilities. They don't have to be one thing. They can do many things.”
99. “If you want someone to become your advocate, ask them ‘If you were in my shoes, what would you do?’ Advice seeking is a surprisingly effective strategy for exercising influence when we lack authority. In one experiment, a researcher had people negotiate the sale of a property. When the sellers focused on their goal of getting the highest possible price, only 8% reached a successful agreement. When the seller asked the buyer for advice on how to meet their goals, 42% reached one. Asking for advice encouraged greater cooperation and information sharing, turning a potentially contentious negotiation into a win-win deal.”
100. “Creativity is generating ideas that are novel and useful. I define originals as people who go beyond dreaming up the ideas and take initiative to make their visions a reality.”
101. “I spend a lot of my time trying to help leaders build cultures of productive givers.”
102. “It's true that every leader needs followers. We can't all be nonconformists at every moment, but conformity is dangerous - especially for an entity in formation.”
103. “Adam Rifkin”
104. “The most meaningful way to succeed is to help others succeed.”
105. “As one Wharton dean explains, “The students call it Game Face: they feel pressured to look successful all the time. There can’t be any chinks in their armor, and opening up would make them vulnerable.”
106. “By looking on the bright side, we'll activate enthusiasm and turn on the go system.”
107. “When people are resistant to change, it helps to reinforce what will stay the same”
108. “The more successful people have been in the past, the worse they perform when they enter a new environment. They become overconfident, and they’re less likely to seek critical feedback even though the context is radically different.”
109. “If we want to forecast whether the originators of a novel idea will be successful, we need to look beyond the enthusiasm they express about their ideas and focus on the enthusiasm for execution that they reveal through their actions.”
110. “When making decisions about people, stop confusing experience with evidence. Just as owning a car doesn't make you an expert on engines, having a brain doesn't mean you understand psychology.”
111. “Being a scientist is not just a profession. It's a frame of mind...Scientific tools are not reserved for people in white coats and beakers. Hypotheses have as much place in our lives as they do in the lab. Experiments can inform our daily decisions.”
112. “Instead of assuming that emotional intelligence is always useful, we need to think more carefully about where and when it matters.”
113. “Givers reject the notion that interdependence is weak. Givers are more likely to see interdependence as a source of strength, a way to harness the skills of multiple people for a greater good.”
114. “If you’d rather give on your own, try the GOOD thirty-day-challenge, Sasha Dichter’s thirty-day generosity experiment, or Ryan Garcia’s year of daily random acts of kindness.”
115. “Giver burnout has less to do with the amount of giving and more with the amount of feedback about the impact of that giving. Givers don’t burn out when they devote too much time and energy to giving. They burn out when they’re working with people in need but are unable to help effectively.”
116. “We listen to views that make us feel good, instead of ideas that make us think hard.”
117. “Conformity is dangerous.”
118. “A powerful way to give is to help others work on tasks that are more interesting, meaningful, or developmental than their average tasks. One VP individually asked employees about their personal interests and asked them what they’d enjoy doing that might also be of interest to other people. He then sent them out into the company to pursue their mission with three rules: 1) it has to appeal to at least one other person 2) be low or no cost and 3) be initiated by you. Months later, about ⅔ of the employees had made some effort toward making their visions a reality, and roughly half of those employees succeeded in launching them.”
119. “As pessoas muito bem-sucedidas apresentam três características em comum: motivação, capacidade e oportunidade. Para alcançar o sucesso, precisamos de combinar trabalho árduo, talento e sorte.”
120. “When you procrastinate, you’re more likely to let your mind wander. That gives you a better chance of stumbling onto the unusual and spotting unexpected patterns.”
121. “The least favorite students were the non-conformists who made up their own rules. Teachers tend to discriminate against highly creative students, labeling them as troublemakers.”
122. “Originality is what everybody wants, but there’s a sweet spot,” Rob Minkoff explains. “If it’s not original enough, it’s boring or trite. If it’s too original, it may be hard for the audience to understand. The goal is to push the envelope, not tear the envelope.”
123. “If you wanted to be original the most important possible thing you can do is do a lot of work.”
124. “Shapers” are independent thinkers: curious, non-conforming, and rebellious. They practice brutal, nonhierarchical honesty. And they act in the face of risk, because their fear of not succeeding exceeds their fear of failing.” ― Adam M. Grant
125. “Argue like you’re right and listen like you’re wrong.
126. “As a giver, his focus was on achieving a high-quality collective result, not on claiming personal responsibility for that result. ‘I tended not to be able to remember the stuff that I had done, so I wasn’t always saying when I did this or that. I was saying when we did this and that. I think it’s good to get in the habit of that.’”
127. “Givers don’t wait for signs of potential. Because they tend to be trusting and optimistic about other people’s intentions, in their roles as leaders and mentors, givers are inclined to see the potential in everyone. By default, givers start by viewing people as bloomers. They see potential where others don’t, which sets in motion a series of self-fulfilling prophecies.”
128. “To generate creative ideas, it's important to start from an unusual place. But to explain those ideas, they have to be connected to something familiar.”
129. “Frenemies are worse than enemies, and it's not just in the workplace”
130. “Good guys are most likely to finish last, but also most likely to finish first.”
131. “If we create networks with the sole intention of getting something, we won’t succeed. We can’t pursue the benefits of networks; the benefits ensue from investments in meaningful activities and relationships.”
132. “The more important argument against grade curves is that they create an atmosphere that's toxic by pitting students against one another. At best, it creates a hypercompetitive culture, and at worst, it sends students the message that the world is a zero-sum game: Your success means my failure.”
133. “In a study of engineers, givers only took a productivity dive when they gave infrequently. Of all engineers, the most productive were those who gave often — and gave more than they received. These were the true givers, and they had the highest productivity and the highest status: they were revered by their peers. By giving often, engineers built up more trust and attracted more valuable help from across their work groups — not just from the people they helped.”
134. “When people know how their work makes a difference, they feel energized to contribute more.”
135. “The mark of higher education isn't the knowledge you accumulate in your head. It's the skills you gain about how to learn.”
136. “The personality trait most associated with an interest in the arts is called openness, the tendency to seek out novelty in intellectual, aesthetic, and emotional pursuits.”
137. “I think there’s a misconception that being a kinder, generous person means saying yes. I think it’s worth recognizing that every no is a chance to say yes when it matters more.”
138. “Rather than looking outward in an attempt to predict the outcome, you turn inward to your identity. You base the decision on who you are--or who you want to be.”
139. “If you want to be a generous giver, you have to watch out for selfish takers.”
140. “If an organization values innovation, you can assume it’s safe to speak up with new ideas, leaders will listen, and your voice matters.”
141. “If you want to find out if someone's a taker, it's not actually that useful to know what they've accomplished. What you want to want to know is how they explain them.”
142. “Being a giver is not good for a 100-yard dash, but it’s valuable in a marathon.”
143. “I'm a precrastinator. Yes, that's an actual term. You know that panic you feel a few hours before a big deadline when you haven't done anything yet? I just feel that a few months ahead of time.”
144. “When ideas survive it's not because they're true - it's because they are interesting. What makes an idea interesting is that it changes our weakly held opinions.”
145. “No one wants to hear everything that's in your head. They just want you to live up to what comes out of your mouth. Adam Grant”
146. “Steve Jobs was famous for making big bets based on intuition rather than systematic analysis.”
147. “You want people who choose to follow because they genuinely believe in ideas, not because they're afraid to be punished if they don't. For startups, there's so much pivoting that's required that if you have a bunch of sheep, you're in bad shape.”
148. “In the workplace, many people become helicopter managers, hovering over their employees in a well-intentioned but ill-fated attempt to provide support. These are givers gone awry - people so desperate to help others that they develop a white knight complex and end up causing harm instead.”
149. “Many people fail to achieve originality because they generate a few ideas and then obsess about refining them to perfection.”
150. “Being a giver is not about saying yes to all of the people all of the time to all of the requests.”
151. “Enemies make better allies than frenemies.”
152. “When people are depending on us, we end up finding strength we didn't know we had.”
153. “As Chris Granger, executive vice president at the NBA, explains, "Talented people are attracted to those who care about them. When you help someone get promoted out of your team, it's a short-term loss, but it's a clear long-term gain. It's easier to attract people, because word gets around that your philosophy is to help people.”
154. “É mais fácil vencer quando todos querem que você vença. Quem não faz inimigos chega ao topo com mais facilidade. Randy Komisar”
155. “If we want people to vote, we need to make it a larger part of their self-image.”
156. “Becoming Original is not the easiest path in the Pursuit of Happiness, but it leaves us perfectly poised for the Happiness of Pursuit.”
157. “The fear of being judged as weak or naïve prevents many people from operating like givers at work.”
158. “What do you want to be when you grow up? As a kid, that was my least favourite question.”
159. “Geniuses don't have better ideas than the rest of us. They just have more of them.”
160. “Benjamin Franklin said, ‘He that has once done you a kindness will be more ready to do you another than he whom you yourself have obliged.’”
161. “People often take because they don’t realize that they’re deviating from the norm. In these situations, showing them the norm is often enough to motivate them to give.”
162. “When you're good at controlling your own emotions, you can disguise your true feelings. When you know what others are feeling, you can tug at their heartstrings and motivate them to act against their own best interests.”
163. “In the face of uncertainty, our first instinct is often to reject novelty, looking for reasons why unfamiliar concepts might fail.26 When managers vet novel ideas, they’re in an evaluative mindset. To protect themselves against the risks of a bad bet, they compare the new notion on the table to templates of ideas that have succeeded in the past. When”
164. “We all have original ideas. Even if we don't see ourselves as supercreative or as wild nonconformists, we have insights every day about how the world around us could be better. It might be a better way of running meetings in your office that would be less mind-numbing. It might be a little twist on a product or a service.”
165. “The Simpsons has contributed many words to the English lexicon, the most famous being Homer’s d’oh! response to an event that causes mental or physical anguish, yoink, the familiar phrase that Simpsons characters utter when they snatch an item from another character’s hands, and meh, the expression of pure indifference that debuted in the sixth season.”
166. “Reinforce freedom of choice: sometimes people resist, not because they are dismissing the argument, but because they are rejecting the feeling of their behavior being controlled. It helps to respect their autonomy by reminding them that it's up to them to choose what they believe.”
167. “It’s easier to win if everybody wants you to win. If you don’t make enemies out there, it’s easier to succeed.”
168. “Most people believe that great leaders are distinguished by their ability to give compelling answers. This profound book shatters that assumption, showing that the more vital skill is asking the right questions…. Berger poses many fascinating questions, including this one: What if companies had mission questions rather than mission statements? This is a book everyone ought to read—without question.”
169. “For women to achieve equal representation in leadership roles, it's important that they have the backing of men as well as women.”
170. “To generate creative ideas, it’s important to start from an unusual place. But to explain those ideas, they have to be connected to something familiar.”
171. “When we’re determined to reach an objective, it’s the gap between where we are and where we aspire to be that lights a fire under us.” ― Adam M. Grant
172. “The key to balancing our responsibility judgments is to focus our attention on what others have contributed. All you need to do is make a list of what your partner contributes before you estimate your own contribution. Bring together a work group of 3–6 people and ask each member to estimate the % of the total work they do. Add up their estimates, and the average total is over 140%. Ask them to reflect on each member’s contributions before their own, and the average total drops to 123%.”
173. “It's ironic that when you go through a tragedy, you appreciate more. You realize how fragile life is and that there are so many things to still be thankful for.”
174. “I study how to make work not suck.”
175. “a friend is someone who sees more potential in you than you see in yourself, someone who helps you become the best version of yourself.”
176. “Os originais aceitam a batalha inglória, esforçando-se para fazer do mundo o que ele podia ser. Ao esforçarem-se por melhorar a vida e a liberdade, temporariamente podem abdicar de algum prazer, pondo a sua própria felicidade em segundo plano. A longo prazo, contudo, tem hipótese de criar um mundo melhor. E isso (...) dá um tipo de satisfação diferente. Tornar-se um original não é o caminho mais fácil para procurar a felicidade, mas deixa-nos numa situação perfeita para a felicidade da procura.”
177. “Don't criticize yourself while you're creating.”
178. “Having a sense of security in one realm gives us the freedom to be original in another.”
179. “Embrace the five-minute favor! Adam Rifkin’s favorite offers are to give honest feedback and to make an intro.”
180. “When we need new info, we may run out of weak ties quickly, but we have a large pool of dormant ties that prove to be helpful. And the older we get, the more dormant ties we have, and the more valuable they become.”
181. “When trying to innovate, most people stop after 10-15 possibilities, failing to recognize that their first ideas are usually the most obvious ones.”
182. “There are always multiple paths to the same end, and the same starting point can be a path to many different ends. We should be careful to avoid getting too attached to a particular route or even a particular destination. There isn't one definition of success or one track to happiness.”
183. “Uncertainty primes us to ask questions and absorb new ideas.”
184. “In a heated argument, you can always stop and ask, ‘What evidence would change your mind?’ If the answer is ‘nothing,’ then there’s no point in continuing the debate.”
185. “Overconfidence is a failure of imagination. Imagine an alternative to your expectation, and your judgment improves.”
186. “We all have goals for our own individual achievements, and it turns out that the givers who excel are willing to ask for help when they need it. Successful givers are every bit as ambitious as takers and matchers. They simply have a different way of pursuing their goals.”
187. “Meditation isn't snake oil. For some people, meditation might be the most efficient way to reduce stress and cultivate mindfulness. But it isn't a panacea. If you don't meditate, there's no need to stress out about it.”
188. “We have many identities, and we can't be authentic to them all. The best we can do is be sincere in our efforts to earn the values we claim.”
189. “The greatest shapers don’t stop at introducing originality into the world. They create cultures that unleash originality in others.” ― Adam M. Grant
190. “Practice makes perfect, but it doesn’t make new”
191. “It’s widely assumed that there’s a tradeoff between quantity and quality—if you want to do better work, you have to do less of it—but this turns out to be false. In fact, when it comes to idea generation, quantity is the most predictable path to quality. “Original thinkers,” Stanford professor Robert Sutton notes, “will come up with many ideas that are strange mutations, dead ends, and utter failures. The cost is worthwhile because they also generate a larger pool of ideas—especially novel ideas.” ― Adam M. Grant
192. “Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World” by Adam M. Grant.
193. “It takes confident humility to admit that we're a work in progress. It shows that we care more about improving ourselves than proving ourselves.”
194. “Focus attention and energy on making a difference in the lives of others, and success might follow as a byproduct.”
195. “Burnout is being overwhelmed by work. Boreout is being underwhelmed by work.”
196. “Originals are nonconformists, people who not only have new ideas but take action to champion them. They are people who stand out and speak up. Originals drive creativity and change in the world. They're the people you want to bet on.”
197. “We dramatically underestimate how powerful appreciation is. For instance, just getting a simple thank you after you give somebody feedback on a job application cover letter. Would you have guessed that just the words ‘thank you’ would be enough to not only lead to a 50% increase that they’re willing to help you again, but also then make them more likely to help somebody else who reaches out?”
198. “Attachment. That’s what keeps us from recognizing when our opinions are off the mark and rethinking them. To unlock the joy of being wrong, we need to detach. I’ve learned that two kinds of detachment are especially useful: detaching your present from your past and detaching your opinions from your identity.”
199. “100 seems to be a magic number when it comes to giving. In a study of more than 2,000 Australians in their mid-60s, those who volunteered 100–800 hours per year were happier and more satisfied with their lives than those who volunteered fewer than 100 or more than 800 hours annually.”
200. “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
201. “The purpose of learning isn't to affirm our beliefs; it's to evolve our beliefs”
202. “People tend to have one of three 'styles' of interaction. There are takers, who are always trying to serve themselves; matchers, who are always trying to get equal benefit for themselves and others; and givers, who are always trying to help people.”
203. “If you've ever had a coworker actively interfere with your productivity, try to make you look bad, steal your ideas, or give you false information, you've been the victim of undermining.”
204. “Originality is taking the road less traveled - Championing a set of novel ideas that go against the grain, but, ultimately, make things better…But it doesn’t stop there: Originals are people who take the initiative to make their visions a reality.”
205. “Of all engineers, the most productive were those who gave often, and gave more than they received. These were the true Givers, and they had the highest productivity, and the highest status. They were revered by their peers. By giving often, engineers built up more trust, and attracted more valuable help across their work groups - Not just from the people they helped.”
206. “Success doesn’t measure a human being; effort does.”
207. “Meyer summarizes his code of honor as "(1) Show up, (2) Work hard. (3) Be kind. (4) Take the high road.”
208. “To overcome fear, why does getting excited work better than trying to calm yourself down? Fear is an intense emotion. You can feel your heart pumping and your blood coursing. In that state, trying to relax is like slamming on the brakes when a car is going 80 miles per hour. The vehicle still has momentum. Rather than trying to suppress a strong emotion, it’s easier to convert it into a different emotion – one that’s equally intense, but propels is to step on the gas.”
209. “When our commitment is wavering, the best way to stay on track is to consider the progress we’ve already made. As we recognize what we’ve invested and attained, it seems like a waste to give up, and our confidence and commitment surge.” ― Adam M. Grant
210. “Stereotypes don’t have the structural integrity of a carefully built ship. They’re more like a tower in the game of Jenga – teetering on a small number of blocks, with some key supports missing. To knock it over, sometimes all we need to do is give it a poke. The hope is that people will rise to the occasion and build new beliefs on a stronger foundation.”
211. “That’s the nature of Power today: Change, or be changed. Learn to Thrive in a networked world, or fall.”
212. “To overcome fear, why does getting excited work better than trying to calm yourself down? Fear is an intense emotion. You can feel your heart pumping and your blood coursing. In that state, trying to relax is like slamming on the brakes when a car is going 80 miles per hour. The vehicle still has momentum. Rather than trying to suppress a strong emotion, it's easier to convert it into a different emotion - one that's equally intense, but propels is to step on the gas.”
213. “Being a nice person is about courtesy: you're friendly, polite, agreeable, and accommodating. When people believe they have to be nice in order to give, they fail to set boundaries, rarely say no, and become pushovers, letting others walk all over them.”
214. “Research shows that givers get extra credit when they offer ideas that challenge the status quo. In studies I conducted, when takers presented suggestions for improvement, colleagues were skeptical of their intentions, writing them off as self-serving. But when ideas that might be threatening were proposed by givers, their colleagues listened and rewarded them for speaking up, knowing they were motivated by a genuine desire to contribute.”
215. “My favourite bias is the ‘I’m not biased’ bias, in which people believe they’re more objective than others.”
216. “Rather than looking outward in an attempt to predict the outcome, you turn inward to your identity. You base the decision on who you are – or who you want to be.”
217. “A resilient culture has a certain amount of resistance embedded in it. Not so much to capsize it, but enough so that it doesn't atrophy.”
218. “Over time, because giving appears to be uncommon, people with giver values begin to feel they’re in the minority. As a result, even when they do engage in giving behaviors, people worry that they’ll isolate themselves socially if they violate the norm, so they disguise their giving behind purely self-interested motives. A Princeton sociologist interviewed a wide range of Americans who chose helping professions, from cardiologists to rescue workers. When he asked them to explain why they did good deeds, they referenced self-interested reasons, such as ‘I liked the people I was working with’ or ‘It gets me out of the house.’ They didn’t want to admit that they were genuinely helpful, kind, generous, caring, or compassionate. We have social norms against sounding too charitable.”
219. “If you’re going to build a strong culture, it’s paramount to make diversity one of your core values. This is what separates Bridgewater’s strong culture from a cult: The commitment is to promoting dissent. In hiring, instead of using similarity to gauge cultural fit, Bridgewater assesses cultural contribution.* Dalio wants people who will think independently and enrich the culture. By holding them accountable for dissenting, Dalio has fundamentally altered the way people make decisions. In a cult, core values are dogma. At Bridgewater, employees are expected to challenge the principles themselves. During training, when employees learn the principles, they’re constantly asked: Do you agree? “We have these standards that are stress tested over time, and you have to either operate by them or disagree with them and fight for better ones,” explains Zack Wieder, who works with Dalio on codifying the principles. Rather than deferring to the people with the greatest seniority or status, as was the case at Polaroid, decisions at Bridgewater are based on quality. The goal is to create an idea meritocracy, where the best ideas win. To get the best ideas on the table in the first place, you need radical transparency. ” ― Adam M. Grant
220. “Born to Rebel: Birth Order, Family Dynamics, and Creative Lives”
221. “At its core, comedy is an act of rebellion. Evidence shows that compared to the norms in the population, comedians tend to be more original and rebellious—and the higher they score on these dimensions, the more professional success they attain. ” ― Adam M. Grant
222. “In the deepest sense of the word, a friend is someone who sees more potential in you than you see in yourself, someone who helps you become the best version of yourself.
223. “Kids who evolve into creative adults tend to have a strong moral compass.”
224. “In the deepest sense of the word, a friend is someone who sees more potential in you than you see in yourself, someone who helps you become the best version of yourself.”
225. “Procrastination gives you time to consider divergent ideas, to think in nonlinear ways, to make unexpected leaps.”
226. “Half a century ago, psychologists paid people for succeeding on a geometry task. In the control group, the participants kept the money. But when another group started to leave, the researcher said, ‘I was wondering if you could do me a favor. The funds for this experiment have run out and I’m using my own money to finish. As a favor to me, would you mind returning the money you won?’ Nearly all gave the money back. When questioned about how much they liked the researcher, the people who had done him the favor liked him substantially more than the people who didn’t. Why? When we give our time, energy, knowledge, or resources to help others, we strive to maintain a belief that they’re worthy and deserving of our help.”
227. “Leaders who don't have time to read are leaders who don't make time to learn.”
228. “Entrepreneurs who kept their day jobs had 33% lower odds of failure than those who quit. If you’re risk averse and have some doubts about the feasibility of your ideas, it’s likely that your business will be built to last. If you’re a freewheeling gambler, your startup is far more fragile. Former track star Phil Knight started selling running shoes out of the trunk of his car in 1964, yet kept working as an accountant until 1969. After inventing the original Apple I computer, Steve Wozniak started the company with Steve Jobs in 1976 but continued working full-time in his engineering job at Hewlett-Packard until 1977. Thriller master Stephen King worked as a teacher, janitor, and gas station attendant for seven years after writing his first story, only quitting a year after his first novel, Carrie, was published.”
229. “Visit www.giveandtake.com to take a free survey that tests your giver quotient. You can invite other people in your network to rate your reciprocity style, and you’ll receive data on how often you’re seen as a giver, taker, and matcher.”
230. “This is what I find most magnetic about successful givers: they get to the top without cutting others down, finding ways of expanding the pie that benefit themselves and the people around them. Whereas success is zero-sum in a group of takers, in groups of givers, it may be true that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.”
231. “You don’t have to ask permission to take responsibility.”
232. “In the mind of a Giver, the definition of success itself takes on a distinctive meaning: Whereas Takers view success as attaining results that are superior to others, and Matchers see success in terms of balancing individual accomplishments with fairness to others, Givers are inclined to follow (Peter Audet)’s lead, characterizing success as individual achievements that have a positive impact on others.”
233. “It works for careers too: in 1990, Dennis was the 40th most common male name in the U.S., Jerry was the 39th, and Walter was 41st. There were 270 dentists in the U.S. named Jerry, 257 named Walter. How many were named Dennis? 482! If your name was Dennis, you were almost twice as likely to become a dentist.”
234. “We all have thoughts and feelings that we believe are fundamental to our lives but that are better left unspoken.”
235. “After all, the purpose of learning isn’t to affirm our beliefs; it’s to evolve our beliefs.”
236. “Practice makes perfect, but it doesn’t make new. The gifted learn to play magnificent Mozart melodies and beautiful Beethoven symphonies, but never compose their own original scores.”
237. “Passionate people don’t wear their passion on their sleeves; they have it in their hearts.” ― Adam M. Grant
238. “Psychological safety is not a matter of relaxing standards, making people comfortable, being nice and agreeable, or giving unconditional praise. It’s fostering a climate of respect, trust, and openness in which people can raise concerns and suggestions without fear of reprisal. It’s the foundation of a learning culture.”
239. “Passionate people don’t wear their passion on their sleeves; they have it in their hearts.”
240. "There’s a wealth of evidence that people want to do meaningful work."
241. “I try to get as close as I can to cleaning out my inbox every night.”
242. “Many people who hold giver values in life choose matching as their primary reciprocity style at work, seeking an even balance of give and take.”
243. “From a relationship perspective, givers build deeper and broader connections.”
244. “Rifkin’s giving is governed by a simple rule: ‘You should be willing to do something that will take you five minutes or less for anybody.”
245. “I start a lot of things and purposely leave them unfinished. When I have a bunch of really long emails, and I need time to think about the response, I'll actually start replying, leave them as drafts, and move onto something else mid-sentence.”
246. “he’s incredibly responsive, which is one of the best characteristics you can have in an investor. He’ll get back to you any hour—day or night—quickly, on anything that matters.”
247. “Bragging about yourself violates norms of modesty and politeness—and if you were really competent, your work would speak for itself.”
248. “Your antidote to burnout is not necessarily less work. It could be more meaning.”
249. “I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world,” E. B. White once wrote. “This makes it difficult to plan the day.” ― Adam M. Grant
250. “People who suffer the most from a given state of affairs are paradoxically the least likely to question, challenge, reject, or change it.” ― Adam M. Grant
251. “In another study, there were no benefits of volunteering more than 100 hours, which seems to be the range where giving is maximally energizing and minimally draining. A hundred hours a year breaks down to just two hours a week. Research shows that if people start volunteering two hours a week, their happiness, satisfaction, and self-esteem go up a year later, the sweet spot where people make a meaningful difference without being overwhelmed or sacrificing other priorities.”
252. “News flash: Millennials aren't more narcissistic than other generations. We were all a bit more self-centered at 21”
253. “highly successful people have three things in common: motivation, ability, and opportunity.”
254. “The culture of a workplace - an organization's values, norms and practices - has a huge impact on our happiness and success.”
255. “When takers talk about mistakes, they’re usually quick to place the blame on other people. Givers are more likely to say, ‘Here’s the mistake I made; I learned the following from it. Here are the steps I’m taking to make sure I don’t let people down in the future.'”
256. “Common sense is rarely common practice.”
257. “I love discovering compelling new ideas and doing what I can to help spread the word about them.”
258. “A hallmark of wisdom is knowing when it’s time to abandon some of your most treasured tools, and some of the most cherished parts of your identity.”
259. “Tweeting has taught me the discipline to say more with fewer words.”
260. “By admitting your inadequacies, you show that you’re self-aware enough to know your areas for improvement—and secure enough to be open about them.”
261. “Who you are should be a question of what you value, not what you believe. Values are your core principles in life - they might be excellence and generosity, freedom and fairness, or security and integrity. Basing your identity on these kinds of principles enables you to remain open-minded about the best ways to advance them. You want the doctor whose identity is protecting health, the teacher whose identity is helping students learn, and the police chief whose identity is promoting safety and justice. When they define themselves by values rather than opinions, they buy themselves the flexibility to update their practices in light of new evidence.”
262. “Because we associate our names so strongly with our identities, we might be attracted to major decisions that remind us of our names. In an effort to demonstrate this, researchers conducted a mind-boggling set of studies and found that people are unusually likely to end up living in places that resemble their first names. People named Jack are four times more likely than people named Phillip to live in Jacksonville. And it’s not that they’re named after these places, people are more likely to move to places that resemble their own names (Georgia is twice as likely to move to Georgia as chance would predict).”
263. “To become original, you have to try something new, which means accepting some measure of risk.” ― Adam M. Grant
264. “Once people take ownership over the decision to receive feedback, they're less defensive about it.”
265. “Being a nice person is about courtesy: you’re friendly, polite, agreeable, and accommodating. When people believe they have to be nice in order to give, they fail to set boundaries, rarely say no, and become pushovers, letting others walk all over them.”
266. “Dissenting opinions are useful, even when they are wrong.”
267. “The most effective negotiators are otherish; they report high concern for their own interests and high concern for their counterparts’ interests. By looking for opportunities to benefit others and themselves, otherish givers are able to think in more complex ways and identify win-win solutions that both takers and selfless givers miss. Instead of just giving away value like selfless givers, otherish givers create value first. By the time they give slices of pie away, the entire pie is big enough that there’s plenty left to claim for themselves: they can give more and take more.”
268. “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” George Bernard Shaw” ― Adam M. Grant
269. “Focus attention and energy on making a difference in the lives of others, and success might follow as a by-product.”
270. “Aprendí que el coraje no era la ausencia de miedo, sino el triunfo sobre él... El hombre valiente no es aquel que no siente miedo, sino el que conquista ese miedo”. NELSON MANDELA”
271. “To get important work done, most leaders organize people into teams. They believe that when people collaborate toward a common goal, great things can happen. Yet in reality, the whole is often much less than the sum of the parts.”
272. “Creativity may be hard to nurture, but it's easy to thwart.”
273. “If we want girls to receive positive reinforcement for early acts of leadership, let's discourage bossy behavior along with banning bossy labels. That means teaching girls to engage in behaviors that earn admiration before they assert their authority.”
274. “En cuestiones de estilo, nade con la corriente”, dicen que aconsejaba Thomas Jefferson, pero “en cuestiones de principios, sea sólido como una roca”,”
275. “And they act in the face of risk, because their fear of not succeeding exceeds their fear of failing.”
276. “To make sense of bossiness, we need to tease apart two fundamental aspects of social hierarchy that are often lumped together: power and status. Power lies in holding a formal position of authority or controlling important resources. Status involves being respected or admired.”
277. “I think of productivity as using your time to accomplish things of value to you and others.”
278. “I'm not a fan of being inauthentic.”
279. “Authenticity means erasing the gap between what you firmly believe inside and what you reveal to the outside world.”
280. “There are two Great Forces of human nature: Self Interest and Caring for Others, and people are most successful when they are driven by a Hybrid Engine of the two.’
281. “I have lots of micro-goals of trying to get things done, whatever the amount of time available”
282. “In a Canadian study, for the first few hours of volunteering a week, volunteers gained knowledge and skills at a consistent rate. By five hours a week, volunteering had diminishing returns: people were learning less and less with each additional hour.”
283. “Power frees us from the chains of conformity.”
284. “The art of advocacy is to lead you to my conclusion on your terms.”
285. “When it comes to landing a good job, many people focus on the role. Although finding the right title, position, and salary is important, there's another consideration that matters just as much: culture.”
286. “Arrogance leaves us blind to our weaknesses. Humility is a reflective lens: it helps us see them clearly. Confident humility is a corrective lens: it enables us to overcome those weaknesses.”
287. “Pronoia — the opposite of paranoia — is the delusional belief that other people are plotting your well-being, or saying nice things about you behind your back. If you’re a giver, this belief may be a reality, not a delusion.”
288. “To be an original one must not only come up with new ideas but also Sherpa those ideas into the wider world, battling skepticism, incomprehension, and outright hostility in the process. . . .”
289. “Geniuses don’t have better ideas than the rest of us. They just have more of them.”
290. “Good teachers introduce new thoughts, but great teachers introduce new ways of thinking.”
291. “Convictions in our ideas is dangerous not only because it leaves us vulnerable to false positives, but also because it stops us from generating the requisite variety to reach our creative potential.”
292. “It’s never too late to become original.”
293. “Lectures aren’t designed to accommodate dialogue or disagreement; they turn students into passive receivers of information rather than active thinkers.”
294. “An employee made a mistake that cost the company $10 million, he walked into the office of Tom Watson, the C.E.O., expecting to get fired. “Fire you?” Mr. Watson asked. “I just spent $10 million educating you.”
295. “Job crafting involves innovating around a job description, creatively adding and customizing tasks and responsibilities to match personal interests and values. A Google study found that this made employees both happier and more productive. You can start by creating a ‘before sketch’ of how you currently allocate your time and energy, and then develop a visual ‘after diagram’ of how you’d like to modify your job. Job crafting booklets can be ordered at www.jobcrafting.org.)”
296. “People tend to have one of three ‘styles’ of interaction. There are takers, who are always trying to serve themselves; matchers, who are always trying to get equal benefit for themselves and others; and givers, who are always trying to help people.”
297. “Negative feedback can make people feel inferior.”
298. “Having a sense of security in one realm gives us the freedom to be original in another. By covering our bases financially, we escape the pressure to publish half-baked books, sell shoddy art, or launch untested businesses. When”
299. “If you don't hire originals, you run the risk of people disagreeing but not voicing their dissent.”
300. “Privately signing a pledge to be kind like Harvard students do might backfire. In one experiment, psychologists randomly assigned people to write about themselves using either giver terms like caring, generous, and kind, or neutral terms like book, keys, and house. After the participants filled out another questionnaire, a researcher asked them if they wanted to donate money to a charity of their choosing. Those who wrote about themselves as givers donated an average of 2.5 times less money. ‘I’m a giving person,’ they told themselves, ‘so I don’t have to donate this time.’ When Harvard students sign the pledge, they establish credentials as givers, which may grant them a psychological license to give less — or take more.”
301. “Being original doesn’t require being first. It just means being different and better.” ― Adam M. Grant
302. “Research suggests that there are two fundamental paths to influence: dominance and prestige. When we establish dominance, we gain influence because others see us as strong, powerful, and authoritative. When we earn prestige, we become influential because others respect and admire us.”
303. “Selfless giving, in the absence of self-preservation instincts, easily becomes overwhelming. Being other-ish means being willing to give more than you receive, but still keeping your own interests in sight, using them as a guide for choosing when, where, how, and to what you give. Otherish givers help with no strings attached; they’re just careful not to overextend themselves along the way.”
304. “Argue like you’re right and listen like you’re wrong.” ― Adam M. Grant
305. “When you put off a task, you buy yourself time to engage in divergent thinking rather than foreclosing on one particular idea.”
306. “If we create networks with the sole intention of getting something, we won’t succeed. We can’t pursue the benefits of networks; the benefits ensue from investments in meaningful activities and relationships.”
307. “Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.”
308. “Changing your mind doesn’t make you a flip-flopper or a hypocrite. It means you were open to learning.”
309. “In every line of work, there are people who become active architects of their own jobs: They rethink their roles through job crafting - Changing their daily actions, to better fit their values, interests, and skills.”
310. “When you put off a task, you buy yourself time to engage in divergent thinking rather than foreclosing on one particular idea...”
311. “Bragging about yourself violates norms of modesty and politeness - and if you were really competent, your work would speak for itself.”
312. “Productive givers focus on acting in the long-term best interests of others, even if it's not pleasant. They have the courage to give the critical feedback we prefer not to hear, but truly need to hear. They offer tough love, knowing that we might like them less, but we'll come to trust and respect them more”
313. “If originals aren’t reliable judges of the quality of their ideas, how do they maximize their odds of creating a masterpiece? They come up with a large number of ideas. Simonton finds that on average, creative geniuses weren’t qualitatively better in their fields than their peers. They simply produced a greater volume of work, which gave them more variation and a higher chance of originality. “The odds of producing an influential or successful idea,” Simonton notes, are “a positive function of the total number of ideas generated.” ― Adam M. Grant
314. “We live in a rapidly changing world, where we need to spend as much time rethinking as we do thinking."
315. “When it comes to landing a good job, many people focus on the role. Although finding the right title, position, and salary is important, there’s another consideration that matters just as much: culture.”
316. “No one wants to hear everything that’s in your head. They just want you to live up to what comes out of your mouth.”
317. “Dissenting opinions are useful even when they’re wrong. So instead of speaking to highly agreeable audiences, target suggestions to people with a history of originality.”
318. “We were four friends before we started, and we made a commitment, and we made a commitment that dealing with each other fairly was more important than success.”
319. “Takers are self-serving in their interactions. It's all about what can you do for me.”
320. “I’m still struggling to accept that Pluto may not be a planet.”
321. “Some people are selfish in all of their relationships. Those people are called sociopaths.”
322. “Original thinkers doubt the default.”
323. “Agreeable people are warm and friendly. They're nice; they're polite. You find a lot of them in Canada.”
324. “The more I help out, the more successful I become. But I measure success in what it has done for the people around me. That is the real accolade.”
325. “This chapter is about the hurdles and best practices in idea selection. To figure out how we can make fewer bad bets, I sought out skilled forecasters who have learned to avoid the risks of false positives and false negatives.”
326. “Complex tasks are often better handled in the back of our mind, and that's often true of creative tasks - when you have something complex to deal with in writing or research or responding to an email. I'll start working, put it aside, and sometimes I'll wake up the next morning with a solution, or I'll find one when I exercise.”
327. “Our intuitions are only accurate in domains where we have a lot of experience.”
328. “When you procrastinate, you're more likely to let your mind wander. That gives you a better chance of stumbling onto the unusual and spotting unexpected patterns.”
329. “If we communicate the vision behind our ideas, the purpose guiding our products, people will flock to us.”
330. “Originals is a fascinating, eye-opening read that will help you not just recognize your own unique gifts, but find the strength to challenge conventional wisdom to bring them to life.”
331. “Ser original no es el camino más fácil en la búsqueda de la felicidad, pero nos deja perfectamente preparados para la felicidad de la búsqueda.”
332. “Another impressive initiative is HopeMob, a place where ‘generous strangers unite to bring immediate hope to people with pressing needs all over the world.’”
333. “The opposite of an underminer is a supporter. When colleagues are supportive, they go out of their way to be givers rather than takers, working to enhance our productivity, make us look good, share ideas, and provide timely help.”
334. “Ser original no implica ser el primero... solo significa ser diferente y mejor.”
335. “According to eminent Stanford professor James March, when many of us make decisions, we follow a logical consequence: which course of action will produce the best result? If you’re like [Jackie] Robinson, and you consistently challenge the status quo, you operate differently, using instead of a logic of appropriateness: What does a person like me do in a situation like this? Rather than looking outward in an attempt to predict the outcome, you turn inward to your identity. You base the decision on who you are – or who you want to be.
336. “If you want to be original, the most important possible thing you could do… is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work.”
337. “The hallmark of originality is rejecting the default and exploring whether a better option exists.”
338. “We tend to stereotype agreeable people as givers, and disagreeable people as takers. When a new contact appears affable, it’s natural to conclude that he has good intentions. If he comes across as cold, this seems like a sign that he doesn’t care what’s in our best interests. But in making these judgments, we’re paying too much attention to the shell of a person’s demeanor, overlooking the pearl inside the shell. Giving and taking are based on our motives and values, and they’re choices that we make regardless of whether our personalities are agreeable or disagreeable. Whether you’re nice or not is separate from whether you’re self-focused or other-focused. When you combine outer appearances and inner intentions, agreeable givers and disagreeable takers are only two of the four combinations that exist in the world. We often overlook that there are people who are rough in demeanor, but ultimately generous with their time, expertise, and connections.”
339. “We often undercommunicate our ideas. They’re already so familiar to us that we underestimate how much exposure an audience needs to comprehend and buy into them.”
340. “In the long run, research shows that the mistakes we regret are not errors of commission, but errors of omission. If we could do things over, most of us would censor ourselves less and express our ideas more.”
341. “One of the signs of a bad coworker is a pattern of persistent undermining - intentionally hindering a colleague's success, reputation, or relationships.”
342. “Teams need the opportunity to learn about each other’s capabilities and develop productive routines. So once we get the right people on the bus, let’s make sure they spend some time driving together.”
343. “In a study, University of Minnesota researchers found that highly talented people tend to make others jealous, placing themselves at risk of being disliked, resented, ostracized, and undermined. But if these talented people are also givers, they no longer have a target on their backs. Instead, givers are appreciated for their contributions to the group. By taking on tasks your colleagues don’t want, you can dazzle them with your wit and humor without eliciting envy.”
344. “As a man, it is true that I will never know what it is like to be a woman. As an organizational psychologist, though, I feel a responsibility to bring evidence to bear on dynamics of work life that affect all of us, not only half of us.”
345. “Givers are comfortable expressing vulnerability; they’re interested in helping others, not gaining power over them, so they’re not afraid of showing chinks in their armor. By making themselves vulnerable, givers can actually build prestige. But there’s a twist: expressing vulnerability is only effective if the audience receives other signals establishing the speaker’s competence. When the average candidate was clumsy in a study, audiences liked him even less. But when the expert was clumsy, audiences liked him more. Psychologists call this the pratfull effect. A blunder can help an expert appear human and approachable — instead of superior and distant.”
346. “It’s ironic that when you go through a tragedy, you appreciate more. You realize how fragile life is and that there are so many things to still be thankful for.”
347. “Conviction in our ideas is dangerous not only because it leaves us vulnerable to false positives, but also because it stops us from generating the requisite variety to reach our creative potential.”
348. “Jason Geller, a Deloitte executive offers help to every new hire. He can’t proactively go and spend time with every junior person is his firm so he tries to sense who’s genuine and who’s not through an initial conversation. Some folks approach the conversation in terms of learning. Others say, ‘I want to get promoted. What should I do?’ and focus on telling him what they’re doing, not really asking insightful questions.”
349. “Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.” ― Adam Grant
350. “Recognize that dissenting opinions are useful even when they're wrong, and go out of your way to reward them.”
351. “In life, there's no such thing as an unmitigated good.”
352. “Finding the right mentor is not always easy. But we can locate role models in a more accessible place: the stories of great originals throughout history. Human rights advocate Malala Yousafzai was moved by reading biographies of Meena, an activist for equality in Afghanistan, and of Martin Luther King, Jr. King was inspired by Gandhi as was Nelson Mandela.
353. “Skender's approach contrasts with the basic model most companies follow when it comes to leadership development: identify high-potential people, and then provide them with the mentoring, support, and resources needed to grow to achieve their potential. To identify these high-potential future leaders, each year companies spend billions of dollars assessing and evaluating talent. Despite the popularity of this model, givers recognize that it is fatally flawed in one respect. The identification of talent may be the wrong place to start.”
354. “In a Reciprocity Ring experiment in my classroom, I announced that each student would make a request to the class and the rest of the class would try to use their knowledge, resources, and connections to help fulfill the request. The request could be anything meaningful in their professional or personal lives, from job leads to travel tips. Assuming other MBA students to be takers, students watched in disbelief as their peers began to use their networks to help one another.”
355. “If I had the day off and knew everyone else was voting, I wouldn't miss it. It would become a routine part of my responsibility as a citizen - like paying taxes, only less soul crushing.”
356. ‘To grow, people need to be challenged.”
358. “Productive givers focus on acting in the long-term best interests of others, even if it’s not pleasant. They have the courage to give the critical feedback we prefer not to hear, but truly need to hear. They offer tough love, knowing that we might like them less, but we’ll come to trust and respect them more.”
359. “Asking questions is a form of powerless communication that givers adopt naturally. Questions work especially well when the audience is already skeptical of your influence, such as when you lack credibility or status, or when you’re in a highly competitive negotiation situation. In a study, expert negotiators spent much more time trying to understand the other side’s perspective; questions made up over 21% of the experts’ comments but less than 10% of the average negotiators’ comments.”
360. “When ideas survive it's not because they're true - it's because they are interesting. What makes an idea interesting is that it changes our weakly heald opinions.”
361. “To judge givers, we often rely on personality cues, but it turns out these cues can be misleading. In half a century of research, psychologists have discovered a fundamental personality trait that distinguishes how people tend to appear in their social interactions. It’s called agreeableness — agreeable people tend to appear cooperative and polite — they seek harmony with others, coming across as warm, nice, and welcoming. Disagreeable people tend to be more competitive, critical, and tough — they’re more comfortable with conflict, coming across as skeptical and challenging.”
362. “To become an original, we have to be willing to take some risks. When we go against the grain to upend time-honored traditions, we can never be certain that we will succeed. As journalist Robert Quillen wrote, “Progress always involves risk. You can’t steal second and keep one foot on first base.”
363. “I’m just being honest” is a poor excuse for being rude. Candor is being forthcoming in what you say. Respect is being considerate in how you say it. Being direct with the content of your feedback doesn’t prevent you from being thoughtful about the best way to deliver it. Adam Grant, Organizational Psychologist
364. “Argue like you’re right and listen like you’re wrong.”
365. “A medida que adquirimos conocimientos sobre un campo, nos convertimos en prisioneros de nuestros prototipos.”
366. “In the eyes of many people, giving doesn't count unless it's completely selfless. In reality, though, giving isn't sustainable when it's completely selfless.”
367. “Before women gained the right to vote in America, many “had never before considered their degraded status as anything but natural,” historian Jean Baker observes. As the suffrage movement gained momentum, “a growing number of women were beginning to see that custom, religious precept, and law were in fact man-made and therefore reversible.”
368. “If you don’t hire originals, you run the risk of people disagreeing but not voicing their dissent.”
369. “There's a fine line between heroic persistence and foolish stubbornness. Sometimes the best kind of grit is gritting our teeth and turning around”
370. “To grow, people need to be challenged.”
371. “When you’re dealing with an ambivalent relationship, you’re constantly on guard, grappling with questions of trust.”
372. “An inspiring community of givers is ServiceSpace, a platform for people to increase their giver quotients through gift economy projects, inspirational content, and nonprofit support. ‘The more you give, the more you want to do it — as do others around you. It’s like going to the gym,’ the founder says, ‘If you’ve been working out your kindness muscles, you get stronger at it.”
373. “The guiding principle of productive disagreement: argue like you’re right, listen like you’re wrong.”
374. “I have two rules for a great book: make me think and make me smile.”
375. “If you want to be original, "the most important possible thing you could do," says Ira Glass, the producer of This American Life and the podcast Serial, "is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work.”
376. “Some of the greatest moments in human history were fueled by emotional intelligence.”
377. “Leaders who master emotions can rob us of our capacities to reason. If their values are out of step with our own, the results can be devastating.”
378. “We believe that great creators are born with a biological immunity to risk. They’re wired to embrace uncertainty
379. “Excellence is the product of high aspirations and low ego.”
380. “In a study, 82% of participants who were told they shared a rare trait with another participant were willing to help them vs. only 55% when they were told they shared a common trait. It was an uncommon commonality that drove people to act like givers. We gravitate toward people, places, and products with which we share an uncommon commonality. To explain why, researcher Marilynn Brewer developed an influential theory. On the one hand, we want to fit in: we strive for connection, community, belonging, and affiliation with others. On the other hand, we want to stand out: we search for uniqueness and individuality. As we navigate the social world, these two motives are often in conflict. The more strongly we associate with a group, the greater our risk of losing our uniqueness. The more we work to distinguish ourselves from others, the greater our risk of losing our sense of belongingness. How do we resolve this conflict? The solution is to be the same and different at the same time. A popular way to achieve this is to join a unique group. Being part of a group with shared interests, identities, values, skills, or experiences gives us a sense of connection and belonging. At the same time, being part of a group that is clearly distinct from other groups gives us a sense of uniqueness. The more unique a group, value, interest, skill, or experience is, the more likely it is to facilitate a bond. These are the groups in which we take the most pride, and feel the most cohesive and valued.”
381. “Talented people are attracted to those who care about them.”
382. “The more reasons we put on the table, the easier it is for people to discard the shakiest one. Once they reject one of our justifications, they can easily dismiss our entire case. That happened regularly to the average negotiators: they brought too many different weapons to battle. They lost ground not because of the strength of their most compelling point, but because of the weakness of their least compelling one.”
383. “As Chris Granger, executive vice president at the NBA, explains, “Talented people are attracted to those who care about them. When you help someone get promoted out of your team, it’s a short-term loss, but it’s a clear long-term gain. It’s easier to attract people, because word gets around that your philosophy is to help people.”
384. “The mark of higher education isn’t the knowledge you accumulate in your head. It’s the skills you gain about how to learn.”
385. “In these pages, I learned that great creators don’t necessarily have the deepest expertise but rather seek out the broadest perspectives.” ― Adam M. Grant
386. “Having a sense of security in one realm gives us the freedom to be original in another.” ― Adam M. Grant
387. “The first step to foster giving is to make it ok and normal to ask for help. Research shows that the vast majority of giving at work occurs between people in response to direct requests.”
388. “When writing 'Give and Take' and 'Originals,' the predominant emotion for me was curiosity.”
389. “Extensive research shows that once people make an investment of time, energy, or resources, when it goes sour, they’re at risk for increasing their investment. When an investment doesn’t pay off, if the expected value is negative, we invest more.”
390. “According to Berkeley sociologist Arlie Hochschild, if you're feeling an intense emotion like anxiety or anger, there are two ways to manage it: surface acting or deep acting. Surface acting involves putting on a mask--modifying your speech, gestures, and expressions to present yourself as unfazed...In deep acting, known as method acting in the theater world, you actually become the character you wish to portray. Deep acting involves changing your inner feelings, not just your outer expressions of them...Deep acting turns out to be a more sustainable strategy for managing emotions than surface acting. Research shows that surface acting burns us out: Faking emotions that we don't really feel is both stressful and exhausting. If we want to express a set of emotions, we need to actually experience them.”
391. “I can't tell you that if you bring in a bunch of weird and different people, then a bunch of good things will happen. But I can tell you that if you hire a bunch of similar people and promote only the ones who are most similar, a bunch of bad things are likely to happen.”
392. “The great thing about a culture of givers is that's not a delusion - it's reality.”
393. “Entrepreneurs who kept their day jobs had 33 percent lower odds of failure than those who quit.”
394. “When takers talk about mistakes, they're usually quick to place the blame on other people. Givers are more likely to say 'Here's the mistake I made; I learned the following from it. Here are the steps I'm taking to make sure I don't let people down in the future.'”
395. “Perhaps gaining power doesn't cause people to act like takers. It simply creates the opportunity for people who think like takers to express themselves.”
396. “Procrastinating is a vice when it comes to productivity, but it can be a virtue for creativity.”
397. “The more you value achievement, the more you come to dread failure. Instead of aiming for unique accomplishments, the intense desire to succeed leads us to strive for guaranteed success.”
398. “After spending decades studying how people deal with setbacks, psychologist Martin Seligman found that three P's can stunt recovery: (1) personalization - the belief that we are at fault; (2) pervasiveness - the belief that an event will affect all areas of our life; and (3) permanence - the belief that the aftershocks of the event will last forever.”
399. “In the conversation about women in leadership, male voices are noticeably absent.”
400. “People donate more money to charity when the phrase ‘even a penny will help’ is added to a request. Interestingly, this phrase increases the number of people who give without necessarily decreasing the amount that they give. Legitimizing small contributions draws in takers, making it difficult and embarrassing for them to say no, without dramatically reducing the amount donated by givers.”
401. “As more women 'lean in' and we collectively continue to fight sexism, there's another barrier to progress that hasn't been addressed: Many men who would like to see more women leaders are afraid to speak up about it.”
402. “Being wrong won’t always be joyful. The path to embracing mistakes is full of painful moments, and we handle those moments better when we remember they’re essential for progress. But if we can’t learn to find occasional glee in discovering we were wrong, it will be awfully hard to get anything right.”
403. “People often believe that character causes action, but when it comes to producing moral children, we need to remember that action also shapes character.”
404. “After all, the purpose of learning isn't to affirm our beliefs; it's to evolve our beliefs.”
405. “For years, I believed that anything worth doing was worth doing early. In graduate school, I submitted my dissertation two years in advance. In college, I wrote my papers weeks early and finished my thesis four months before the due date. My roommates joked that I had a productive form of obsessive-compulsive disorder.”
406. “In college, my idea of a productive day was to start writing at 7 A.M. and not leave my chair until dinnertime.”
407. “Turns out that motivation is the reason that people develop talent in the first place.”
408. “High academic achievers were 2.3 times as likely to be firstborn as lastborn. Rebels were twice as likely to be lastborn as firstborn. And when asked to write about the few most rebellious or unconventional things they had ever done in their lives, laterborns had longer responses and described more unconventional behaviors. Hundreds of studies point to the same conclusion: although firstborns tend to be more dominant, conscientious, and ambitious, laterborns are more open to taking risks and embracing original ideas. Firstborns tend to defend the status quo; laterborns are inclined to challenge it.”
409. “We don’t know how time and circumstances will change what we want and even who we want to be, and locking our life GPS onto a single target can give us the right directions to the wrong destination.”
