Think Again - Adam Grant

The bestselling author of Give and Take and Originals, Organizational psychologist Adam Grant examines the critical art of rethinking: learning to question your opinions and open other people’s minds, which can position you for excellence at work and wisdom in life in his book 'Think Again' which was 22nd of 2021. He makes it one of his guiding principles to argue like he’s right but listen like he’s wrong. With bold ideas and rigorous evidence, he investigates how we can embrace the joy of being wrong, bring nuance to charged conversations, and build schools, workplaces, and communities of lifelong learners. Think Again reveals that we don’t have to believe everything we think or internalize everything we feel. It’s an invitation to let go of views that are no longer serving us well and prize mental flexibility over foolish consistency. If knowledge is power, knowing what we don’t know is wisdom. 

Learning requires focus. But, unlearning and relearning requires much more—it requires choosing courage over comfort. In Think Again, Adam Grant weaves together research and storytelling to help us build the intellectual and emotional muscle we need to stay curious enough about the world to actually change it. We listen to opinions that make us feel good, instead of ideas that make us think hard. We see disagreement as a threat to our egos, rather than an opportunity to learn. We surround ourselves with people who agree with our conclusions, when we should be gravitating toward those who challenge our thought process. The result is that our beliefs get brittle long before our bones. We think too much like preachers defending our sacred beliefs, prosecutors proving the other side wrong, and politicians campaigning for approval–and too little like scientists searching for truth. Intelligence is no cure, and it can even be a curse: being good at thinking can make us worse at rethinking. The brighter we are, the blinder to our own limitations we can become.

Steve Job did the rethinking in apple or did he? 

The story goes, it was his genius, clarity of vision that gave birth to the revolutionary iPhone. This is only part of the truth. The reality is Jobs was dead-set against the mobile phone category. It was his employees’ vision and their ability to change Job’s mind that really saved Apple from the brink of collapse. Sure, Jobs knew to think differently but it was his team that did much of the re-thinking. In 2004, a small group of engineers, designers, and marketers pitched Jobs on turning their hit product, the iPod, into a phone. “Why the f@*& would we want to do that?” Jobs snapped. “That is the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard.” The team had recognized that mobile phones were starting to feature the ability to play music, but Jobs was worried about cannibalizing Apple’s thriving iPod business. He hated cell-phone companies and didn’t want to design products within the constraints that carriers imposed. When his calls dropped or the software crashed, he would sometimes smash his phone to pieces in frustration. In private meetings and on public stages, he swore over and over that he would never make a phone. Yet some of Apple’s engineers were already doing research in that area. They worked together to persuade Jobs that he didn’t know what he didn’t know and urged him to doubt his convictions.

The iPhone represented a dramatic leap in rethinking the smartphone. Since its inception, smartphone innovation has been much more incremental, with different sizes and shapes, better cameras, and longer battery life, but few fundamental changes to the purpose or user experience. Looking back, if Mike Lazaridis who was an innovator had been more open to rethinking his pet product, would BlackBerry and Apple have compelled each other to reimagine the smartphone multiple times by now?

(Could hear audio on Mike Lazaridis as well)

"The curse of knowledge is that it closes our minds to what we don’t know. Good judgment depends on having the skill—and the will—to open our minds. I’m pretty confident that in life, rethinking is an increasingly important habit. Of course, I might be wrong. If I am, I’ll be quick to think again."

If there is a medical emergency, we take second opinion. But when it comes to our thoughts, we favor feeling right, over being right. We make many diagnoses of our own, we need to create the habit of making our own second opinions. 

The conventional wisdom says confidence and competence go hand in hand. In practice, they often diverge. The armchair quarterback syndrome is where confidence exceeds competence. The opposite of armchair quarterback syndrome is the imposter syndrome, where competence exceeds confidence. Imposter syndrome is when people believe they don’t deserve their success when they reach a certain level of success.

The Good Fight Club: The Psychology of Constructive Conflict

Karen Etty Jehn, an organization psychologist and one of the world’s leading experts in conflict management, says there are two types of conflicts. When you think about conflict, you’re probably picturing ‘relationship conflict’ – personal and emotional clashes. There’s another flavor called ‘task conflict’ – idea and opinion clashes. The two types of conflicts lead down to two very different consequences.

Great leaders know they learn more from the people who challenge their thought process, than a team of yes-man. They engage their critics to explain their range of view and make their thoughts stronger. Weak leaders silence their critics out of the fear of losing power and authority.  

Sometimes questioning our stereotypes means realizing that many members of a certain group aren’t terrible at all. And that’s more likely to happen when we actually come face to face with them. The most effective way to help people pull the unsteady Jenga blocks out of their stereotype towers is to talk with them in person.

Motivation Through Interviewing

Motivational interviewing begins at the intersection of humility and curiosity. The goal is not to tell them what to do, it is to help people break out of negative cycles and see new possibilities. Motivational interviewing happens in three simple steps:

1. Ask open-ended questions
2. Engage in reflective listening
3. Affirm the person’s desire and ability to change

This help people make their own decisions; its done by all professionals these days.

Adam shared his own thought on falling prey to idea cults. He said, “From time to time I’ve run into idea cults—groups that stir up a batch of oversimplified intellectual Kool-Aid and recruit followers to serve it widely. They preach the merits of their pet concept and prosecute anyone who calls for nuance or complexity. In the area of health, idea cults defend detox diets and cleanses long after they’ve been exposed as snake oil. In education, there are idea cults around learning styles—the notion that instruction should be tailored to each student’s preference for learning through auditory, visual, or kinesthetic modes. Some teachers are determined to tailor their instruction accordingly despite decades of evidence that although students might enjoy listening, reading, or doing, they don’t actually learn better that way. In psychology, I’ve inadvertently offended members of idea cults when I’ve shared evidence that meditation isn’t the only way to prevent stress or promote mindfulness; that when it comes to reliability and validity, the Myers-Briggs personality tool falls somewhere between a horoscope and a heart monitor; and that being more authentic can sometimes make us less successful. If you find yourself saying ____ is always good or ____ is never bad, you may be a member of an idea cult. Appreciating complexity reminds us that no behavior is always effective and that all cures have unintended consequences.”

Time For A Checkup

As a closure note, Adam share his thought on rethinking our career choices. He said, “My advice to students is to take a cue from health-care professions. Just as they make appointments with the doctor and the dentist even when nothing is wrong, they should schedule checkups on their careers. I encourage them to put a reminder in their calendars to ask some key questions twice a year. When did you form the aspirations you’re currently pursuing, and how have you changed since then? Have you reached a learning plateau in your role or your workplace, and is it time to consider a pivot? “

Regularly checking up career choices help you stay curious enough to discover new possibilities or even reconsider previously discarded ones. Checkups are not limited to careers. They’re relevant to plans in every domain of our lives. A successful relationship requires regular rethinking, whether it’s with our friends, mentors or a partner.

Our identities are open. So are our lives. We don’t have to stay fixated to old images of where we want to go or who we want to be. The simplest way to start rethinking our options is to question what we do daily. Rethinking liberates us from the shackles of our familiar surroundings and former selves. Rethinking is a tool for leading a more fulfilling life.

If you think rethinking is hard, you think rightly. Our inner Preacher, Prosecutor and Politician stand ready to trip us up: "The risk is that we become so wrapped up in preaching that we’re right, prosecuting others who are wrong, and politicking for support that we don’t bother to rethink our own views."

So what should we do instead? This book helps you find your inner Scientist — infinitely curious, moderately confident, perennially skeptical. Then "you define your identity in terms of values, not opinions", and actively "seek out information that goes against your views."

Rethinking is not only a skill set but also a mindset.