Via Talks at Google

“We found there was remarkable consensus within organizations about which mindset their organization has, and more importantly, it made a big difference. In this research, we found that employees in growth-mindset organizations said they felt more empowered by the organization and more committed to it, whereas their counterparts in the more fixed-mindset organizations had one foot out the door waiting for the next highest bidder.”

— The Growth Mindset | Carol Dweck | Talks at Google, at 15:27

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Dr. Carol Dweck, Professor of Psychology at Stanford University and bestselling author of Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, conducted research across Fortune 500 companies and found “remarkable consensus within organizations about which mindset their organization has.”

More striking: that shared mindset played out in measurably different ways depending on the direction a company’s mindset leaned.

Employees in growth mindset organizations reported:

• Feeling more empowered and committed to the organization;
• Their companies truly valued creativity and innovation, with genuine support for reasonable risks;
• Strong emphasis on teamwork and collaboration;
• Managers believed most employees had the potential to rise and become stars.

Employees in fixed mindset organizations reported:

• One foot out the door, waiting for the next highest bidder;
• Companies talked about innovation, but “someone pays the price” when things don’t work out;
• Less collaboration and more knowledge hoarding;
• Despite worshipping, hiring, and paying for talent, few people were seen as having the potential to rise.

What’s more, employees in fixed mindset organizations reported that cheating and deception were far more prevalent. The logic is straightforward: If I have to be smarter than you, if I have to be the superstar, I’m going to consider all the different ways to look better than you look. They’ll also be more defensive and unwilling to admit mistakes.

In growth mindset organizations where people collaborate, learn, and tackle challenges together, the incentive to cheat disappears. The currency is learning and improvement, and employee behavior follows.

Things to Try Doing Today

If you’re a manager or leader:

• Examine your reward systems: do they reward collaboration and learning, or individual competition?
• Make it clear that reasonable risks are supported, even when outcomes don’t work out
• Ask about failures in interviews, and listen for whether candidates take responsibility and learn from them
• Share your own learning journey and growth moments, not just your successes
• Identify your triggers for fixed-mindset thinking (criticism, seeing others succeed, facing challenges) and pause long enough to be mindful when these triggers arise.