My interest in growth and learning led me to the book “Mindset” by Carol Dweck. It has opened my eyes to the ways in which we as humans tend to limit our own potential, both individually and in our organizations.

The concept of a fixed versus growth mindset is simple, yet the implications are massive.

According to Dweck, how you approach learning, and more specifically, how you approach yourself and others when it comes to growth, has the potential to drastically alter the direction and trajectory of your life and the lives of those around you. How you address challenges, how you cope with set-backs, and whether you begin to scratch the surface of your potential all hinges on your beliefs about growth and intelligence.

A fixed mindset is the belief that you have a fixed amount of intelligence and your skills and abilities cannot be developed. Granted, we all have natural limitations, but it assumes that our character, intelligence, and creative ability are unchangeable, and success is somehow the affirmation of that inherent intelligence.

If your mindset is fixed, you may have thoughts such as…

“I’m just not good with numbers…”

“I’m not a natural athlete…”

“I’m not a people person…”

With a fixed mindset, striving for success and avoiding failure at all costs becoming a way of maintaining the sense of being smart or skilled. Regardless of the amount of practice and effort you put in, you believe that your growth and development is limited.

A growth mindset, alternatively, is about believing you can develop your abilities, intelligence, or skills. It thrives on challenge and sees failure not as evidence of unintelligence but as a heartening springboard for growth and for stretching our existing abilities. The growth mindset creates a passion for learning rather than a hunger for approval. Thoughts look like…

“If I practice these equations, I can master them.”

“If I focus on improving, I can become a great athlete.”

“I can put myself out there and learn to work a room.”

If you have this mindset, you know that with intentional and focused practice, you can achieve a level of expertise in most anything you put your mind to. While not everyone can become an Einstein or Beethoven, a person’s full potential is rarely tapped into.

These two mindsets, which we tend to manifest from a very early age, determine a great deal of our behavior, our relationship with success and failure in both professional and personal contexts, and ultimately our capacity for happiness.

The major factor in whether people achieve expertise is not some fixed trait or prior ability, but rather, it’s purposeful engagement: where we place our focus and effort. It’s not always the people who start out the smartest that end up the smartest.

These different mindsets show up in our lives in different ways. Let’s look at a couple of different areas of life they impact and explore which mindset you may have in each of these areas.

Fear of Failure

I was recently on a call with a Fierce client, joined by my colleague Jaime Navarro, VP of Global and Channel Partners. During the call, she quickly built rapport with the client and helped them overcome their concerns in a way that if I had been leading the call, I don’t feel like I would have been able to do so skillfully. I thought wow, I’ve been doing this for two and a half years and I don’t lead calls this effectively. It would be natural to feel discouraged, but the truth is that I can learn from this experience. I had a choice in that moment to choose the path of growth or stay stuck in a fixed mindset and question my own self-worth.

It’s human to be impacted by failure and to fall into the trap of negative self-talk. The important part is to be aware of it. When you enter into the fixed mindset, your constant objective is to prove that you’re smart or talented. Any failure is unacceptable, and it’s humiliating and debilitating. Your goal is never about growth because you believe that’s not possible, so your goal becomes to validate and prove yourself.

The fixed mindset has even changed what failure means. To people living out of the fixed mindset, failure has been transformed from an action or event (I failed) to an identity (I’m a failure).

People with the growth mindset, however, seem to have a special talent for converting life’s setbacks into future successes. When you adopt the growth mindset and you truly believe that your traits and skills can be improved on and developed, you’ll start to have a great passion for learning.

Ask yourself:

How do I cope with set-backs and failure?

How do I cope with the set-backs or failures of others?

What kind of self-talk do you turn to?

When people believe their basic qualities can be developed, failure may still hurt, but failures don’t define them in a permanent way. If abilities can be expanded—if change and growth are possible—then there are still many paths to success.

Effort and Challenges

As I mentioned earlier, the major factor in whether people achieve expertise is not some fixed trait or prior ability, but rather, it’s purposeful engagement.

When you enter into the fixed mindset, you believe that effort is a bad thing. If you have to push yourself and exert any level of effort, it must mean that you don’t have a very high level of intelligence or talent. Effort, in this mentality, is for people with deficiencies. Risk and effort are seen as potential giveaways of their inadequacies, revealing that they come up short in some way.

The fixed mindset is about avoiding effort and risk at all costs…the growth mindset is about moving toward concerted effort and challenges with the goal of development.

People with the growth mindset believe that even geniuses have to work hard for their achievements. And what’s so heroic, they would say, about having a gift? This mindset believes that you need to work your hardest at the things you love the most. Achieving a level of mastery is not only possible, but a certainty through continued, consistent practice and effort.

Question to consider:

Are there areas in your life where you avoid being challenged?

Do you believe that if you put in effort, it says something negative about your intelligence or who you are?

Do you believe that the people are you can’t change or grow? Do you believe that how they are is how they will always be?

The Organizational Implications

Research into Enron following the scandal revealed exactly how a fixed mindset contributed to their downfall:

• Leaders in the organization had a fixed mindset, and they were revered for their “innate” intellect and ability.
• Everyone was deathly afraid of failure. It was a final evaluation of your competence and worth to the organization.
• A toxic culture was created while leaders were hungry to get ahead by pulling others down. It was a constant battle to prove superiority over your peers and deliver great personal results even at the expense of the organization.
• Ultimately, people were failing and too afraid to show it. It was covered up and all boiled over when the company was finally exposed.

Leaders with the fixed mindset carry over their beliefs to the people they lead. They believe that some people are inherently smart, talented or successful, and others are simply C-players that will never develop and never succeed. They believe there’s not much, if any, influence they can have over that person’s growth or development…so why bother? It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

People in a growth mindset don’t just seek challenge, they thrive on it. The bigger the challenge, the more they stretch. When you change the definition, significance, and impact of failure, it changes the deepest meaning of effort.

Great leaders believe in the growth mindset, they believe in the growth of intellect and talent, and they’re fascinated with the process of learning. Great leaders create an environment of trust where it’s clearly communication to their people, “I’m going to teach you, and I’m not going to judge your talent.” They believe people can reach a higher potential.

So, what’s really at stake for organizations?

Here’s what you can expect when leaders have a fixed mindset:

• A lack of innovation and accountability
• A lack of vulnerability, trust, and honesty
• People don’t seek new challenges and growth suffers
• Effort is seen as a bad thing, which creates a lack of productivity
• Political maneuvering, proving superiority, and seeking validation
• A toxic work culture
• Personal results come at the expense of organizational results

When this mindset infiltrates a company, the consequences are clear. It’s critical for the health of the culture, the people within it, and the organization to find a solution.

Aligning with Fierce

The content in Fierce programs address and help shift participants from a fixed to a growth mindset.

Foundations, for example, shows you how to provoke learning, tackle touch challenges, strengthen relationships, and shift the context filter that you have for yourself and others.

Another program that addresses this issue directly is Feedback. Those with a fixed mindset are only interested in hearing feedback that reflect directly on their current abilities, but they tune out information that could help them learn and improve. They even showed no interest in hearing the right answer when they had gotten a question wrong, because they had already filed it away in the failure category.

In Fierce Feedback, you develop a growth mindset by shifting your beliefs about feedback and learning how to give and receive feedback in a way that enriches relationships. You become attentive to information that could help them expand their existing knowledge and skill, regardless of whether they’d gotten the question right or wrong—in other words, their priority was learning, not the binary trap of success and failure.

Organizations need to collectively move away from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset. You can begin making changes by having a conversation with yourself, and then with your team.

In what ways do you personally hold a fixed mindset, and how can you shift towards growth instead?

Are there any policies or behaviors within your organization that promote a fixed mindset? If so, how can you and your team work together to change it?

Read about our programs if you’re curious to know more and want to shift your organization from fixed to growth.

Do you consider advice-giving to be part of your role as a business leader?

Even better, do you enjoy giving advice, solving problems, and suggesting best courses of action?

What if a guide wasn’t necessarily someone that tells you what’s the best route forward to reach your end goal, but instead helped you illuminate your path so that you—the employee, the friend, the mentee—could recognize the right path on your own?

This reminds me of a situation I experienced at Fierce recently.

The situation wasn’t unique. I was asked a question about the next steps to take in a small project we were working on.

While I had an idea of how I should respond, I quickly brushed that thought away. I didn’t want to make an error in assuming that I knew the answer and the next best steps. My truth was that I was a rookie and that disqualified me from dishing out some advice to myself.

That little voice of self-doubt gets quite comfortable once you open the door to let it into your mind. So I reached out to my boss only to discover that the next step was actually pretty obvious.

What’s stopping me from seeing the solutions that aren’t as obscure as I think—in the workplace, and even in my personal relationships?

Have a Mineral Rights conversation

In the Coaching program, you’ll walk through the seven steps in a Mineral Rights conversation. This is a conversation model that interrogates reality by mining for increased clarity, improved understanding, and impetus for change.

The goal of the mineral rights conversation is inspired by the literal action of mining: you dig deep into the layers of the ground, continuing to go deeper and deeper past temporary obstacles until you hit the “oil.”

Solutions are often obscured in layers of stratum: confusion, resistance, defensiveness, rational barriers, and emotional slush. You can’t rush through the layers at the same speed you would cruising along an open highway, because you’ll end up getting lodged into one of the first layers.

Have fun getting out of that sticky situation.

At Fierce, we believe that by engaging in deep and authentic conversations with your employees, you can discover the source of an issue, a conflict, a relationship that is falling apart, or an obstacle to completing a project successfully.

Your job as a leader is to tap into your employees and understand what’s really going on. You’re mining for clarity, and not just so that you can understand the issue.

First, connecting on a deeper level (where it’s honest and authentic) can enrich your relationship.

Second, this conversation is also helping your employee understand what’s really going on. And once they’ve reached this moment of clarity, they can then start digging around and realize that the solution is actually quite obvious.

This is what we at Fierce call an apostrophe moment. It’s that flash of blinding clarity. A “duh” moment.

All too often, the solution lies in you. We know it, deep inside, in the gut that we don’t always allow to chat with our head. Just having a safe space where a leader is listening to us in silence and only asking questions that prompt us to speak further allows us to dig deep and have what may be the most meaningful conversation you will ever have: the one with yourself.

Every conversation is with yourself and sometimes it involves other people.

Just taking the time to acknowledge this realization can be enlightening, as well as empowering. It can empower your employees to become more solution-oriented and solution-minded. It’s a cultural shift from a state of co-dependence on a leader or manager to one where there is more collaboration at all levels.

Be a coach rather than an advisor

The value behind the solutions that are generated in these conversations is that they are self-generated. It promotes self-actualization and contributes to the employee’s personal and professional development. As the leader, your job is to create the space for this conversation to happen. Ask the questions, listen, and let your employees create the solution.

They’ll come up with their own advice and it will be just what they need to hear.

Your job is to be the coach, not the advisor.

That process of digging deep and mining for the solution can be challenging. It’s tough to interrogate my own reality.

But if you don’t find solutions, you get stuck in a rut. And if you don’t have the conversation, chances are you probably won’t find the right solution on your own.

So how can a leader—acting as a coach rather than all-omnificent, advice-giver—prompt the conversation so that the mining can commence?

Ask clarifying questions

Have you ever heard of open-ended questions? These are questions that can’t be answered with a mere “yes” or “no”. Instead, they prompt everyone who is a part of the conversation to dig deeper. They lead to richer conversations that build the relationship and get to the heart of the matter.

The same practice applies to coaching employees to discover their own solutions. By asking leading questions and statements, you can mine for the root issues and, ultimately, the best solution.

For example, instead of asking your employee “have you ever thought about…?” before launching into what you think is an excellent piece of advice, say, “What have you thought about?”

Through this model, the employee is prompted to think: What have I thought about? What do I know? What are the details? What is the impact? How have I contributed to this issue? What do I think the ideal outcome is?

Every conversation that we have is with ourselves, and sometimes it involves other people. Through this conversation, you are not only having a conversation with your employee, you are prompting them to have a conversation with themselves.

Get real with yourself

An essential part of this process involves coming out from behind yourself into the conversation, making it real. Be curious. Challenge yourself to access the context that you have and that you want to believe is real. Your perception of the issue may be very different from that of your employee.

In her bestselling book “Fierce Conversations,” Fierce Founder and CEO Susan Scott talks about both the costs of being real and the costs of not.

“When we are real with ourselves and others, the change occurs even before the conversation has ended,” says Scott. “Insights about who we are and what we really want and need are already at work, rearranging our interior furniture, cleaning our internal closet of unnecessary clutter, revealing the way we must go.”

Ironically, the realities that we hold to be truth can be the very layers of stratum that are inhibiting the realization of the solution. As Scott mentions, they’re internal, so they may be subconscious.

Challenge these realities. Ask yourself why you are bringing these contexts into your current relationships, both at work and at home. Chances are, they are going to impact your ability to problem-solve. This exercise applies to everyone at all levels within an organization.

Ouch. That hurts. But so do growing pains. And uncomfortable is where change happens, where the “aha” happens.

And the brilliant result of a fierce conversation—where the employee is the problem-solver— is that the change that needs to occur (whether a plan of action or a shift in your attitude or perspective on the situation) has changed, within that moment.

How can you empower your employees even further to be problem-solvers in a fierce conversation? Explore the Fierce Coaching program to learn more.

Low productivity is last but not least on our list of the leading business problems we address in our latest eBook.

Each year, companies lose approximately $37 billion due to unproductive meetings. This impacts not only individual businesses but also the global economy. Time and money is being lost when it doesn’t have to be. This problem is real, and it’s time to wake up, have the right conversations, and address the root cause of the problem.

The problem of low productivity affects nearly all businesses at some point in their lifespan, and it shows up in a number of different ways in the everyday working environment. Here are a few of the symptoms:

1. Disengagement – Participation in activities, whether they’re directly related to roles and tasks or cultural events, is low. No one seems eager to discuss or resolve issues.

2. Nothing is accomplished in meetings – Rather than creating clarity, meetings lead to disengagement or even more confusion. Effective meetings get to the heart of the matter and leaders will seek input, while ineffective meetings generally involve beating around the bush and one-way conversations that don’t allow employees to weigh in.

3. Capacity doesn’t match results – Just because people are showing up to work and are putting forth an effort doesn’t mean productivity is being maximized. If technical or motivational problems are apparently and there’s more that could be achieved, your organization likely has an issue with low productivity.

4. Creativity is lacking – Few new ideas are being brought to the table, and the organization is in need of innovation in all areas of the business, from processes to projects to solutions. Growth, initiatives, and creative problem-solving may be stalled as a result.

The good news is that introducing the right conversations in your organization can reverse this problem, leading to more productive teams, more innovation, and better business results.

Client Highlight

Our work with The Taunton Press revealed the power effective conversations can have on workplace culture and productivity.

Their organizational goals prior to training were to improve performance, communication, and collaboration among teams. They rolled out Fierce training for all employees, both part-time and full-time, and they appointed two people internally to become certified in Fierce who could serve as coaches for employees.

After undergoing training, Taunton improved productivity and held more effective meetings with their new conversational approach. “People are giving frank input more often; it allows for the tougher conversations that they may have avoided in the past. We’re able to tackle tougher challenges and be more nimble. Meetings go better and we accomplish more,” said Carol Marotti, Taunton Vice President of Human Resources.

A survey they conducted every six months also revealed that employees were more satisfied with overall communication. Employee scores have risen when responding to the statement, the teams I interact with engage in meaningful debates that result in the best decisions for the company.

“If you’re going to live and breathe Fierce, you have to be consistent and to work harder at good communication, using the Fierce tools. It’s not always easy in the face of changes; sustainability is the key,” said Marotti.

Download the full case study here.

In our eBook, we refer to three programs that are particularly effective for organizations who want to increase productivity. Here’s a look at each, and some of the reasons why they’re effective:

Fierce Team

Increase engagement by seeking input – When leaders request input from their teams and communicate how much their individual input is valued, it builds trust and a sense of psychological safety. When employees are more engaged, more productivity results.

Have more productive meetings – When leaders and their teams know how to get to the heart of the matter, it saves time. Initiatives and projects move forward more easily, and after meetings, everyone knows what their role is and where to start so they can hit the ground running.

Increase innovation – Team conversations require soliciting multiple perspectives before reaching a decision. This increases collaboration and encourages individuals to share their unique ideas. The answers are in the room. Leaders are more informed when all ideas are brought to the table, allowing them to make better, more productive decisions.

Fierce Confront

Address issues head-on – When performance or relationship issues go unresolved, productivity is impacted. Addressing issues head-on removes the barriers that are hindering the momentum to move forward more efficiently and effectively.

Improve relationships, build trust – Confrontation requires transparency and courage. When you confront an issue with someone, you are showing what you really think and feel. From there, trust and a sense of safety are formed, and the other person knows that if an issue arises again, they can trust that you’ll let them know. This sense of safety leads to greater productivity. Read more here.

Course correct to salvage projects – When issues arise gradually, they can lead to an unwanted suddenly with projects. Confronting problems early on before they turn into a suddenly has the power to salvage the entire success of a project and set it on more positive trajectory. It also sets a better course for future projects.

Fierce Coach

Allow others to uncover their own barriers to success – If an employee is experiencing disengagement or their production efforts are slipping, chances are, they’ll have more insight into it than anyone else will. Effective coaching allows the other person to uncover what their barriers might be and how they can overcome them.

Initiate growth and development – Coaching leads others on a path of self-discovery, often resulting in a greater awareness of where they want to develop and take on tasks best suited to their strengths, skills, and interests, leading to more intrinsic motivation and productivity.

Reveal authentic truths – Guide individuals to have “aha!” moments and discover more of what they authentically want for themselves and their career. These are the kinds of revelations that will guide behavior moving forward and contribute to greater productivity.

Low productivity is a common business problem, but the power of effective conversation can set your organization on an entirely new, and more productive, path. Download the eBook here for more on low productivity and how to solve it.