Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know

by Adam M. Grant

Progress is impossible without change;1 and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything. —GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

As the iPhone skyrocketed onto the scene, Mike maintained his belief in the features that had made the BlackBerry a sensation in the past. He was confident that people wanted a wireless device for work emails and calls, not an entire computer in their pocket with apps for home entertainment. As early as 1997, one of his top engineers wanted to add an internet browser, but Mike told him to focus only on email. A decade later, Mike was still certain that a powerful internet browser would drain the battery and strain the bandwidth of wireless networks. He didn’t test the alternative hypotheses.

Mental horsepower doesn’t guarantee mental dexterity. No matter how much brainpower you have, if you lack the motivation to change your mind, you’ll miss many occasions to think again. Research reveals that the higher you score on an IQ test, the more likely you are to fall for stereotypes, because you’re faster at recognizing patterns.21 And recent experiments suggest that the smarter you are,22 the more you might struggle to update your beliefs.

Research shows that when people are resistant to change, it helps to reinforce what will stay the same. Visions for change are more compelling when they include visions of continuity. Although our strategy might evolve, our identity will endure.

For months, she struggled with the idea of becoming a candidate. As her friends and family encouraged her to recognize that she had some relevant skills, Halla was still convinced that she lacked the necessary experience and confidence. She tried to persuade other women to run—one of whom ended up ascending to a different office, as the prime minister of Iceland.

The opposite of armchair quarterback syndrome is impostor syndrome, where competence exceeds confidence.8 Think of the people you know who believe that they don’t deserve their success. They’re genuinely unaware of just how intelligent, creative, or charming they are, and no matter how hard you try, you can’t get them to rethink their views.

What he lacked is a crucial nutrient for the mind: humility. The antidote to getting stuck on Mount Stupid is taking a regular dose of it. “Arrogance is ignorance plus conviction,”27 blogger Tim Urban explains. “While humility is a permeable filter that absorbs life experience and converts it into knowledge and wisdom, arrogance is a rubber shield that life experience simply bounces off of.”

Many people picture confidence as a seesaw. Gain too much confidence, and we tip toward arrogance. Lose too much confidence, and we become meek. This is our fear with humility: that we’ll end up having a low opinion of ourselves. We want to keep the seesaw balanced, so we go into Goldilocks mode and look for the amount of confidence that’s just right. Recently, though, I learned that this is the wrong approach.

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.

When adults have the confidence to acknowledge what they don’t know, they pay more attention to how strong evidence is and spend more time reading material that contradicts their opinions.34 35 In rigorous studies of leadership effectiveness across the United States and China, the most productive and innovative teams aren’t run by leaders who are confident or humble. The most effective leaders score high in both confidence and humility.36 Although they have faith in their strengths, they’re also keenly aware of their weaknesses. They know they need to recognize and transcend their limits if they want to push the limits of greatness.

A few years later, when I invited her to speak to my class, Halla mentioned that the psychological fuel that propelled her meteoric rise was none other than impostor syndrome. Feeling like an impostor is typically viewed as a bad thing, and for good reason—a chronic sense of being unworthy can breed misery, crush motivation, and hold us back from pursuing our ambitions.

Uncertainty primes us to ask questions and absorb new ideas.

Disagreeable people tend to be more critical, skeptical, and challenging—and they’re more likely than their peers to become engineers and lawyers.21 They’re not just comfortable with conflict; it energizes them. If you’re highly disagreeable,22 you might be happier in an argument than in a friendly conversation. That quality often comes with a bad rap: disagreeable people get stereotyped as curmudgeons who complain about every idea, or Dementors who suck the joy out of every meeting.