Hidden Potential

by Adam M. Grant

The true measure of your potential is not the height of the peak you’ve reached, but how far you’ve climbed to get there.

It’s easy for people to be critics or cheerleaders. It’s harder to get them to be coaches. A critic sees your weaknesses and attacks your worst self. A cheerleader sees your strengths and celebrates your best self. A coach sees your potential and helps you become a better version of yourself.

Instead of seeking feedback, you’re better off asking for advice.23 Feedback tends to focus on how well you did last time. Advice shifts attention to how you can do better next time. In experiments, that simple shift is enough to elicit more specific suggestions and more constructive input.fn2 Rather than dwelling on what you did wrong, advice guides you toward what you can do right.

There’s nothing wrong with taking criticism personally. Taking it personally shows you’re taking it seriously. Getting upset isn’t a mark of weakness or even defensiveness—as long as your ego doesn’t stand in the way of your learning.

Being a sponge is not only a proactive skill—it’s a prosocial skill. Done right, it’s not just about soaking up nutrients that help us grow. It’s also about releasing nutrients to help others grow.

Wabi sabi is a character skill. It gives you the discipline to shift your attention from impossible ideals to achievable standards—and then adjust those standards over time. But finding beauty in imperfection is often easier said than done. As a recovering perfectionist, I know from experience.

Pivoting is a popular concept in Silicon Valley, where it’s often said that done is better than perfect. To rapidly iterate and improve, entrepreneurs and engineers are advised to build a minimum viable product. But excellence is a higher standard: for me, that means aiming for a minimum lovable product.

Making progress isn’t always about moving forward. Sometimes it’s about bouncing back. Progress is not only reflected in the peaks you reach—it’s also visible in the valleys you cross. Resilience is a form of growth.

Unlocking the hidden potential in groups requires leadership practices, team processes, and systems that harness the capabilities and contributions of all their members. The best teams aren’t the ones with the best thinkers. They’re the teams that unearth and use the best thinking from everyone.

Putting people in a group doesn’t automatically make them a team.

When we select leaders, we don’t usually pick the person with the strongest leadership skills. We frequently choose the person who talks the most. It’s called the babble effect. Research shows that groups promote the people who command the most airtime15—regardless of their aptitude and expertise. We mistake confidence for competence, certainty for credibility, and quantity for quality. We get stuck following people who dominate the discussion instead of those who elevate it.

They know that the goal isn’t to be the smartest person in the room; it’s to make the entire room smarter.

If we listen only to the smartest person in the room, we miss out on discovering the smarts that the rest of the room has to offer. Our greatest potential isn’t always hidden inside us—sometimes it sparks between us, and sometimes it comes from outside our team altogether.

Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles … overcome while trying to succeed.1 —BOOKER T. WASHINGTON