Hidden Potential
By Adam Grant
(PODCAST) | Briefing Document | (Amazon)
Overview:
Study shows that exceptional talent is often not visible at the start, as most high achievers were not child prodigies. Success comes from high personal standards and the right support, not just innate talent. Teaching and coaching others can boost our own skills and confidence.
Talent is evenly distributed, opportunity is not.
Aspiration is the person you hope to become.
Character is more than just having principles. It’s a learned capacity to live by your principles.
When we admire great thinkers, doers, and leaders, we often focus narrowly on their performance. That leads us to elevate the people who have accomplished the most and overlook the ones who have achieved the most with the least. 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.
Character is your capacity to prioritize your values over your instincts. Personality is not your destiny—it’s your tendency. Character skills enable you to transcend that tendency to be true to your principles. It’s not about the traits you have—it’s what you decide to do with them.
Becoming a creature of discomfort can unlock hidden potential in many different types of learning. Summoning the nerve to face discomfort is a character skill—an especially important form of determination.
Procrastination is a common problem whenever you’re pushing yourself beyond your comfort zone.
Many people associate procrastination with laziness. But psychologists find that procrastination is not a time management problem—it’s an emotion management problem. When you procrastinate, you’re not avoiding effort. You’re avoiding the unpleasant feelings that the activity stirs up. Sooner or later, though, you realize that you’re also avoiding getting where you want to go.
You can’t be ready for anything if you haven’t trained for everything. Pilots learn to cope with discomfort by intensifying it, and they build their skills as they navigate it.
It is not the most intellectual of the species that survives; it is not the strongest . . .the species that survives is the one that is able best to adapt. —Leon C. Megginson
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. Feedback tends to focus on how well you did last time. Advice shifts attention to how you can do better next time.
In their quest for flawless results, research suggests that perfectionists tend to get three things wrong.
One: they obsess about details that don’t matter. They’re so busy finding the right solution to tiny problems that they lack the discipline to find the right problems to solve. They can’t see the forest for the trees.
Two: they avoid unfamiliar situations and difficult tasks that might lead to failure. That leaves them refining a narrow set of existing skills rather than working to develop new ones.
Three: they berate themselves for making mistakes, which makes it harder to learn from them. They fail to realize that the purpose of reviewing your mistakes isn’t to shame your past self. It’s to educate your future self.
If perfectionism were a medication, the label would alert us to common side effects. Warning: may cause stunted growth. Perfectionism traps us in a spiral of tunnel vision and error avoidance: it prevents us from seeing larger problems and limits us to mastering increasingly narrow skills.
Beating yourself up doesn’t make you stronger—it leaves you bruised. Being kind to yourself isn’t about ignoring your weaknesses. It’s about giving yourself permission to learn from your disappointments. We grow by embracing our shortcomings, not by punishing them.
Ultimately, excellence is more than meeting other people’s expectations. It’s also about living up to your own standards. After all, it’s impossible to please everyone. The question is whether you’re letting down the right people. It’s better to disappoint others than to disappoint yourself.
On the path to any goal, roadblocks are inevitable. When we run into external barriers, they often take an internal toll. The daily grind starts to bore us and eventually burns us out. Stagnation leaves us discouraged. Difficult tasks lead to failure, dejection, and doubt. We begin to question whether we can bounce back, let alone move forward.
Character skills aren’t always enough to travel great distances. Many new skills don’t come with a manual, and steeper hills often require a lift. That lift comes in the form of scaffolding: a temporary support structure that enables us to scale heights we couldn’t reach on our own. It helps us build the resilience to overcome obstacles that threaten to overwhelm us and limit our growth.
Obsession leads us to see rest as taking a foot off the gas pedal. We don’t stop until we’ve pushed ourselves to the edge of exhaustion—it’s a price to pay for excellence. Under harmonious passion, it’s easier to recognize that rest is a supply of fuel. We take regular reprieves to maintain energy and avoid burnout.
Relaxing is not a waste of time—it’s an investment in well-being. Breaks are not a distraction—they’re a chance to reset attention and incubate ideas. Play is not a frivolous activity—it’s a source of joy and a path to mastery.
A rut is not a sign that you’ve tanked. A plateau is not a cue that you’ve peaked. They’re signals that it may be time to turn around and find a new route. When you’re stuck, it’s usually because you’re heading in the wrong direction, you’re taking the wrong path, or you’re running out of fuel. Gaining momentum often involves backing up and navigating your way down a different road—even if it’s not the one you initially intended to travel. It might be unfamiliar, winding, and bumpy. Progress rarely happens in a straight line; it typically unfolds in loops.
A digression doesn’t have to be a diversion. It can be a source of energy. A detour is a route off your main road that you take to refuel. You’re not taking a break; you’re not sitting still, idling. You’re temporarily veering off course, but you’re still in motion. You’re advancing toward a different goal.
Progress is rarely noticeable at a snapshot in time—it unfolds over extended periods of time.
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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.
I now believe that impostor syndrome is a sign of hidden potential. It feels like other people are overestimating you, but it’s more likely that you’re underestimating yourself. They’ve recognized a capacity for growth that you can’t see yet. When multiple people believe in you, it might be time to believe them.
Success is more than reaching our goals—it’s living our values.
