I’ll Figure it Out
Learning how to fix your leaky plumbing these days is easy: Just watch it on YouTube. What if you grew up without YouTube and had to figure things out yourself?
I keep a copy of the book “Mindset” by Dr. Carol Dweck nearby on a bookshelf in my home office where I currently work. Her research and book resonate with me. I want every young parent to read this before raising their children.
In a recent visit with my nephew, His wife, and two-year-old, I was mesmerized by watching my two-year-old grand-neice interact with all of the stimuli around her and kept thinking about Mindset and Dr. Dweck’s writing and research.
Dweck research shows that children who are repeatedly told how smart they are often fail later in life at life tasks or basic human activities. Why? Because of what Dweck calls a “closed mindset.” A person with a closed mindset may believe they are already smart (after all, my parents told me) and don’t need to learn anything. So, it is incomprehensible to them when they fail at something. How could they fail if repeatedly told they were the brightest, smartest, and best?
I think of my childhood and the lessons my parents taught me. Most of the lessons were about hard work. I walked into adulthood with a strong work ethic. I also went into adulthood with the idea that there was nothing I couldn’t do if I tried.
Let me explain. My Father grew up on a farm in harsh Eastern European (Latvia) conditions, yet local standards, his family were successful farmers and well-known in the area. Farmers are engineers, scientists, chemists, veterinarians, builders, and operators in the USA, all wrapped into one. A Farmer has to learn and know how to do everything on the farm. Why? Because everything will eventually go wrong, and there is no one to call to come to the farm and fix things quickly. The conditions on a farm in Eastern Europe just a few generations removed from serfdom were like that, perhaps harsher.
This was my Father’s life in the early part of the last century in Latvia. He transferred this “I can do anything with effort and perseverance” when he immigrated to the USA. Not knowing any English, he nonetheless worked hard to get a degree by taking courses via the mail, which was how “distance learning” was done in the 1950s’; he improved his speech and went from entry-level foundry and steel mill worker to a Quality Control Engineer.
He treated his home that way, too. The house we grew up in is filled with evidence of his “I’ll do it myself” attitude. He wasn’t a plumber, electrician, or carpenter, but he knew enough to try it and eventually get the job done. He didn’t care what others might think of his work; frankly, he didn’t have the money to pay professionals. Today’s generation would wonder how he was able to do it without first watching it on YouTube.
Whenever I read about technology, artificial intelligence, semiconductors, and other present-day concepts and ideas, I say to myself; I will need to learn about that someday as if that will be my third or fourth career choice. Right!
However, all this has rubbed off on me, and I am always at the edge of learning. My parents never read a book like Mindset, but they put into place a belief in myself that I can do anything. It may not be perfect, but it doesn’t matter.
Children who grew up under conditions wherein they believe they are already smart have been trained to think they don’t need to learn. They quit learning. They quit trying. This is the opposite of what I grew up with.
Through her research, Dweck determined that it’s better to laude your child for their effort rather than give them a preconceived idea that they are smarter than everyone else. “You worked hard studying for that test and now got an A. Excellent work, Johnny,” might be better than outright praising the child’s intellect.
This can apply to communities, too. Communities that believe they have already made it often fail because they (collectively) believe they don’t have anything to learn from other cities and regions. They often recite lines such as, “We have the best workers and education system around…” Blah, blah, blah, when they have never left their community, spent time learning from other communities, or understood the data. The data could reveal a different outcome than having the most intelligent and productive workforce.
Applying Dweck’s ideas to a community, organization, or business tells you that a growth mindset is superior. A growth mindset, applied to a person or a community, can reap great benefits and maturity as time passes.
“This community worked hard; people from all walks of life came together, learned together, and made this project happen,” might be a learning mindset speech made by the Mayor at the next ground-breaking or ribbon cutting. This is the opposite of the leader who stands on the stage and tells everyone how incredibly awesome the community is with the “best workforce, etc., etc., blah blah, blah.” That feels good at the moment, but when the unemployment rate rockets or a major employer leaves, what speech do you give? How does this make the community feel? How do they respond?
What kind of community is yours? Are you a growth mindset community or a closed mindset community? Is your economic development organization a learning organization or a close mindset organization?
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