Adam Grant on Productivity and Personal motivation
The Tim Ferriss Show hosted by Tim Ferriss - Podcast Index
Adam Grant, an organizational psychologist at Wharton and bestselling author, dives into the intricacies of productivity and personal motivation. He challenges the notion of laziness, suggesting that aligning projects with intrinsic values boosts engagement. Grant shares how feedback can enhance confidence and teaching effectiveness, and discusses the importance of structured routines for maximizing productivity. He also emphasizes redefining success beyond metrics, highlighting personal growth and the impact of meaningful relationships.
Snips
[01:31:51] Create a User Manual of Yourself for Others
🎧 Play snip - 1min️ (01:31:51 - 01:33:14)
✨ Key takeaways
- When working with new people, it is important to be selfaware and write down what strengths and weaknesses you have in order to be more effective.
- It is also important to ask others who work with you to do the same so that you can build a collective user manual.
📚 Transcript
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Adam Grant
I buy a new car, it comes with an owner's manual, so I know how to operate it. But when I work with a new person who's way more complex than a car, I don't get anything. And so I'm kind of starting from square one when, in fact, they have all these experiences that could teach me something from their past about how to work with them better in the present And the future. And so what he did, his name is Orskolnik, he sat down and he wrote up a one-pager on how to work with him effectively. What are his strengths? What are his weaknesses? What are the triggers that bring out the worst in him? What are the moments that bring out the best in him? And then he didn't stop there. He asked his team to write their user manual for him so that he could gauge his own self-awareness. And of course, he found the team's analysis much more insightful and accurate than his own because of the blind spot factor in part. But now every new person who works with him gets that one pager and gets to immediately start as if they've known him for a month or two and say, okay, here are the things I might want to adapt If I want to be really effective with this manager. And so I've gone and done that. I asked a bunch of people who work with me to write my user manual. And it's very simple. The questions are, what are my strengths? What brings those out? What are my weaknesses? What brings those out? What are my blind spots? And what do you know now about working with me that you wish you had known when we first started working together?