In this video I'm excited to provide my review and summary of the book Think Again by Adam Grant,
and I also have a free pdf giveaway for you which I'll talk about towards the end of this video. Hi
this is Supreet, I'm an engineer-turned-leadership trainer. I upload weekly videos about books,
personal growth and meditation. so here's my review of think again by adam grant!
it is very well written, it flows smoothly from part one which is individual rethinking
to part two interpersonal rethinking to part three collective rethinking. in the book adam writes
"when i write a book i like to enlist my own challenge network i recruit a group of people
who are my most thoughtful critics and that i ask them to tear each chapter apart". it is
evident that adam did that with this book. the acknowledgement section shows that many people
were consulted to improve the book. this book is a labor of love for sure. this book is for
anyone who wants to rethink on an individual level or at a collective level or help others
to rethink. it will be especially appealing for you if you are an analytical person like me,
who likes to think about thinking, and rethinking, and rethink about rethinking! it has ideas
that can help entrepreneurs, managers, leaders, parents and mostly just anyone with an open mind.
i should mention that although i have read more than 100 self-help books, this is the first book
that i have read on the topic of rethinking. many concepts are explained using graphs and being
a person with a scientific background, i love graphs! i think graphs are super cool! it has lots
of great stories including two stories from nasa. stories involving astronauts and space station
are always fun for me. at the end there is a section called actions for impact where he has
summarized all the practical takeaways for you in just a few pages. i am all about the practical
application of self-help books. if a book just makes you feel good or motivated in the short
term, what's the point? i think that it would be a good idea to revisit these practical actions
at the end of the book if you don't have time to reread the whole book. the only thing that
i wasn't a fan of was the weird way he wrote the epilogue at the end. but that is so so minor that
i would still give this book five stars. if you want to buy the book, the amazon links are in
the description below. if you don't want to buy the book, think again! if you're getting value
out of this video, smash that like button! thank you! now i will give you my summary of this book.
this book is an invitation to let go of the knowledge and opinions that are no longer
serving you well, and also to anchor yourself in a sense of flexibility rather than consistency.
most of us including myself take pride in our knowledge and expertise and in staying true
to our beliefs and opinions. that makes sense in a stable world where we get rewarded for
having conviction in our ideas. but the problem is that we live in a rapidly changing world
where we need to spend as much time rethinking as we do thinking. rethinking is a skill set
but it is also a mindset. we often prefer the ease of hanging on to old views over the difficulty of
grappling with new ones. we favor the comfort of conviction over the discomfort of doubt. we laugh
at people who still use windows 95 yet we still cling to the opinions that we formed in 1995.
we listen to views that make us feel good instead of ideas that make us think hard. questioning
ourselves makes the world more unpredictable. it requires us to admit that the facts may have
changed and that what was once right may now be wrong. reconsidering something we believe
deeply, can threaten our identities, making it feel as if we're losing a part of ourselves.
adam says that as we think and talk, we often slip into the mindset of a preacher,
a prosecutor or a politician. the risk is that we become so wrapped up in preaching that we're
right, prosecuting others who are wrong, and politicking for support, that we don't bother
to rethink our own views. instead of taking on the role of a preacher, prosecutor or politician,
adam encourages us to consider acting like a scientist. if you're a scientist by trade,
rethinking is fundamental to your profession. you are paid to be constantly aware of the limits of
your understanding. you're expected to doubt what you know, be curious about what you don't know
and update your views based on new data. but being a scientist is not just a profession,
it's a frame of mind, a mode of thinking that differs from preaching, prosecuting
and politicking. adam grant is an organizational psychologist. so i learned lots of interesting
things about psychology from this book. for example the dunning-kruger effect, which says that
it's when we lack competence that we're most likely to be brimming with overconfidence. i
definitely know a few people like that! Dunning quips, "the first rule of Dunning Kruger club
is that you don't know that you're a member of that club". another concept of psychology
that i learned and found fascinating is called motivational interviewing or persuasive listening,
which is a technique to help change someone's mind. when we're trying to open other people's
minds, we can frequently accomplish more by listening than by talking. how can you show an
interest in helping people crystallize their own views and uncover their own reasons for change? a
good way to start is to increase your question to statement ratio. motivational interviewing starts
with an attitude of humility and curiosity. we don't know what might motivate someone
else to change but we're genuinely eager to find out. the goal isn't to tell people what to do,
it is to help them break out of overconfidence cycles and see new possibilities. our role is
to hold up a mirror so they can themselves see more clearly, and then empower them to examine
their beliefs and behaviors. that can activate a rethinking cycle in which people approach their
own views more scientifically. but be careful not to use this technique manipulatively.
psychologists have found that when people detect an attempt at influence, it can backfire.
motivational interviewing requires a genuine desire to help people reach their goals. i
am definitely going to try this on my kids and my husband! i love the story of the vaccine whisperer
where a motivational interviewer was able to change a mom's mind in favor of vaccinating her
kids for measles. this woman came from a village of anti-vaxxers and was very adamant about her
beliefs. the vaccine whisperer changed her mind not by giving her any logic or facts or arguments,
but mostly by listening and being curious about her reasons against vaccination.
a key turning point for the woman was "when the vaccine whisperer" and this is her own words
"told me that whether i choose to vaccinate or not he respected my decision as someone who wanted
the best for my kids. just that sentence to me was worth all the gold in the world"
said the woman. a big practical takeaway for me as a parent was never ask your kids what they want
to be when they grow up. they don't have to define themselves in terms of a career. a single identity
can close the door to alternatives. instead of trying to narrow down their options, help them
broaden their possibilities. they don't have to be one thing. they can do many things. there are so
many other nuggets of wisdom in this book which i couldn't fit in this video, but i have compiled my
top 10 quotes from this book in a pdf that you can download for free by going to the link in
the description below. I'm curious what was your top take away from this video? Comment below! If
you're interested in my book reviews and summaries of other books, you can check out my "Book
reviews/takeaways" playlist in the description below. See you in the next video, Keep growing!