A growth mindset is the belief that abilities can be developed through effort, good strategies and help from others. A fixed mindset treats them as given.
Where it comes from
Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck built the concept over decades of research on how children respond to setbacks, and brought it to a wide audience with her 2006 book Mindset.¹ In a national U.S. experiment with more than 12,000 ninth graders, a short online growth-mindset program modestly improved grades among lower-achieving students.²
Where it goes wrong
Dweck herself has warned against a "false growth mindset": praising effort alone, or simply declaring oneself growth-minded.³ Across broader meta-analyses the average effects have been small,⁴ which makes a growth mindset a helpful ingredient in development, alongside good strategies and support.
Talent Takeaway
Praise the strategy along with the effort: "Trying a different approach with that client worked." When someone is stuck, ask what else they could try and who could help. That is a growth mindset in action.
¹ Dweck, C. S. (2006). Mindset: The new psychology of success. Random House.
² Yeager, D. S., Hanselman, P., Walton, G. M., Murray, J. S., Crosnoe, R., Muller, C., … Dweck, C. S. (2019). A national experiment reveals where a growth mindset improves achievement. Nature, 573, 364–369. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1466-y
³ Dweck, C. (2016, January 13). What having a "growth mindset" actually means. Harvard Business Review.
⁴ Sisk, V. F., Burgoyne, A. P., Sun, J., Butler, J. L., & Macnamara, B. N. (2018). To what extent and under which circumstances are growth mind-sets important to academic achievement? Two meta-analyses. Psychological Science, 29(4), 549–571. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797617739704
Further reading: Dweck, C. S. (2016). Mindset: The new psychology of success (Updated ed.). Ballantine Books.