A recent study from Zenger Folkman found:

Only 16.6% of leaders excel in both grit and coachability.

Leaders must develop both traits.

Grit fuels determination and perseverance.

Coachability acts as the catalyst for continuous improvement through feedback and adaptability.

“Embracing both traits can lead to substantial growth and transformation in leaders, driving them toward long-term achievement and success. As organizations seek to nurture their future leaders, recognizing the importance of these characteristics will undoubtedly foster a more effective and resilient leadership culture.”

Grit

I wrote about Grit for The Digital Transformation People back in 2020.

Angela Duckworth, in her book Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, describes grit as having passion and perseverance to achieve long-term and meaningful goals, and that with grit comes resilience.

Duckworth is a University of Pennsylvania psychologist, and her study of grit began when she was teaching math to 12- and 13-year-olds. She recognized that IQ (talent) was not the only factor separating successful students from those who were struggling, and that grit was the combination of perseverance and passion for the achievement of long-term goals.

She went on to research the short- and long-term effects of grit on students and people at work. So, although the study of grit originated in education, the principles apply in the workplace too.

Duckworth’s research revealed four psychological assets that the exemplars of grit possess. They develop over the years in a particular order. They are interest, practice, purpose, and hope.

Interest is about enjoying what you do. We all have aspects of our work that we don’t enjoy. When we have grit, we can see our work as a whole of many parts and find it meaningful and interesting. People with grit love what they do.

Practice is about perseverance and the daily self-control to do something better than you did it yesterday. With grit, you strive for mastery through regular and sustained practice. You identify your areas of weakness and work to improve them. There is no room for complacency. Practice is about devotion to improvement and embracing challenges.

Purpose is what matures passion. Purpose is the belief that your work matters not just for you, but for others. Without having a purpose, any interest will be difficult to sustain.

Hope is not the last stage of grit, but it is in every stage of grit. We must be able to keep going and face our doubts and demons. We will get knocked down, but we can’t stay down. If we stay down, we lose. When we get up, we prevail.

Coachability

Zenger Folkman describes coachability as checking in with others on the impact of your efforts to improve.

For me, this translates as possessing a growth mindset, being open to feedback, and being prepared to unlearn. I wrote the growth mindset back in October 2020 in my series When Everyone Leads.

Growth mindset

After studying the behaviour of thousands of children, Carol Dweck, Ph.D., coined the terms fixed mindset and growth mindset. These mindsets describe how we view our intelligence and personality. Dweck wrote about these mindsets in her 2007 publication Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.

With a fixed mindset, you believe you have finite amounts of characteristics: intelligence, personality, morality, etc. You feel the need to prove yourself to demonstrate that you have these characteristics—and enough of them.

With a growth mindset, you believe you have basic qualities and characteristics. You differ from others regarding your inherent talents, aptitudes, interests, and disposition, but with a growth mindset, you believe that you can change and grow.

Here is an example to demonstrate the difference between a fixed and growth mindset that I used in my 2020 publication “Unleash the Resiliator Within. Resilience: A Handbook for Leaders.”

It’s performance review time with your boss. Upon reflection, you believe you did well; however, your boss doesn’t have the same opinion and believes you have areas for self-development. You are upset. On the way home from work, you get a flat tire and must call for roadside assistance, which takes forever to arrive and means you arrive home late. When you get home, you call one of your siblings to discuss your day and your frustration, but you feel you are being given the cold shoulder, which makes your day worse.

You can consider the events of your day in two ways. With a fixed mindset, you are likely to tell yourself:

• I’m a failure.

• I’m stupid.

• I’m going nowhere.

• I’m on my own.

• No-one cares.

With a growth mindset, you are likely to tell yourself:

• I need to follow the advice of my boss and work harder in some areas of my development.

• I need to get my car serviced more often and get my wheels aligned.

• I need to learn how to change a tire myself and check my spare tire is in good condition.

• I wonder if my sibling also had a bad day; maybe worse than mine.

So, given that most of us would like to operate with a growth mindset: what would be your coping strategies in the above situation?

You could start by:

• Working harder on professional development or finding alternative ways of working towards a goal.

• Putting in place a development plan.

• Calling your sibling to check they are okay.

• Schedule time to learn basic car maintenance skills.

People with a growth mindset don’t throw their hands up in despair. They can get just as upset or frustrated as those with a fixed mindset, but they choose to meet the challenges head-on, work at overcoming them, and invest in personal development and growth.

A fixed mindset is about validation. A growth mindset is about development.

You have a choice: just as you can change your mind, you can change your beliefs. You can either believe that your intellect and abilities are static or believe that they can evolve and grow.

Open to feedback

You must proactively seek feedback on a regular basis regarding your performance as a leader. The key thing is to remember that feedback is generally not personal. It is not about you as a person, but about you as a leader, and how well you are performing in that role.

When a person is brave enough to give you feedback when they know it is not positive, it is your duty as the leader to take it on board and own it. Whilst you may feel upset, angry, or disappointed by what you hear, you must see this as an opportunity for improvement, growth, and development.

Just as positive feedback is an opportunity to do more of the same, negative feedback is an opportunity to do things differently.

Explain why you are asking for feedback. Provide the person you are requesting feedback from some context. You are trying to improve your leadership skills. You want to know what you do well and what you could do better. Are there things you are not doing that you should be doing? Are there things you should stop doing?

You must provide a safe environment in which people can give you feedback. You need an environment of psychological safety in which everyone feels safe to speak up and say what they think without fear of reprimand or repercussion. Ask for feedback in private.

Get a diverse set of views. Ask your team, your peers, your colleagues, and your leadership team. Give people time to think about your leadership. Don’t put them on the spot.

Thank those who provide you with feedback. Recognise their contribution to your ongoing development.

The most important thing about receiving feedback is to act on it. If you do not act, people will stop giving you feedback.

Prepared to unlearn

Adam Grant summed unlearning up when he said:

“It takes curiosity to learn. It takes courage to unlearn. Learning requires the humility to admit what you don't know today. Unlearning requires the integrity to admit that you were wrong yesterday. Learning is how you evolve. Unlearning is how you keep up as the world evolves.”

It takes bravery to unlearn. Learning requires the humility to admit what you don't know today. Unlearning requires the integrity to admit that you were wrong yesterday. Learning is how you evolve. Unlearning is how you keep up as the world evolves.

It was the American businessman and futurist, Alvin Toffler, that said:

“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. 

The hardest part of the learn, unlearn, relearn approach is unlearn. Most of us are used to learning but unlearning is often a new concept. It is more than just forgetting something you learned some time ago like how to speak French. It is about making space for new ideas and perspectives. To do that we must let go of ingrained ways of thinking and operating to make way for relearning.

We must let go of things that may have worked well for us in the past. We must challenge our long-held assumptions and be open to changing our mindsets. It is about the courage to change and the humility to admit that what we knew yesterday is no longer credible. This is a process of questioning the validity of what we believe in.

Marshall Goldsmith titled his 2007 book “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There – How Successful People Become Even More Successful.” He identified 21 behaviors that needed to be eliminated if you wanted to be successful. He argued that while these behaviors may not have stopped you from getting “here” - to your current level of success - they won’t get you “there” - to the heights of success that you ultimately aspire to. In essence, if you want to be an effective leader you need to eliminate some learning and replace them with new learnings.

One of the most recent examples of “unlearn” was a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Prior to the pandemic, many managers (note I have dropped the term leader) had an entrenched belief that if they could see their employees at their desks, then they were being productive. Now, you and I know that all because the managers could see them, it didn't mean they were being productive. However, there was this engrained delusion that drove so many other behaviors such as presenteeism.

Post-pandemic many employees wanted to continue with the autonomy and flexibility they had experienced whilst working from home whilst many employers were mandating a return to the office. The mandate was a direct response to a need to unlearn. If managers could not see their employees, how would they know they were working? Many managers have time-managed employees for decades. This was going to be hard to unlearn.

These managers now had to learn how to performance manage employees based on outcomes not hours at a desk. They needed to provide clear goals and “trust” their employees to deliver. They had to change the way in which they rewarded their employees. No longer were employees rewarded for working 12-hour days. They were rewarded for the value they delivered. I worked with many leadership teams through workshops and one-on-one coaching sessions to enable them to (a) realize the need to unlearn and then (b) assist them to relearn how to effectively manage performance regardless of employee location. The unlearning part is the biggest challenge as most people have been used to “acquisitive” learning which is adding more learning and acquiring new knowledge on top of what was already there. Unlearning means you must continually question and challenge your knowledge to ensure it is relevant and current. The knowledge you have today may have taken time and energy to acquire so you have made an investment that you are now being asked to let go of because it no longer serves a purpose.

As Chinese philosopher, Lao Tzu said:

 “To attain knowledge, add things every day. To attain wisdom, remove things every day.”

To unlearn we need to:

1. Recognize and accept that the knowledge that has worked so far Is no longer relevant. The sooner you recognize it, the sooner you can move away from it. Seek feedback on your beliefs, behaviours, and methods, to help determine its congruence.

2. Learn to unlearn and seek the opportunity to relearn. The knowledge you eliminate must be replaced with new knowledge. Being open-minded, curious, and intentional helps to unlearn. Focus on the new knowledge and break the old patterns of thought and behaviour. 

3. Continue to be open to new experiences and knowledge. Do not unlearn and relearn only to close the door again. Continually question and challenge what you know and make sure it is relevant and current. Keep learning to unlearn and relearn. As in step 1, keep seeking feedback and adjust as needed.

Conclusion

You can be in the 16.6% club if you intentionally work at exhibiting grit, developing a growth mindset, proactively seeking feedback, and being brave enough to unlearn.