Think Again JJ Abrams Takes Adam’s Job

Adam Grant
And, you know, why do I have such a hard time admitting when I’m not? And that, you know, I think that was sort of a defining moment. And then, you know, much later, I feel like my job as an organizational psychologist is, you know, is to really think again about how we work, how we lead, how we live, and to motivate other People to do that, too. And my most frustrating experiences as an author, as a speaker, as a researcher, as a teacher, as a consultant, are always when people are not willing to rethink assumptions that I think They ought to be questioning. And so, you know, just over the past few years, the number of conversations I’ve had with founders and CEOs where I give them the best evidence I have available and they say, well, that’s Not how we do things around here or that’s not the way I’ve always done things. And I just want to come back to them and say, you know, Blockbuster, BlackBerry, Kodak, Sears, you know what? You should definitely not rethink anything in your vision, strategy, or business model. And so I guess, JJ, when, you know, when I have both personal and professional experiences that drive me insane on the same topic, I feel like there might be a problem worth tackling or A question worth writing about.
JJ Abrams
That’s a great answer. In reading the book, it made me wonder if people’s, not bandwidth, but their comfort level is so low that are people finding comfort in belief systems, and that’s the thing that they Can rely on because there’s so little to rely on? And so rethinking is a threat to one of the few comforts left.
Adam Grant
That’s such an interesting question. I

Adam Grant
They found that if you had a really controlling boss, that you actually became more authoritarian as a parent with your children, which was just kind of a stunning spillover for me to, You know, to think that the way you get treated at work might affect the way that you raise your children. It just never would have occurred to me. And I think that body of research and a whole bunch of other studies that followed kind of, they made me start to think about this basic truth that when we lack control in one domain of our Lives, we become motivated to seek it and try to regain it in other parts of our lives. And I think, you know, especially in the wake of this pandemic and global recession, we’re facing a lot of threats to control right now. And I wonder if part of what people are doing is they’re grasping at the things they do have control over. And one of the things we all have control over is what we believe. And so, you know, holding fast to the things that I think are true, they make that sort of makes the world feel more predictable, less uncertain. It also gives me a sense of belonging with whoever my tribe is, right? It validates my worldview. And I’ve even wondered if, you know, if that’s part of why the George Floyd protests, you know, really rose up when they did.

Adam Grant
So the, I feel like one of the things that I’ve rethought twice now as I’ve been writing books is, I wrote my first book, Give and Take, with a whole framework to organize the world in terms Of givers, takers, and matchers. And then I didn’t want to be constrained by a framework like that when I wrote originals, and I felt like I overcorrected. And there wasn’t enough connective tissue between the different chapters. I felt like I had a lot of interesting trees, but the forest was not clear enough. And so I decided when I was writing Think Again that I was going to be open to finding an overarching framework, but I was not going to be attached to one. And that felt like the sweet spot. And about halfway through the writing, it hit me and I had to rewrite the book from scratch. The framework was my colleague, Phil Tetlocks, where he observed that whatever your job or career is, that you spend a disproportionate amount of your time thinking like certain professions. He said, look, you know, there are moments when we think like preachers, prosecutors and politicians. And I think that that all three of these mindsets can stand in the way of rethinking, because when you’re preaching, you’re already convinced that you found the truth. And so you don’t need to question any of your assumptions. When you’re prosecuting, you are trying to win your case. That means the other side is wrong. And so you’ve got to get them to do all the rethinking, but you get to stand still. And

Adam Grant
The problem is then that I get too close-minded. And so I’m trying to get out of prosecutor mode and spend more time thinking like a scientist, which is something I think we could all learn to do better.
JJ Abrams
It’s funny. In the book you say out, I think the first time you were called a logic bully, it actually was something that you liked, that at first it appealed to you.
Adam Grant
I was proud. I thought, yeah, that’s my job as a social scientist. I want to decimate your bad arguments with rigorous evidence and airtight logic, and I’m good. And then I didn’t like the bully part so much as I thought about it more. Given that, what are some of your favorite practices for questioning your own assumptions and for rethinking yourself? I think the first one for me is just the basic idea of thinking like a scientist. To say that what scientists do is instead of forming beliefs, they actually form hypotheses. And so instead of having an opinion that’s set in stone, that means, okay, this is a hunch. How would I go and test it? And I don’t think that we have to always operate like we’re in a lab, right, with a bunch of test tubes. But I do think that we should all be running experiments in our lives.

Adam Grant
I don’t think that we have to always operate like we’re in a lab, right, with a bunch of test tubes. But I do think that we should all be running experiments in our lives. So during the pandemic, for example, I have, instead of assuming there’s a routine that’s going to work for me, I’ve run experiments to say, okay, what if I shift my creative brainstorming From the morning to the night? What does that do, you know, to the number of original ideas that I generate? What if I turn my camera off, right, during a Zoom meeting? Do I actually have a, you know, a more reflective, more thoughtful discussion? And all of those, you know, those little changes and adjustments that we make, we could think about them as experiments. And then we could say, okay, well, what information, what data do I need in order to find out if that was a successful or failed experiment? And I think that’s a huge step. And I guess the other thing I would just put on the table is when I was writing Think Again, I made a list of all the things that I know I’m completely ignorant about. And my goal was actually not to reduce the list, it was to expand the list. Because I feel like the more I know about what I don’t know, the more curious I am, and the more I’m going to learn from people who actually are knowledgeable in those areas. So, you know, my list, I think it started out, I immediately said, I know nothing about music. I don’t understand financial markets. I’m clueless about chemistry. And, you know, the list just kept growing from there. And I’ve actually been just keeping that list. I have a file on my desktop. And my goal is to add something new to it every week. And if I stay clear about what I don’t know, then I hope I’m going to stay in a more humble, more curious mindset. That’s great.
JJ Abrams
When I was reading Think Again, it was occurring to me, you know, that you tell such great stories, including like the story of the BlackBerry company and, you know, Mike’s inability To rethink the way perhaps he could have and what might have been. And

Adam Grant
In any way?
JJ Abrams
I think the thing about magic, as much as some might see it as the geekiest sort of, you know, silliest thing to me, it’s incredibly powerful. We had a magician in our office and this was like two years ago. And he was in my office, just the two of us. And he did a few tricks and he did one that literally made me as a 50 yearyear-old man, think to myself, in my head, he might be magical. Because I know how magic tricks are done. I know a bunch of gimmicks. I know a bunch of tricks. He did something where I was like, I wonder if he’s maybe magical. He have? And my whole point is the fact that someone who’s a half a century old can still have a moment of thinking there might be powers beyond that, which I know, is so profound. And the wow and the gasping and the amazement that any audience has, big or small, there’s something about the sense of possibility that the world is more than it seems and that we want To see things that we can’t imagine and that we don’t expect. And so I feel like that is a natural aspect to telling a story. And I just think that whether it’s writing a book or making a show or a movie, it’s all a bit of a magic trick.
Adam Grant
You