Does a Growth Mindset Enable Successful Aging?

Successful aging broadly refers to the attainment, development, and maintenance of favorable life outcomes with increasing age. We propose that the likelihood of people aging successfully is enhanced by routinely engaging in habitually repeated actions (henceforth, “rituals”) that cultivate their personal resources in the physical, emotional, mental, social, and spiritual domains. We suggest that fixed mindsets will impede the discovery and adoption of such rituals, whereas growth mindsets will facilitate people exploring, trialing, and perpetually enacting rituals that help them age successfully. After defining successful aging, we explain the nature of mindsets and discuss their role in systematically cultivating relevant physical, emotional, mental, social, and spiritual resources. Practical examples of personal resource-building rituals are provided throughout. We outline several avenues for future research to test hypotheses derived from the propositions we have advanced and illustrate how mindsets might be deliberately fostered to support successful aging. We also suggest potential boundary conditions on the utility of growth mindsets

In Learning Mode? : The Role of Mindsets in Experiential Leadership Development

International audienceCompared to the massive literatures on leadership theories, behaviors, concepts, frameworks, and skills, scant attention has been paid to why leaders often learn little from their experiences and how they can learn to become better leaders. A notable exception is the mindful engagement experiential learning process (Ashford & DeRue, 2012), which addresses both these issues. Drawing on extensive social, educational, and organizational psychological research on mindsets, we aim to supplement this framework by proposing the concept of being in learning mode, defined as being intentionally focused on each of the tasks of mindful engagement with a growth rather than a fixed mindset. We outline concrete practical implications for individual leaders, those who manage leaders, and organizations eager to support leadership development. We also suggest several lines of research regarding the role of being in learning mode for enabling experiential leadership development.<br/

Sorting the Wheat from the Chaff : The Role of Mindsets in Employee Differentiation

International audienceTo judiciously allocate resources, opportunities, and rewards, managers are often expected to differentiate between employees. Such differentiation can be helpful for cultivating a productive workforce, though may also result in organizations under-utilizing employee talent, as well as discriminatory practices, when managers differentiate on the basis of misguided assumptions and stereotypes. In this study, we examine whether people differ in their assumptions regarding the capacity for some types of workers (e.g., those working in high tech) to develop their abilities much more than others (e.g., factory employees), both generally and as a function of induced mindsets. We also explore the potential impact of differentiated mindsets on managers' employee development investment decisions. The results reveal that people hold stereotyped assumptions about employees' scope for development and that mindsets shape the kinds of human resource management initiatives they prefer for creating a productive workforce. Implications for theory, research, and practice are discussed.<br/

The Potential Role of Mindsets in Unleashing Employee Engagement

International audienceEngaged employees work vigorously, feeling dedicated and mentally absorbed in their work. Much is known about the kinds of jobs and work environments that stimulate employee engagement, yet levels of disengagement remain high in many organizations. To provide fresh insights into how to increase engagement, we draw on theory and research in social, educational, and organizational psychology to illuminate how mindsets are a personal resource that may influence employees' engagement via their enthusiasm for development, construal of effort, focus of attention, perception of setbacks, and interpersonal interactions. We outline several avenues for future research, as well as practical implications for organizational, managerial, and individual-level initiatives for increasing engagement via supporting employees in adopting and sustaining a growth mindset with regard to the challenges they encounter at work.<br/

Goal Linking : A Work Motivational Peril or Imperative?

International audienceThe attainment of work role goals is essential for work performance and organizational effectiveness. Failure to achieve their work goals might nonetheless mean more to people than is currently acknowledged in the work performance literature. In this paper, we draw on the concept of goal linking to delineate how work role goals linked to higher-order goals can affect work performance. Specifically, we theorize about how implicit theories of ability guide ruminative thoughts in the context of work role goal non-attainment, as well as how implicit theories influence negative emotions in ways that can affect work role performance. Implications for work performance and implicit theories research, as well as practical implications are discussed.<br/

Goal Linking : A Work Motivational Peril or Imperative?

International audienceThe attainment of work role goals is essential for work performance and organizational effectiveness. Failure to achieve their work goals might nonetheless mean more to people than is currently acknowledged in the work performance literature. In this paper, we draw on the concept of goal linking to delineate how work role goals linked to higher-order goals can affect work performance. Specifically, we theorize about how implicit theories of ability guide ruminative thoughts in the context of work role goal non-attainment, as well as how implicit theories influence negative emotions in ways that can affect work role performance. Implications for work performance and implicit theories research, as well as practical implications are discussed.<br/

In Learning Mode? : The Role of Mindsets in Experiential Leadership Development

International audienceCompared to the massive literatures on leadership theories, behaviors, concepts, frameworks, and skills, scant attention has been paid to why leaders often learn little from their experiences and how they can learn to become better leaders. A notable exception is the mindful engagement experiential learning process (Ashford & DeRue, 2012), which addresses both these issues. Drawing on extensive social, educational, and organizational psychological research on mindsets, we aim to supplement this framework by proposing the concept of being in learning mode, defined as being intentionally focused on each of the tasks of mindful engagement with a growth rather than a fixed mindset. We outline concrete practical implications for individual leaders, those who manage leaders, and organizations eager to support leadership development. We also suggest several lines of research regarding the role of being in learning mode for enabling experiential leadership development.<br/

How Mindsets Set the Stage for Career Success

International audienceFor almost a century, career scholars have developed theories, research and interventions to help people to (i) find a career role that fits their given character type (i.e., personality), as well as to (ii) develop their more malleable career attributes (e.g., networking skills). We revisit this broad dichotomy drawing upon research on mindsets about the malleability of human attributes – such as personality and cognitive ability – that influence how people think and act in career relevant ways. We show how mindsets can prime change in the presumably stable dispositions of personality and cognitive ability that are associated with both objective and subjective career success. The scope for mindsets to be altered also has implications for understanding and influencing the development of human capital, as well as a host of other personal attributes (i.e., self-efficacy, networking skills, and adaptability) addressed by the career facilitation literature. By critiquing the presumed rigidity of some of the most well-established antecedents of career success, we show how mindset theory and research can fruitfully inform careers theory, research, and interventions aimed at fostering career success.<br/

The Potential Role of Mindsets in Unleashing Employee Engagement

International audienceEngaged employees work vigorously, feeling dedicated and mentally absorbed in their work. Much is known about the kinds of jobs and work environments that stimulate employee engagement, yet levels of disengagement remain high in many organizations. To provide fresh insights into how to increase engagement, we draw on theory and research in social, educational, and organizational psychology to illuminate how mindsets are a personal resource that may influence employees' engagement via their enthusiasm for development, construal of effort, focus of attention, perception of setbacks, and interpersonal interactions. We outline several avenues for future research, as well as practical implications for organizational, managerial, and individual-level initiatives for increasing engagement via supporting employees in adopting and sustaining a growth mindset with regard to the challenges they encounter at work.<br/

Sorting the Wheat from the Chaff : The Role of Mindsets in Employee Differentiation

International audienceTo judiciously allocate resources, opportunities, and rewards, managers are often expected to differentiate between employees. Such differentiation can be helpful for cultivating a productive workforce, though may also result in organizations under-utilizing employee talent, as well as discriminatory practices, when managers differentiate on the basis of misguided assumptions and stereotypes. In this study, we examine whether people differ in their assumptions regarding the capacity for some types of workers (e.g., those working in high tech) to develop their abilities much more than others (e.g., factory employees), both generally and as a function of induced mindsets. We also explore the potential impact of differentiated mindsets on managers' employee development investment decisions. The results reveal that people hold stereotyped assumptions about employees' scope for development and that mindsets shape the kinds of human resource management initiatives they prefer for creating a productive workforce. Implications for theory, research, and practice are discussed.<br/