The surprising habits of original thinkers | Adam Grant | TED

Summary

The speaker recounts his initial rejection to invest in Warby Parker, reflecting on the traits of successful 'originals' who champion new ideas. He explores the surprising benefits of moderate procrastination for creativity, the myth of the first-mover advantage, and the importance of embracing doubt and fear to drive innovation. The talk encourages viewers to recognize and nurture their own originality, emphasizing that many great ideas come from persistent attempts and the courage to challenge the norm.

Takeaways

• 🤔 The speaker initially declined to invest in Warby Parker due to their hesitancy and lack of a functioning website before launch, illustrating the common mistake of underestimating potential in early-stage ventures.
• 🎓 The concept of 'originals' is introduced as nonconformists who not only generate new ideas but also take action to implement them, driving creativity and change.
• 🕒 The speaker admits to being a 'precrastinator', contrasting with the benefits of moderate procrastination found in studies, which can lead to increased creativity.
• 💡 Originals often start quickly but take time to refine their ideas, debunking the myth of the 'first-mover advantage' and highlighting the value of improvement over首创.
• 🚀 Success stories like Facebook and Google show that waiting to refine an idea can be more beneficial than rushing to be the first in the market.
• 🤷‍♂️ Originals may appear confident, but they experience the same fears and doubts as others; they simply manage these feelings differently, often through idea doubt which is channeled into improvement.
• 🧐 The importance of questioning the default and seeking better options is exemplified by the browser study, suggesting that those who do so perform better in their jobs.
• 💡 The idea of 'vuja de' is introduced as the opposite of déjà vu, where one sees something familiar with fresh eyes, leading to innovative thinking.
• 🛑 Embracing fear and doubt is key for originals, as they are more afraid of not trying than of failing, which is a driving force for taking risks.
• 🚫 Many people stay silent with their best ideas due to fear of judgment, but originals understand that bad ideas are necessary to generate good ones.
• 🎼 The volume of output is highlighted as a predictor of success, with classical composers and other creatives producing a large quantity to increase the chance of originality.

Q & A

What was the initial hesitation of the speaker in investing in Warby Parker?

The speaker was hesitant to invest in Warby Parker because the founders were slow in getting their website operational and had backup jobs lined up, which suggested a lack of full commitment to their startup.

What is the term the speaker uses to describe himself as someone who does things ahead of time?

The speaker refers to himself as a 'precrastinator', indicating someone who tends to complete tasks well before deadlines.

What did the speaker discover about the relationship between procrastination and creativity in his research?

The speaker found that moderate procrastinators tend to be more creative than those who either rush to complete tasks or put them off entirely, suggesting a 'sweet spot' for fostering original ideas.

Why did the speaker decide to learn to procrastinate while writing a chapter on procrastination?

The speaker wanted to experience the process of procrastination firsthand to better understand its potential benefits for creativity, which was the subject of the chapter he was writing.

What historical figures are mentioned as examples of procrastinators who achieved great success?

Leonardo da Vinci and Martin Luther King, Jr. are mentioned as examples of successful procrastinators. Da Vinci took 16 years to work on the Mona Lisa, and King was still rewriting his speech the night before the March on Washington.

What is the term used to describe the opposite of déjà vu, when something familiar is seen with fresh eyes?

The term used to describe the opposite of déjà vu is 'vuja de'.

What did the speaker learn about the first-mover advantage from his research?

The speaker learned that the first-mover advantage is mostly a myth, with improvers who introduce something different and better having a much higher success rate than first movers.

What are the two kinds of doubt the speaker identifies in his research?

The speaker identifies 'self-doubt' as paralyzing and 'idea doubt' as energizing, with the latter motivating individuals to test, experiment, and refine their ideas.

How does the speaker suggest we should deal with doubt in order to foster originality?

The speaker suggests that instead of succumbing to self-doubt, one should embrace 'idea doubt', viewing initial drafts or ideas as a work in progress and using doubt as a motivator for improvement.

What browser-related study does the speaker reference to illustrate the importance of doubting the default?

The speaker references a study that suggests Firefox and Chrome users outperform Internet Explorer and Safari users, attributing this to the initiative these users took to doubt the default browser and seek a better option.

What is the key message the speaker conveys about the relationship between fear, failure, and originality?

The key message is that originals are not immune to fear, but they are more afraid of failing to try than of failing itself. They understand that inaction often leads to greater regret than taking a chance.

What role do bad ideas play in the process of becoming more original, according to the speaker?

According to the speaker, having bad ideas is an essential part of the creative process, as generating a high volume of ideas increases the likelihood of producing something original.

How did the Warby Parker founders approach naming their company, and what can we learn from this?

The Warby Parker founders tested over 2,000 possibilities before settling on their company name, demonstrating the importance of generating a large volume of ideas to find something truly unique and effective.

Outlines

00:00

🤔 The Missed Opportunity with Warby Parker

The speaker recounts a story from seven years ago when a student sought investment for his startup, Warby Parker, an online glasses retailer. Despite the student's lack of full commitment and a functioning website on the eve of launch, the company became highly successful, prompting the speaker to reflect on his own biases. The speaker introduces the concept of 'originals'—individuals who champion new ideas and drive change. They are nonconformists who stand out and speak up, and are the ones to bet on, contrary to the speaker's initial expectations. The speaker also admits to being a 'precrastinator,' contrasting with the common procrastinator's mind, and shares early life anecdotes to illustrate this trait.

05:03

🕒 Embracing Procrastination for Creativity

The speaker delves into the relationship between procrastination and creativity, challenging the conventional view of procrastination as purely detrimental. They introduce the term 'precrastinator' to describe themselves, someone who feels the panic of an impending deadline well in advance. Through a study conducted by a student named Jihae, it's revealed that moderate procrastinators are rated as more creative than both extreme precrastinators and chronic procrastinators. The speaker then shares personal anecdotes of metaprocrastination while writing a book chapter on procrastination, leading to a surge of new ideas. Historical figures like Leonardo da Vinci and Martin Luther King, Jr. are cited as examples of great originals who were also procrastinators, suggesting that delaying tasks can leave room for a wider range of ideas and improvisation.

10:03

🤷 Doubt and Fear: The Catalysts for Originality

The speaker discusses the role of doubt and fear in the creative process, distinguishing between paralyzing self-doubt and energizing idea doubt. They argue that originals manage their doubts differently, using them as motivation to test and refine their ideas. The speaker also touches on the importance of not accepting the default and seeking better options, using the choice of web browsers as a metaphor for job performance and commitment. The concept of 'vuja de' is introduced as the opposite of déjà vu, where one sees something familiar with fresh eyes, exemplified by Jennifer Lee's reinvention of the villain in the movie 'Frozen'. The speaker emphasizes that originals are not judged on their bad ideas, and that having many ideas increases the chances of originality.

15:05

🚀 Overcoming Fear and Doubt to Foster Originality

In the final paragraph, the speaker concludes that originals are not fundamentally different from others; they feel fear and doubt but use these feelings as catalysts for creativity and innovation. They procrastinate, have bad ideas, and sometimes it is these very qualities that lead to their success. The speaker encourages the audience not to dismiss such individuals and to recognize that being quick to start but slow to finish can enhance creativity. They also highlight the importance of embracing the fear of failing to try and generating a multitude of ideas to find the truly original ones. The speaker ends with a strong belief that originality is the best way to improve the world, leaving the audience with a call to action to embrace their originality.

Keywords

💡Originals

Originals in the context of this video refers to individuals who are nonconformists, innovators, and pioneers in their respective fields. They are characterized by their ability to not only conceive new ideas but also to take action to realize these ideas. The video emphasizes that originals are the drivers of creativity and change in the world, and they are the ones worth investing in. For example, the speaker initially overlooked the potential in Warby Parker, a company that would later be recognized for its innovation.

💡Procrastination

Procrastination is typically seen as a negative trait, associated with delaying tasks until the last minute. However, the video presents a nuanced view, suggesting that moderate procrastination can actually foster creativity. It is posited that giving oneself time to incubate ideas can lead to more divergent thinking and innovation. The speaker's own experience with writing a book chapter and historical examples like Leonardo da Vinci's work on the Mona Lisa illustrate this concept.

💡Precrastination

Precrastination is a term coined in the video to describe the tendency to complete tasks well ahead of deadlines, which is the opposite of procrastination. The speaker identifies as a precrastinator, and the video uses this concept to explore the relationship between the timing of work and creativity. It is suggested that precrastinators may miss out on the creative benefits of moderate delay, as they are too focused on completing tasks early.

💡Innovation

Innovation is a central theme of the video, highlighting the process of creating new methods, ideas, or products. The speaker discusses how 'originals' are key innovators, and how their approach to work, including their willingness to delay and iterate, contributes to innovation. Warby Parker's success in the eyeglass industry and the study on procrastination's impact on creativity exemplify the importance of innovation.

💡First-Mover Advantage

The first-mover advantage is a concept that suggests being the first to enter a new market can provide a competitive edge. However, the video challenges this notion, using the example of Warby Parker and citing a study that shows improvers, or those who refine existing ideas, have a higher success rate than first movers. This challenges the traditional belief and underscores the value of being different and better rather than simply being first.

💡Doubt

Doubt in the video is portrayed as a double-edged sword. It can be paralyzing, leading to inaction (self-doubt), or it can be energizing, leading to experimentation and refinement (idea doubt). The speaker argues that originals manage their doubts differently, using them as a motivation to test and improve their ideas, which is crucial for originality and innovation.

💡Fear

Fear is a universal emotion that the video suggests originals also experience. However, what distinguishes originals is their greater fear of not trying than of failing. This mindset propels them to take risks and pursue their ideas despite the potential for failure. Elon Musk's perspective on the importance of trying, even when success is not guaranteed, exemplifies this concept.

💡Vuja De

Vuja De is a term introduced in the video to describe the experience of seeing something familiar with fresh eyes. It is the opposite of déjà vu and is associated with the ability to question the default and seek out new perspectives. The video uses the example of Jennifer Lee's work on 'Frozen,' where she reimagined a classic story, leading to unprecedented success.

💡Inaction

Inaction is presented in the video as a source of regret, especially when it involves missed opportunities. The speaker mentions that people's biggest regrets are often the chances they did not take, which underscores the importance of taking action despite fear of failure. This concept is linked to the idea that originals are those who are more afraid of failing to try than of trying and failing.

💡Bad Ideas

The video challenges the notion that having bad ideas is detrimental by suggesting that originals generate a multitude of ideas, including bad ones, as part of their creative process. It argues that the volume of output increases the likelihood of producing something original. The example of Thomas Edison, who had many failed inventions before the light bulb, illustrates that bad ideas are a natural part of the path to innovation.

💡Masterpieces

Masterpieces in the video are presented as the end result of a large volume of work and the distillation of many ideas into a few exceptional creations. The speaker uses classical composers as examples, noting that it took hundreds of compositions to produce a small number of masterpieces. This highlights the importance of quantity in the creative process and the role of perseverance in achieving originality.

Highlights

A student approached the speaker to invest in his online retail company, which later became Warby Parker, a billion-dollar brand.

Despite initial hesitations, Warby Parker was recognized as the world's most innovative company, illustrating the importance of investing in original ideas.

The speaker learned from his mistake and began studying 'originals', nonconformists who champion new ideas and drive change.

Precrastination versus procrastination: The speaker identifies himself as a precrastinator, which contrasts with the typical procrastinator's mindset.

Moderate procrastination can lead to higher creativity, as demonstrated by the speaker's research involving business idea generation.

The speaker experimented with procrastination and found it beneficial for generating new ideas for his book on originals.

Historical figures like Leonardo da Vinci and Martin Luther King Jr. were procrastinators, which contributed to their creative achievements.

The first-mover advantage is often overstated; improvers who refine existing ideas tend to have a higher success rate.

Originals are often quick to start but slow to finish, using time to refine and improve their ideas.

Doubts can be energizing, motivating individuals to test, experiment, and refine their ideas.

The choice of web browser can reflect a person's tendency to question defaults and seek better options.

Vuja de, the opposite of déjà vu, allows individuals to see familiar things with fresh eyes, leading to innovation.

Originals embrace the fear of failing to try, which distinguishes them from others who are afraid of failure.

Generating a high volume of ideas increases the likelihood of producing something original, as evidenced by classical composers.

Warby Parker's founders tested over 2,000 names before settling on their brand, demonstrating the importance of quantity in idea generation.

Originals are not inherently different; they succeed because of their ability to manage fear, doubt, and the process of idea generation.

Transcripts

Seven years ago, a student came to me and asked me to invest in his company.

He said, "I'm working with three friends,

and we're going to try to disrupt an industry by selling stuff online."

And I said, "OK, you guys spent the whole summer on this, right?"

"No, we all took internships just in case it doesn't work out."

"All right, but you're going to go in full time once you graduate."

"Not exactly. We've all lined up backup jobs."

Six months go by,

it's the day before the company launches,

and there is still not a functioning website.

"You guys realize, the entire company is a website.

That's literally all it is."

So I obviously declined to invest.

And they ended up naming the company Warby Parker.

(Laughter)

They sell glasses online.

They were recently recognized as the world's most innovative company

and valued at over a billion dollars.

And now? My wife handles our investments.

Why was I so wrong?

To find out, I've been studying people that I come to call "originals."

Originals are nonconformists,

people who not only have new ideas

but take action to champion them.

They are people who stand out and speak up.

Originals drive creativity and change in the world.

They're the people you want to bet on.

And they look nothing like I expected.

I want to show you today three things I've learned

about recognizing originals

and becoming a little bit more like them.

So the first reason that I passed on Warby Parker

was they were really slow getting off the ground.

Now, you are all intimately familiar with the mind of a procrastinator.

Well, I have a confession for you. I'm the opposite. I'm a precrastinator.

Yes, that's an actual term.

You know that panic you feel a few hours before a big deadline

when you haven't done anything yet.

I just feel that a few months ahead of time.

(Laughter)

So this started early: when I was a kid, I took Nintendo games very seriously.

I would wake up at 5am,

start playing and not stop until I had mastered them.

Eventually it got so out of hand that a local newspaper came

and did a story on the dark side of Nintendo, starring me.

(Laughter)

(Applause)

Since then, I have traded hair for teeth.

(Laughter)

But this served me well in college,

because I finished my senior thesis four months before the deadline.

And I was proud of that, until a few years ago.

I had a student named Jihae, who came to me and said,

"I have my most creative ideas when I'm procrastinating."

And I was like, "That's cute, where are the four papers you owe me?"

(Laughter)

No, she was one of our most creative students,

and as an organizational psychologist, this is the kind of idea that I test.

So I challenged her to get some data.

She goes into a bunch of companies.

She has people fill out surveys about how often they procrastinate.

Then she gets their bosses to rate how creative and innovative they are.

And sure enough, the precrastinators like me,

who rush in and do everything early

are rated as less creative

than people who procrastinate moderately.

So I want to know what happens to the chronic procrastinators.

She was like, "I don't know. They didn't fill out my survey."

(Laughter)

No, here are our results.

You actually do see that the people who wait until the last minute

are so busy goofing off that they don't have any new ideas.

And on the flip side, the people who race in

are in such a frenzy of anxiety that they don't have original thoughts either.

There's a sweet spot where originals seem to live.

Why is this?

Maybe original people just have bad work habits.

Maybe procrastinating does not cause creativity.

To find out, we designed some experiments.

We asked people to generate new business ideas,

and then we get independent readers

to evaluate how creative and useful they are.

And some of them are asked to do the task right away.

Others we randomly assign to procrastinate

by dangling Minesweeper in front of them

for either five or 10 minutes.

And sure enough, the moderate procrastinators

are 16 percent more creative than the other two groups.

Now, Minesweeper is awesome, but it's not the driver of the effect,

because if you play the game first before you learn about the task,

there's no creativity boost.

It's only when you're told that you're going to be working on this problem,

and then you start procrastinating,

but the task is still active in the back of your mind,

that you start to incubate.

Procrastination gives you time to consider divergent ideas,

to think in nonlinear ways, to make unexpected leaps.

So just as we were finishing these experiments,

I was starting to write a book about originals,

and I thought, "This is the perfect time to teach myself to procrastinate,

while writing a chapter on procrastination."

So I metaprocrastinated,

and like any self-respecting precrastinator,

I woke up early the next morning

and I made a to-do list with steps on how to procrastinate.

(Laughter)

And then I worked diligently

toward my goal of not making progress toward my goal.

I started writing the procrastination chapter,

and one day -- I was halfway through --

I literally put it away in mid-sentence

for months.

It was agony.

But when I came back to it, I had all sorts of new ideas.

As Aaron Sorkin put it,

"You call it procrastinating. I call it thinking."

And along the way I discovered

that a lot of great originals in history were procrastinators.

Take Leonardo da Vinci.

He toiled on and off for 16 years

on the Mona Lisa.

He felt like a failure.

He wrote as much in his journal.

But some of the diversions he took in optics

transformed the way that he modeled light

and made him into a much better painter.

What about Martin Luther King, Jr.?

The night before the biggest speech of his life,

the March on Washington,

he was up past 3am, rewriting it.

He's sitting in the audience waiting for his turn to go onstage,

and he is still scribbling notes and crossing out lines.

When he gets onstage, 11 minutes in,

he leaves his prepared remarks

to utter four words that changed the course of history:

"I have a dream."

That was not in the script.

By delaying the task of finalizing the speech until the very last minute,

he left himself open to the widest range of possible ideas.

And because the text wasn't set in stone,

he had freedom to improvise.

Procrastinating is a vice when it comes to productivity,

but it can be a virtue for creativity.

What you see with a lot of great originals

is that they are quick to start but they're slow to finish.

And this is what I missed with Warby Parker.

When they were dragging their heels for six months,

I looked at them and said,

"You know, a lot of other companies are starting to sell glasses online."

They missed the first-mover advantage.

But what I didn't realize was they were spending all that time

trying to figure out how to get people

to be comfortable ordering glasses online.

And it turns out the first-mover advantage is mostly a myth.

Look at a classic study of over 50 product categories,

comparing the first movers who created the market

with the improvers who introduced something different and better.

What you see is that the first movers had a failure rate of 47 percent,

compared with only 8 percent for the improvers.

Look at Facebook, waiting to build a social network

until after Myspace and Friendster.

Look at Google, waiting for years after Altavista and Yahoo.

It's much easier to improve on somebody else's idea

than it is to create something new from scratch.

So the lesson I learned is that to be original you don't have to be first.

You just have to be different and better.

But that wasn't the only reason I passed on Warby Parker.

They were also full of doubts.

They had backup plans lined up,

and that made me doubt that they had the courage to be original,

because I expected that originals would look something like this.

(Laughter)

Now, on the surface,

a lot of original people look confident,

but behind the scenes,

they feel the same fear and doubt that the rest of us do.

They just manage it differently.

Let me show you: this is a depiction

of how the creative process works for most of us.

(Laughter)

Now, in my research, I discovered there are two different kinds of doubt.

There's self-doubt and idea doubt.

Self-doubt is paralyzing.

It leads you to freeze.

But idea doubt is energizing.

It motivates you to test, to experiment, to refine,

just like MLK did.

And so the key to being original

is just a simple thing

of avoiding the leap from step three to step four.

Instead of saying, "I'm crap,"

you say, "The first few drafts are always crap,

and I'm just not there yet."

So how do you get there?

Well, there's a clue, it turns out,

in the Internet browser that you use.

We can predict your job performance and your commitment

just by knowing what web browser you use.

Now, some of you are not going to like the results of this study --

(Laughter)

But there is good evidence that Firefox and Chrome users

significantly outperform Internet Explorer and Safari users.

Yes.

(Applause)

They also stay in their jobs 15 percent longer, by the way.

Why? It's not a technical advantage.

The four browser groups on average have similar typing speed

and they also have similar levels of computer knowledge.

It's about how you got the browser.

Because if you use Internet Explorer or Safari,

those came preinstalled on your computer,

and you accepted the default option that was handed to you.

If you wanted Firefox or Chrome, you had to doubt the default

and ask, is there a different option out there,

and then be a little resourceful and download a new browser.

So people hear about this study and they're like,

"Great, if I want to get better at my job, I just need to upgrade my browser?"

(Laughter)

No, it's about being the kind of person

who takes the initiative to doubt the default

and look for a better option.

And if you do that well,

you will open yourself up to the opposite of déjà vu.

There's a name for it. It's called vuja de.

(Laughter)

Vuja de is when you look at something you've seen many times before

and all of a sudden see it with fresh eyes.

It's a screenwriter who looks at a movie script

that can't get the green light for more than half a century.

In every past version, the main character has been an evil queen.

But Jennifer Lee starts to question whether that makes sense.

She rewrites the first act,

reinvents the villain as a tortured hero

and Frozen becomes the most successful animated movie ever.

So there's a simple message from this story.

When you feel doubt, don't let it go.

(Laughter)

What about fear?

Originals feel fear, too.

They're afraid of failing,

but what sets them apart from the rest of us

is that they're even more afraid of failing to try.

They know you can fail by starting a business that goes bankrupt

or by failing to start a business at all.

They know that in the long run, our biggest regrets are not our actions

but our inactions.

The things we wish we could redo, if you look at the science,

are the chances not taken.

Elon Musk told me recently, he didn't expect Tesla to succeed.

He was sure the first few SpaceX launches

would fail to make it to orbit, let alone get back,

but it was too important not to try.

And for so many of us, when we have an important idea,

we don't bother to try.

But I have some good news for you.

You are not going to get judged on your bad ideas.

A lot of people think they will.

If you look across industries

and ask people about their biggest idea, their most important suggestion,

85 percent of them stayed silent instead of speaking up.

They were afraid of embarrassing themselves, of looking stupid.

But guess what? Originals have lots and lots of bad ideas,

tons of them, in fact.

Take the guy who invented this.

Do you care that he came up with a talking doll so creepy

that it scared not only kids but adults, too?

No. You celebrate Thomas Edison for pioneering the light bulb.

(Laughter)

If you look across fields,

the greatest originals are the ones who fail the most,

because they're the ones who try the most.

Take classical composers, the best of the best.

Why do some of them get more pages in encyclopedias than others

and also have their compositions rerecorded more times?

One of the best predictors

is the sheer volume of compositions that they generate.

The more output you churn out, the more variety you get

and the better your chances of stumbling on something truly original.

Even the three icons of classical music -- Bach, Beethoven, Mozart --

had to generate hundreds and hundreds of compositions

to come up with a much smaller number of masterpieces.

Now, you may be wondering,

how did this guy become great without doing a whole lot?

I don't know how Wagner pulled that off.

But for most of us, if we want to be more original,

we have to generate more ideas.

The Warby Parker founders, when they were trying to name their company,

they needed something sophisticated, unique, with no negative associations

to build a retail brand,

and they tested over 2,000 possibilities

before they finally put together

Warby and Parker.

So if you put all this together, what you see is that originals

are not that different from the rest of us.

They feel fear and doubt. They procrastinate.

They have bad ideas.

And sometimes, it's not in spite of those qualities but because of them

that they succeed.

So when you see those things, don't make the same mistake I did.

Don't write them off.

And when that's you, don't count yourself out either.

Know that being quick to start but slow to finish

can boost your creativity,

that you can motivate yourself by doubting your ideas

and embracing the fear of failing to try,

and that you need a lot of bad ideas in order to get a few good ones.

Look, being original is not easy,

but I have no doubt about this:

it's the best way to improve the world around us.

Thank you.

(Applause)