WEBVTT - Malcolm Gladwell debates Adam Grant 0:00:15.356 --> 0:00:23.876 Pushkin. Did you miss me? Did you want to hear 0:00:23.876 --> 0:00:34.796 my voice? Hello? Hello, fellow revisionist historians. This is Malcolm Gladwell. 0:00:35.316 --> 0:00:39.076 Season three is almost ready to go. We are this close, 0:00:39.876 --> 0:00:42.916 and as a reward for your patients, I thought I'd 0:00:42.916 --> 0:00:46.436 give you a little gift. It's a live conversation I 0:00:46.436 --> 0:00:48.516 did with my friend Adam Grant at the ninety second 0:00:48.556 --> 0:00:50.516 Street Why in New York City a few weeks ago. 0:00:51.116 --> 0:00:53.876 We've done this before The Why when his last book 0:00:53.916 --> 0:00:56.916 came out. I interviewed him there on stage, and now 0:00:57.236 --> 0:01:00.916 he wanted to interview me, which is daunte Because Adam 0:01:00.996 --> 0:01:03.676 is a very big deal professor of psychology at the 0:01:03.716 --> 0:01:06.996 University of Pennsylvania. He's written best sellers like Give and Take, 0:01:07.196 --> 0:01:11.076 Originals and Option B with Cheryl Sandberg. He's a winner 0:01:11.076 --> 0:01:13.636 of all kinds of awards. He's the kind of person 0:01:13.796 --> 0:01:16.636 who if you email him some question, he'll write you 0:01:16.676 --> 0:01:19.436 back in like two minutes with this brilliantly thought out 0:01:19.476 --> 0:01:23.116 dissertation and you think, how did he do that? Oh? 0:01:23.156 --> 0:01:26.276 And on aside, Adam and I still use a BlackBerry. 0:01:26.396 --> 0:01:28.636 I know, I know, And since we both get a 0:01:28.636 --> 0:01:32.236 lot of grief for that, we have explanatory signature lines 0:01:32.396 --> 0:01:37.316 under our BlackBerry emails. His is sent from my BlackBerry 0:01:37.436 --> 0:01:39.956 because I'm a lott ied and I believe in supporting 0:01:39.956 --> 0:01:44.836 the Canadian economy. Mine is sent from my BlackBerry because 0:01:44.876 --> 0:01:49.076 there's no school like old school. Not to get competitive 0:01:49.076 --> 0:01:52.876 about this, but mine's way better. What you are about 0:01:52.916 --> 0:01:55.716 to hear is a conversation about the workplace, which is 0:01:55.796 --> 0:01:59.436 Adam's specialty. Now why exactly he thought I would have 0:01:59.476 --> 0:02:02.276 anything intelligent to say about the workplace is unclear, since 0:02:02.316 --> 0:02:05.156 I work in coffee shops. So a lot of what 0:02:05.276 --> 0:02:08.516 follows is just me pretending to know something that I don't, 0:02:09.196 --> 0:02:11.396 which has never happened before. 0:02:16.796 --> 0:02:19.436 I have to say, you're my favorite sparring partner in 0:02:19.476 --> 0:02:22.996 the sense that you really take joy in intellectual disagreement. 0:02:23.076 --> 0:02:25.676 I've discovered that I do too, and so my hope 0:02:25.716 --> 0:02:27.436 is that we will disagree on some things tonight. 0:02:27.596 --> 0:02:27.836 Good. 0:02:30.036 --> 0:02:32.316 When we do, I hope you take that as a 0:02:32.356 --> 0:02:34.796 sign that I respect your opinion enough to want to 0:02:34.876 --> 0:02:39.876 change it all right, And ideally I will win more 0:02:39.876 --> 0:02:41.116 of these arguments than I lose. 0:02:41.996 --> 0:02:43.796 Yes, is that fair and ground rules? 0:02:44.316 --> 0:02:46.956 Sure? Yeah, I didn't know. I'm happy to lose arguments 0:02:46.996 --> 0:02:47.836 to you anytime you want. 0:02:48.036 --> 0:02:51.436 Great, Yeah, you should do this more often. I'm so 0:02:51.516 --> 0:02:52.196 glad you're here. 0:02:52.236 --> 0:02:54.636 So the place I wanted to start is to say that, 0:02:54.796 --> 0:02:57.236 you know, when I think about work life, we both 0:02:57.276 --> 0:03:00.276 spend a huge part of our work lives thinking about 0:03:00.356 --> 0:03:02.596 human behavior and trying to understand it and make sense 0:03:02.596 --> 0:03:04.876 of it and maybe even make it a little bit better. 0:03:05.556 --> 0:03:07.636 And I think, you know, we're both. 0:03:07.436 --> 0:03:10.116 In jobs that have a pretty strong monopoly on that right, 0:03:10.116 --> 0:03:14.236 between journalism and social science. I'm curious outside of our jobs, 0:03:14.276 --> 0:03:16.076 what you would say is the occupation that has the 0:03:16.116 --> 0:03:19.116 most insight into human nature and human behavior? 0:03:20.116 --> 0:03:25.276 Well, I mean there are obvious ones. Teachers would be 0:03:25.356 --> 0:03:29.236 the first, and by extension, and then all of the 0:03:29.356 --> 0:03:34.036 professions attached to that. So my brother is a principal. 0:03:34.076 --> 0:03:37.676 I always feel like in the position he's in, he's 0:03:37.676 --> 0:03:42.596 a principle of an elementary school, so he interacts with kids, 0:03:43.276 --> 0:03:45.956 their parents, and then the teachers who have to deal 0:03:45.996 --> 0:03:48.956 with the kids and the parents. It strikes me that 0:03:48.996 --> 0:03:52.116 you have a very powerful lens on human beings when 0:03:52.116 --> 0:03:56.156 you're particularly because parents are never more crazy than when 0:03:56.156 --> 0:03:57.716 they are interacting with the teachers. 0:03:57.716 --> 0:03:58.436 Of their children. 0:03:59.716 --> 0:04:03.956 So you're going to nominate principles teachers. My instinct was comedians. 0:04:04.756 --> 0:04:07.476 I think as a comedian you have to understand not 0:04:07.556 --> 0:04:08.756 only what will make people. 0:04:08.596 --> 0:04:11.916 Laugh, but also what's right on the edge of making 0:04:11.916 --> 0:04:12.836 people uncomfortable. 0:04:13.476 --> 0:04:16.516 And that requires a lot of insight into the immediate 0:04:16.636 --> 0:04:18.796 reactions that your audience is going to have. And so 0:04:18.956 --> 0:04:20.956 I think comedians are master psychologists. 0:04:21.116 --> 0:04:27.116 Oh I agree, disagree, totally disagree, because who invited you? 0:04:27.516 --> 0:04:28.076 Think about this? 0:04:28.196 --> 0:04:30.996 No? No, think about this atom so I have I'm 0:04:31.076 --> 0:04:34.716 using the principal teachers as my model using the comedian. 0:04:35.276 --> 0:04:37.756 The thing that's difficult about the teacher is that the 0:04:37.756 --> 0:04:40.676 teacher is dealing with people in a natural environment in 0:04:40.756 --> 0:04:45.796 real time, and there is an infinite variety in the 0:04:45.836 --> 0:04:47.916 circumstances and the kinds of people that they have to 0:04:47.956 --> 0:04:52.596 interact with. The comedian, by contrast, is dealing with people 0:04:52.636 --> 0:04:55.956 in a tightly controlled setting with a rich set of 0:04:55.996 --> 0:04:58.876 expectations governing their behavior, where they get to turn down 0:04:58.916 --> 0:05:02.556 the lights, dose everyone with alcohol, you know, and create 0:05:02.556 --> 0:05:05.236 an expectation that laughter is the appropriate response to what 0:05:05.236 --> 0:05:08.756 they're doing. I cannot imagine a better set of circumstances 0:05:09.156 --> 0:05:13.396 the easier set of circumstances for navigating a situation than those. 0:05:13.876 --> 0:05:15.996 So if that's true, when are you ready for your 0:05:16.036 --> 0:05:17.116 first stand up performance? 0:05:17.636 --> 0:05:20.276 I would If you're asking me, that's not the right. 0:05:20.556 --> 0:05:22.636 The best question is if you're asking me, would I 0:05:22.756 --> 0:05:25.396 rather teach a class of first graders or do a. 0:05:25.316 --> 0:05:26.156 Stand up performance? 0:05:26.156 --> 0:05:27.876 And the answer is I would do a stand up 0:05:27.916 --> 0:05:30.676 performance a million times before I would teach a class 0:05:30.676 --> 0:05:31.436 of first graders. 0:05:31.556 --> 0:05:32.436 I am really harder. 0:05:32.796 --> 0:05:34.956 I cannot wait to present you with both options and 0:05:35.196 --> 0:05:36.236 see what you really choose. 0:05:36.356 --> 0:05:37.356 But way, how could you? 0:05:37.716 --> 0:05:40.316 It's not even close by the way stand up. 0:05:41.356 --> 0:05:43.716 One of the things that stand up comedians do that 0:05:43.796 --> 0:05:46.876 drives me crazy is that they like to pretend that 0:05:46.876 --> 0:05:51.316 their profession is this terrifying death defying, you know, high 0:05:51.396 --> 0:05:54.956 wire act. Have you ever given a performance before a 0:05:54.996 --> 0:05:57.956 group of people who have been drinking they are putting 0:05:57.996 --> 0:06:01.636 in your hands. It's like they're just they're sitting there, 0:06:01.716 --> 0:06:04.836 they're dosed up with alcohol, waiting to be entertained. That 0:06:04.956 --> 0:06:06.596 is about as far as you can get from a 0:06:06.676 --> 0:06:09.756 room full of first graders as is human leader imaginable. 0:06:10.876 --> 0:06:12.116 I think there's some truth to that. 0:06:12.276 --> 0:06:15.356 I also think though that the nice thing about about 0:06:15.436 --> 0:06:18.516 kids is that the situations repeat over and over again. 0:06:18.876 --> 0:06:21.316 So you only have a certain number of ways that 0:06:21.396 --> 0:06:23.996 kids can misbehave and that parents can be difficult, and 0:06:24.036 --> 0:06:26.356 you get to practice over and over again the responses 0:06:26.356 --> 0:06:28.516 that you want to have, and over time that becomes 0:06:28.516 --> 0:06:29.996 a skill and it becomes expertise. 0:06:30.036 --> 0:06:32.436 Wait, you don't think comedians practice over Of course they do. 0:06:32.636 --> 0:06:35.156 Of course they do, but your audience very so much. 0:06:35.436 --> 0:06:38.116 Try to give an improv performance in a new country 0:06:38.316 --> 0:06:38.996 for the first time. 0:06:39.236 --> 0:06:41.196 Yeah, but they don't do that. They go to Vegas 0:06:41.196 --> 0:06:42.876 and they go to the comedy cellar and they go 0:06:42.916 --> 0:06:43.396 to I. 0:06:43.316 --> 0:06:45.356 Mean, they're hanging out with the wrong comedian. 0:06:45.476 --> 0:06:46.196 No, what's my point. 0:06:46.236 --> 0:06:49.436 They control their environments. No one controls their environments better 0:06:49.476 --> 0:06:51.876 than comedians. That's how they manage to do what they 0:06:51.916 --> 0:06:52.396 do right. 0:06:53.436 --> 0:06:56.516 And so you don't think that still requires deep insight 0:06:56.636 --> 0:06:58.476 into human behavior or psychology. 0:06:58.596 --> 0:07:02.876 Not deep insight. No, talking to drunk people requires some insight. 0:07:03.076 --> 0:07:03.556 But it's not. 0:07:05.436 --> 0:07:10.076 You're maybe doing it right. Now, let's shift cares a 0:07:10.116 --> 0:07:12.636 little bit. I want to talk about your work life. 0:07:13.236 --> 0:07:14.516 So I'd love to hear a little bit about your 0:07:14.556 --> 0:07:17.596 creative process and where your ideas come from, how you 0:07:17.676 --> 0:07:20.676 develop them, and any insights for our audience on how 0:07:20.676 --> 0:07:21.996 to be a little bit more creative. 0:07:22.396 --> 0:07:25.196 Well, you know, I did an episode of my podcast 0:07:25.316 --> 0:07:28.276 last year called The King of Tears, which is all 0:07:28.316 --> 0:07:32.236 about why is that country music can do sad songs 0:07:32.236 --> 0:07:34.356 and rock and roll can't. And one of the things, 0:07:34.356 --> 0:07:35.836 one of the points I made was something that I've 0:07:35.876 --> 0:07:37.676 believe very strongly for a long time, which is that 0:07:38.196 --> 0:07:42.036 country music can be sad when rock and roll can't 0:07:42.276 --> 0:07:47.396 because country music is specific and specificity is something I've 0:07:47.436 --> 0:07:52.516 become increasingly interested in as a trait of interestingness, that 0:07:52.636 --> 0:07:56.356 all the interesting people I know are people whose speech 0:07:56.676 --> 0:07:59.676 and thinking has a great deal of specificity to it. 0:07:59.756 --> 0:08:02.916 So I was listening, for example, to a interview with 0:08:03.756 --> 0:08:05.716 Rostambat Moglige, who's. 0:08:05.396 --> 0:08:06.276 The Is that a person? 0:08:06.436 --> 0:08:10.116 Yes, he's a brilliant musician who was one half of 0:08:10.876 --> 0:08:15.156 Vampire Weekend before they broke up. And I happen to 0:08:15.196 --> 0:08:18.996 know his brother, who's also a brilliant director, and they 0:08:19.036 --> 0:08:22.076 have the same quality when they talk about what they do, 0:08:22.796 --> 0:08:26.596 there is this brilliant level of specificity, so they don't 0:08:26.636 --> 0:08:32.396 just say I really loved that film by Alfred Hitchcock, 0:08:32.396 --> 0:08:34.716 which is what ninety percent of us would say. What 0:08:34.836 --> 0:08:39.796 Zell will say is if you watch that film by Hitchcock, 0:08:40.396 --> 0:08:43.276 in the thirty second moment, there's this scene where this happens, 0:08:43.316 --> 0:08:45.556 and so and so says this, and the camera does this, 0:08:45.676 --> 0:08:48.956 and in that moment you realize this right. And Ross 0:08:49.076 --> 0:08:50.636 did the same thing. He was talking about the song 0:08:50.636 --> 0:08:53.276 he'd written, and as he went through the song, didn't 0:08:53.316 --> 0:08:55.476 he identified the points of his influence. 0:08:55.836 --> 0:08:57.276 He zeroed in on. 0:08:57.316 --> 0:09:01.476 Exactly the moment in the song from nineteen sixty nine 0:09:01.516 --> 0:09:03.676 that he heard when he was a kid in high 0:09:03.716 --> 0:09:06.796 school in nineteen eighty nine. And you know, Blenny was 0:09:06.836 --> 0:09:09.316 here when he heard it, and that guitar, you know, 0:09:10.036 --> 0:09:12.796 and you realize that's why you listen to him. And 0:09:12.916 --> 0:09:16.836 that quality of being specific and being able to illustrate 0:09:17.036 --> 0:09:21.436 your larger points with that kind of precision is the 0:09:21.516 --> 0:09:24.836 quality of what makes something interesting. Ever since I've come 0:09:24.876 --> 0:09:28.036 to understand this, that has informed the way I look 0:09:28.076 --> 0:09:32.196 for ideas. So I try I'm trying to be I'm 0:09:32.196 --> 0:09:34.996 trying to be as precise as possible in how I 0:09:34.996 --> 0:09:38.276 illustrate an idea and to understand that in the service 0:09:38.316 --> 0:09:41.316 of illustrating an idea, you don't have to skate over that. 0:09:41.356 --> 0:09:42.796 You don't want to skate over the surface. 0:09:43.036 --> 0:09:45.436 But isn't that what you've always done, right, Like, here's 0:09:45.436 --> 0:09:47.676 a story about a statue, and oh my gosh, that 0:09:47.796 --> 0:09:51.196 changes your entire understanding of intuition. And here's a story 0:09:51.236 --> 0:09:53.236 about a hockey team or a soccer team, and all 0:09:53.236 --> 0:09:55.756 of a sudden, you know, we're going to reimagine how 0:09:55.796 --> 0:09:58.116 success works and think it's much more ut luck and 0:09:58.116 --> 0:09:58.836 opportunity than. 0:09:58.796 --> 0:10:00.396 We Yeah, but I think I did it in the 0:10:00.436 --> 0:10:04.196 beginning without realizing that's what I was doing. So you 0:10:04.356 --> 0:10:07.036 asked me what my creative process is and the answers. 0:10:07.076 --> 0:10:09.596 I've only recently become kind of conscious of it, and 0:10:09.676 --> 0:10:11.676 I realized, you know, with a podcast, you have to 0:10:11.676 --> 0:10:16.916 crank up the specificity even more so, you because now 0:10:16.916 --> 0:10:20.116 you're listening to somebody's voice. In order to engage someone 0:10:20.156 --> 0:10:22.916 who's only experiencing this through their ears, you need to 0:10:23.996 --> 0:10:25.596 ramp up the precision. 0:10:26.196 --> 0:10:28.316 So I have a different I guess, a different take 0:10:28.356 --> 0:10:33.836 on interestingness, which comes from a sociologist Murray Davis, who 0:10:33.876 --> 0:10:37.676 wrote this beautiful paper decades ago called That's interesting, where 0:10:37.676 --> 0:10:40.476 he said ideas survive not because they're true, but. 0:10:40.476 --> 0:10:43.556 Because they're interesting, and you're like, huh, that's interesting. This 0:10:43.676 --> 0:10:44.756 is bad news. 0:10:45.636 --> 0:10:47.356 But then he's kind of proving his point in a 0:10:47.356 --> 0:10:49.676 meta way, and then he says, well, what makes an 0:10:49.676 --> 0:10:52.596 idea interesting? He says, what makes an idea interesting is 0:10:52.636 --> 0:10:55.916 when it departs from conventional wisdom. If something just affirms 0:10:55.916 --> 0:10:58.356 your assumptions, you don't get curious, you don't get intrigued, 0:10:58.396 --> 0:11:01.196 there's no surprise, and you're like, whoop, confirmation bias. 0:11:01.276 --> 0:11:02.036 All good. 0:11:02.716 --> 0:11:04.756 When you're interested is when you're like, huh, that's that's 0:11:04.796 --> 0:11:06.676 the opposite of what I would have thought, or that's 0:11:06.716 --> 0:11:09.996 different from what I would have believed. I don't think 0:11:10.036 --> 0:11:12.276 specificity gets you there. I think if you know, if 0:11:12.276 --> 0:11:14.476 you have a really specific story that confirms everything I 0:11:14.476 --> 0:11:17.076 always thought was true about the world, I'm not that 0:11:17.196 --> 0:11:21.516 excited if you have a specific theory that I've read 0:11:21.516 --> 0:11:25.236 a Malcolm Gladwell book generator once that created fake book 0:11:25.276 --> 0:11:27.076 titles of yours, and one of them that I remember 0:11:27.236 --> 0:11:30.676 was nothing what sand Castles can tell us about North Korea? 0:11:33.236 --> 0:11:35.316 Like that's interesting, right, I'm like, wow, I never would 0:11:35.316 --> 0:11:37.876 have thought that a sand castle could explain North Korea. Yeah, 0:11:39.316 --> 0:11:42.836 and so don't don't you think that specificity needs. 0:11:42.676 --> 0:11:43.796 To be coupled with surprise? 0:11:44.836 --> 0:11:48.836 Sure? Good way. I rest the case that guys, thank 0:11:48.876 --> 0:11:51.756 you all so much for that guy's theory of it. 0:11:51.876 --> 0:11:53.876 What's interesting? Not terribly interesting? 0:11:53.956 --> 0:11:55.396 I used to I. 0:11:55.356 --> 0:11:58.876 Mean, yeah, so Davis then creates this is the worst 0:11:58.876 --> 0:12:00.956 thing for a social scientist to do, but he creates 0:12:00.956 --> 0:12:03.316 a typology of the interesting, and he says, there are 0:12:03.316 --> 0:12:05.196 all these different ways that you can challenge an assumption. 0:12:05.356 --> 0:12:07.596 But I think what is interesting is he says, but 0:12:07.636 --> 0:12:10.356 not all assumptions want to be challenged, and so an 0:12:10.396 --> 0:12:13.236 interesting idea is one that challenges your weekly held assumptions, 0:12:13.756 --> 0:12:16.356 whereas if you challenge somebody strongly held assumptions, they just 0:12:16.396 --> 0:12:16.956 say you're. 0:12:16.836 --> 0:12:19.396 Wrong or you're stupid. That's good, that's fun. 0:12:19.956 --> 0:12:23.636 You've been working on the fit topic around questions of 0:12:24.156 --> 0:12:26.996 what does it take to be effective or successful or 0:12:26.996 --> 0:12:29.916 a high performer? And you know, how much does my 0:12:30.076 --> 0:12:32.596 environment and whether I fit it matter? And I'd love 0:12:32.636 --> 0:12:33.276 to talk about that. 0:12:33.516 --> 0:12:35.676 So can you tell us first what you've been doing there? 0:12:35.836 --> 0:12:36.036 Well? 0:12:36.076 --> 0:12:40.356 I had I wanted to talk about basketball, because right 0:12:40.396 --> 0:12:43.356 now the NBA is this lovely little case study in 0:12:43.436 --> 0:12:48.116 fit to backtrack basketball. The kind of intuitive position of 0:12:48.116 --> 0:12:53.276 basketball is it's the sport where talent matters most and 0:12:53.996 --> 0:12:57.836 coaching an organizational fit matter least. If you put Lebron 0:12:57.876 --> 0:13:02.316 on a team of also rans, you can basically guarantee 0:13:02.316 --> 0:13:04.236 you and make the playoffs. And he actually has made 0:13:04.276 --> 0:13:07.276 the finals several times with teams, so it's like it 0:13:07.316 --> 0:13:10.356 doesn't really matter who's with Lebron. He's you know, you 0:13:10.396 --> 0:13:13.036 can put a bunch of stiffs and it's fine. 0:13:13.116 --> 0:13:13.316 Right. 0:13:14.156 --> 0:13:17.956 In fact, the two greatest teams basketball teams of all time, 0:13:18.036 --> 0:13:22.036 the mid nineties Chicago Bulls were three superstars and then 0:13:22.036 --> 0:13:24.956 two very ordinary players. Their fifth player was a big, slow, 0:13:25.076 --> 0:13:27.676 white guy from Australia. And if you look at this 0:13:27.796 --> 0:13:30.876 Warriors of two years ago, they were three superstars and 0:13:30.916 --> 0:13:32.836 then their fifth player was a big, slow, lumbering white 0:13:32.876 --> 0:13:33.836 guy from Australia. 0:13:33.916 --> 0:13:35.356 Like it doesn't matter. 0:13:35.436 --> 0:13:38.356 You could just go to Australia and like get some 0:13:38.476 --> 0:13:42.316 random guy and he can be your fifth. So, but 0:13:42.396 --> 0:13:45.196 what's happening now in basketball? There's a couple examples in 0:13:45.236 --> 0:13:46.996 this season that sort of go against that one is 0:13:47.396 --> 0:13:49.116 that one of the best guards in the game this 0:13:49.196 --> 0:13:52.276 season was this guy named Victor Oladipo on OKAYC and 0:13:52.516 --> 0:13:58.276 was considered a disaster. And he simply moves teams to 0:13:58.356 --> 0:14:01.476 a new environment with a presuming a better coach. He's 0:14:01.516 --> 0:14:04.396 longer playing with Russell Westbrook, who's probably a very difficult 0:14:04.396 --> 0:14:07.756 person to play with, and simply by moving teams, he 0:14:07.796 --> 0:14:10.636 went from being someone who was why they considered to 0:14:10.636 --> 0:14:12.516 be a bust someone would be washing out of the 0:14:12.556 --> 0:14:15.436 league sooner, or a media coal player into this suddenly 0:14:15.596 --> 0:14:18.196 a superstar who's kind of playing transcendently. 0:14:18.676 --> 0:14:21.076 The reverse is also true that the best coach. 0:14:21.036 --> 0:14:24.556 In the league is probably Brad Stevens of the Boston Celtics. 0:14:24.596 --> 0:14:25.276 I second that. 0:14:25.596 --> 0:14:29.796 And every time a very promising player is traded from 0:14:29.836 --> 0:14:32.796 the Boston Celtics, they turn out to be terrible, Like 0:14:32.836 --> 0:14:34.396 they just leave Boston and they go on to the 0:14:34.396 --> 0:14:36.636 team like, oh, wait a minute, the guy actually Jake 0:14:36.676 --> 0:14:39.276 Crowder is a good example. Everyone was like, oh, Jake 0:14:39.316 --> 0:14:42.596 Crowder's really good. Oh, then Boston trades him, Like oh god, 0:14:42.716 --> 0:14:45.156 they traded Jake Crowder. Wow, I don't know if they 0:14:45.156 --> 0:14:47.556 can survive without Jake Croder. Jake Crowder goes to the 0:14:47.556 --> 0:14:50.396 Cleveland Cavaliers and like they all of a sudden, people realize, oh, 0:14:50.716 --> 0:14:53.316 Jake Crowder is actually not any good. He just was 0:14:53.356 --> 0:14:54.156 good on Boston. 0:14:54.676 --> 0:14:57.196 And there's another piece of I think evidence for your theory, 0:14:57.196 --> 0:14:59.436 which is this season they've lost their two biggest stars 0:14:59.716 --> 0:15:01.956 and the first time they got better, and the second 0:15:01.956 --> 0:15:03.756 time they were way better than they should have been. 0:15:03.956 --> 0:15:06.876 Yeah, So it's like, now, is this always true in basketball? 0:15:06.876 --> 0:15:09.356 I don't know, but we're certainly in this moment in 0:15:09.396 --> 0:15:12.956 basketball it seems like it's very, very, very coach dependent. 0:15:13.236 --> 0:15:15.316 And when you see those I've given a couple those, 0:15:15.796 --> 0:15:19.116 those specific example and total examples, you then begin to 0:15:19.156 --> 0:15:24.356 wonder how many players on basketball teams who we consider 0:15:24.476 --> 0:15:28.156 mediocre are actually really good but just in the wrong environment. 0:15:28.636 --> 0:15:32.276 Is Victor oladepot Is he an exception or is he 0:15:32.356 --> 0:15:35.036 part of a larger trend? And I am increasingly of 0:15:35.076 --> 0:15:37.236 the opinion that there must be lots of Victor olidepots 0:15:37.236 --> 0:15:37.676 out there. 0:15:37.916 --> 0:15:39.396 I think there are, and I think they're not just 0:15:39.436 --> 0:15:40.156 in basketball. 0:15:40.196 --> 0:15:43.196 So this makes me think of study of cardiac surgeons, 0:15:43.676 --> 0:15:45.876 where you track their performance over the course of the day, 0:15:46.316 --> 0:15:48.636 And the question is how many surgeries do they have 0:15:48.676 --> 0:15:52.476 to perform with let's say, minimally invasive robot technology before 0:15:52.516 --> 0:15:54.516 they get to the point where they're up the learning curve. 0:15:55.076 --> 0:15:57.036 And I read in a book once that an average 0:15:57.036 --> 0:16:00.556 of ten thousand hours could be helpful. That does not 0:16:00.596 --> 0:16:03.676 turn out to be the case. Practice has no effect 0:16:03.716 --> 0:16:06.276 whatsoever in that context, and they are as deadly on 0:16:06.316 --> 0:16:08.436 surgery number one hundred and a thousand as they were 0:16:08.436 --> 0:16:09.236 on number one. 0:16:09.556 --> 0:16:11.276 And this is weird, right, because we're supposed to learn 0:16:11.316 --> 0:16:12.076 from experience. 0:16:12.516 --> 0:16:14.556 And so what Huckman and Pisano did was they broke 0:16:14.556 --> 0:16:17.236 down the data by which hospital you're performing surgery at, 0:16:17.756 --> 0:16:20.396 and they said, well, what's the effect of practice at 0:16:20.436 --> 0:16:23.716 Hospital A on your performance at Hospital A versus then 0:16:23.796 --> 0:16:27.276 Hospital B. And they found that surgeries were hospital specific, 0:16:27.796 --> 0:16:30.796 so that every surgery I performed at Hospital A, at 0:16:30.876 --> 0:16:32.916 least up to a certain point, reduced the patient mortality 0:16:32.956 --> 0:16:35.596 rate by about one percent. But then later that afternoon, 0:16:35.636 --> 0:16:37.316 as a surgeon, I go over to hospital B and 0:16:37.316 --> 0:16:39.796 it's like I'm starting over and I have none of 0:16:39.796 --> 0:16:41.676 that experience. And the reason is I have a different 0:16:41.716 --> 0:16:45.836 team who knows my strengths and weaknesses, and we've developed 0:16:45.836 --> 0:16:48.796 a set of effective routines. And that kind of suggests 0:16:48.836 --> 0:16:52.396 that performance and skill and expertise is team specific, it's 0:16:52.396 --> 0:16:55.196 context specific. And then you see the same thing in 0:16:55.236 --> 0:16:57.756 financial services companies, and so that makes me think that 0:16:57.796 --> 0:17:00.196 people you surround yourself with really matter. 0:17:00.876 --> 0:17:06.996 Discuss well, does this suggest that we Isn't it a 0:17:07.036 --> 0:17:10.236 lot more rational for me? If I'm you know, the 0:17:10.316 --> 0:17:13.236 University Toronto and I want to poach Adam Grant, why 0:17:13.276 --> 0:17:15.716 don't I poach you and all of the colleagues who 0:17:15.756 --> 0:17:18.716 you think make you as good as you are? Why 0:17:18.756 --> 0:17:22.116 isn't it routine for businesses to try and hire the group? 0:17:22.316 --> 0:17:24.876 So twenty twelve, I was asked to speak at a 0:17:24.876 --> 0:17:28.956 Google event. I walked in and Larry Page was on stage, 0:17:29.076 --> 0:17:31.236 and they told me they wanted me to explain how 0:17:31.316 --> 0:17:33.516 I would run Google as an organizational psychologist. 0:17:33.596 --> 0:17:34.476 What would I do differently? 0:17:34.636 --> 0:17:36.156 And this is exactly the point I made to them, 0:17:36.156 --> 0:17:38.116 is I said, you know, if you look at your 0:17:38.116 --> 0:17:41.476 greatest innovations from you know, the Google search engine, all 0:17:41.516 --> 0:17:44.996 the way across a few more recent ones, they've almost 0:17:45.076 --> 0:17:46.596 all been a diet or a team. 0:17:46.916 --> 0:17:47.996 And yet you hire. 0:17:47.796 --> 0:17:50.996 Individuals, you reward individuals, You promote individuals, you fire individuals. 0:17:51.196 --> 0:17:53.076 What if you did what Grosberg calls a lift up 0:17:53.396 --> 0:17:55.116 and you hired entire teams, but. 0:17:55.076 --> 0:17:55.716 You didn't just do that. 0:17:55.756 --> 0:17:58.396 You promoted teams, you rewarded teams, and when a team failed, 0:17:58.436 --> 0:18:00.196 you fired the whole group as opposed to the individual. 0:18:00.916 --> 0:18:02.356 And they got really excited about it. 0:18:02.356 --> 0:18:04.836 And then they did the math of how much work 0:18:04.876 --> 0:18:06.476 it was going to be to keep a team together, 0:18:06.876 --> 0:18:08.636 and they said, this is just not practical. And so 0:18:08.716 --> 0:18:10.716 instead they said, we're going to study what makes our 0:18:10.756 --> 0:18:12.996 teams great and then try to create more of those 0:18:12.996 --> 0:18:16.036 conditions so that anyone can join any team and become great. 0:18:16.356 --> 0:18:17.556 But I'm a big fan of this. 0:18:18.516 --> 0:18:21.076 Does what they wanted to do make any sense? Or 0:18:21.116 --> 0:18:23.196 does that sound like a cop like Silicon Valley cop out? 0:18:23.276 --> 0:18:23.356 No? 0:18:23.396 --> 0:18:25.276 I think it makes a lot of sense. So you've 0:18:25.276 --> 0:18:26.076 seen the research. 0:18:26.596 --> 0:18:32.756 Having observed that teams outperform individuals, they said that they 0:18:32.796 --> 0:18:37.956 would rather than use teams, just study the individuals in 0:18:37.996 --> 0:18:38.156 the no. 0:18:38.476 --> 0:18:40.316 No, So they wanted to study the qualities of great 0:18:40.316 --> 0:18:43.196 teams and how to enable any team even if they 0:18:43.196 --> 0:18:46.236 hadn't shown excellence together to reach that level of success. 0:18:46.876 --> 0:18:49.636 It seems insanely convoluted in the way that I mean, 0:18:49.676 --> 0:18:51.756 it's not enough to take a very simple idea that 0:18:51.836 --> 0:18:54.276 a team that is observed to work well should be 0:18:54.316 --> 0:18:57.516 kept together and continue to work well there. Instead want 0:18:57.556 --> 0:19:00.916 to kind of abstract out the quality and recreate it 0:19:00.956 --> 0:19:01.396 over there. 0:19:02.116 --> 0:19:05.356 Yeah, I mean, I think I think they're do. 0:19:05.276 --> 0:19:08.756 You see what I'm saying. We'll get so smart that 0:19:09.396 --> 0:19:12.996 the obvious thing is no longer satisfactory. Like, no, no, Adam, 0:19:13.556 --> 0:19:15.756 I can think of a way that's way harder and 0:19:15.756 --> 0:19:18.596 way more complicated and ultimately might work as well. 0:19:18.596 --> 0:19:20.116 I think we should do that way. 0:19:21.036 --> 0:19:23.956 Definitely. No. Look, I think there are two complications. 0:19:23.996 --> 0:19:26.796 One is, over seventy five percent of of airline accidents 0:19:26.836 --> 0:19:29.396 happened the first time a crew is flying together. And 0:19:29.436 --> 0:19:32.596