Pursue a brighter future with a growth mindset

Pursue a brighter future with a growth mindset

Treat every challenge as a learning experience and you'll grow stronger

As we near the end of 2020, we are reflecting on the crisis we have faced that has changed our lives and businesses forever. We’ve been disrupted in many ways we didn’t expect. The workplace, the way we work and the entire business landscape are among the many elements that have changed.

One of the biggest challenges we are facing as individuals and businesses is the skills gap. The pandemic-induced shifts in the business landscape didn’t just change the way we work but also the way we interact with our changing customers.

The fact is, we cannot avoid crisis and change. We may face even tougher situations in the future and the only way to prepare for them is to build strong foundations.

We will always face challenges, and while I’ve often stressed that resilience is important, that quality alone can’t help us move to a brighter future — we must pair it with a growth mindset. With resilience, we bounce back from adversity. With a growth mindset, we heed the lessons learned from adversity to become more effective in our work.

A growth mindset simply means that we find opportunity for growth in every circumstance, no matter how bad it might be. We can learn to develop ourselves; we don’t necessarily need to have innate skills to be good at them, as long as we learn and practise.

At the opposite pole from the growth mindset is what we know as the fixed mindset. This mindset makes us believe that skills are more innate than developed, and that the things we face are to be blamed on other people or elements we cannot control. Every one of us has a combination of these two mindsets — more one than the other in different situations — so we must learn to lean toward the growth mindset.

While a growth mindset is a skill in its own right, it is a basic skill that allows us to build more skills. Most importantly, it helps us sustain a positive outlook toward change, and to realise that learning is a part of daily life.

So, how can growth mindset help us drive toward a brighter future? The answer lies in the effects it has while you develop and strengthen your growth mindset. Here are the beneficial side effects that you gain while you strengthen your growth mindset.

The first side effect is better insight into yourself. We all face challenges and adversity and with resilience, we learn to overcome them. With a growth mindset, we learn more about our strengths and how to use them effectively. We also learn more about our weaknesses and understand how to develop ourselves for the better.

The second side effect is the improvement in relationship management. Relationship management is an important aspect of life and business. During tough times, it can be difficult to maintain relationships in a sustainable and healthy way. With a growth mindset, we learn to understand others, such as our customers, and find better solutions for them.

The third side effect is the improvement in stress management. While things have grown slightly better since the toughest days of the pandemic, we’re still in stressful times and we don’t know what’s going to happen in 2021. A growth mindset reminds us that we’re all still learning and working toward a better future, even if things don’t always pan out the way we want.

The fourth side effect is a better ability to gather insights from challenges. We cannot run away from the challenges that life throws at us. We use our resilience to get back up and then we use a growth mindset to find the key learning points that will make us more effective in life and work.

The fifth side effect is the skills we develop with our growth mindset. A growth mindset is about taking the opportunity to learn from any situation. This allows us to strengthen our skills and even develop new ones. We naturally and more sustainably develop ourselves because we have made it a habit to learn new things from every situation we face.

The final side effect is better ability to create change and a positive impact. With all the other side effects combined, we can learn to create the changes within ourselves to make a more positive impact in life and work. This ultimately leads to a greater and more sustainable future in our lives and businesses. 

The growth mindset isn’t about simply learning. It’s about being aware and understanding that challenges are more like hidden opportunities for us to grow. Change will always happen; we know we cannot remain still if we wish to overcome challenges. With a growth mindset, we can also see sustainable changes around us for the better.


Arinya Talerngsri is Chief Capability Officer and Managing Director at SEAC - Southeast Asia’s Lifelong Learning Center. She can be reached by email at arinya_t@seasiacenter.com or https://www.linkedin.com/in/arinya-talerngsri-53b81aa. Explore and experience our lifelong learning ecosystem today at https://www.yournextu.com 

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