What does your mindset at work reveal about your potential for success? How can shifting your perspective transform your career trajectory?
The difference between average contributors and impact players comes down to three key mindset shifts. By learning to embrace change, consider multiple perspectives, and overcome self-doubt, you can elevate your professional impact and accelerate your career growth.
Read more to discover how your mindset at work can unlock new opportunities and help you become an invaluable team member.
Mindset at Work
In her book Impact Players, Liz Wiseman argues that impact players adopt a mindset at work that allows them to see more opportunities to create value than average contributors. They embrace change, they consider the perspectives of others, and they don’t doubt themselves.
(Shortform note: The idea that your mindset and thoughts affect your reality is central to the law of attraction. Popularized by books like Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret, the law of attraction posits that your energy attracts like energy from the universe—positive thinking attracts positive things and negative thinking attracts negative things into your life. Although the law of attraction is considered a pseudoscience, meaning there’s no empirical proof for it, studies have shown that your thoughts can make you luckier or unluckier. Research suggests that, like impact players, lucky people are simply more open to opportunities and are more prepared to seize them when they appear.)
Let’s explore each of these shifts in thinking to help you adopt the mindset of an impact player.
Mindset Shift #1: See Change as an Opportunity
First, Wiseman writes that most workers see change as a threat to their jobs or self-esteem. They therefore avoid new responsibilities and unexpected challenges, which limits their ability to make valuable contributions to their organization.
In contrast, impact players approach change with an empowered mindset: They welcome change as an opportunity to grow and be valuable. This way of thinking allows them to competently navigate common workplace challenges like unexpected obstacles, changing goals, or excessive demands—challenges that average contributors struggle with.
To view change more positively, Wiseman suggests you use a process called cognitive reframing: First, recognize that situations can be seen in more than one way. Then, examine how you view a situation and evaluate whether your perspective stems from fear. Finally, try to reframe the situation: Are there positives you didn’t see before? Could this challenging time also be a chance for you to grow or improve? Regularly asking yourself these kinds of questions can gradually shift your perspective toward change.
| Change the Vocabulary You Use to Describe Change In Awaken the Giant Within, Tony Robbins provides another way to view change more positively: Change the vocabulary you use to describe change. The words you regularly use to describe things affect how you experience them, so swapping out the vocabulary you use to describe change can help you be more open to it. 1) Identify three disempowering words you use to describe change. To come up with these words, think of the negative emotions you feel when faced with change. What words would you use to describe these emotions? For example, some words might include “overwhelming” or “scary.” 2) Substitute your disempowering words with more empowering ones. For example, you could swap out “overwhelming” for “transformative” and “scary” for “thrilling.” 3) Reinforce your new vocabulary. Use Robbins’s six-step process to replace your negative thinking patterns with a new, positive one. 4) Get support. Share your new vocabulary with friends and family, and have them ask you how you feel when you experience change. Their reminders will hold you accountable and reinforce your new vocabulary. |
Mindset Shift #2: See the Bigger Picture
Second, Wiseman contends that many professionals only view situations from their point of view. As a result, they exclusively focus on their individual work and fail to consider the needs of their team and their organization, which limits their impact.
(Shortform note: In Focus, Daniel Goleman says that our attention can go in three directions: inward, toward others, and outward. To reach your full potential, develop the ability to pay attention to all three. According to Wiseman, many professionals have mastered inward attention, which Goleman says strengthens your self-awareness and willpower. However, you could benefit from focusing more on others and on the bigger picture. Focusing on others improves empathy and social awareness, which allows you to understand people and adjust your behavior to navigate workplace dynamics. Expanding your attention even further allows you to think about and confront large-scale issues like inequality and the climate crisis.)
Wiseman says that impact players, on the other hand, strive to look beyond themselves: They widen their perspective by being observant of their surroundings and trying to see things through other people’s eyes. In doing so, impact players often notice two things that average contributors miss:
1) Unspoken rules: Every organization has rules and expectations that aren’t stated explicitly but shape its culture and how it operates. These might include, for example, whether workers are expected to arrive early or stay late, or which employees tend to sway others’ opinions. By broadening your perspective and decoding these unspoken rules, you can identify the best ways to communicate with colleagues, align your actions with the organization’s expectations, and gain respect from your superiors.
2) What others value: Considering other people’s perspectives ensures that you don’t waste your efforts on things people don’t find helpful, but instead that you contribute to what your boss and coworkers need.
To hone your ability to see the bigger picture, Wiseman suggests you practice seeing others’ perspectives. Ask people how they see a situation and spend more time listening instead of rushing to share your thoughts. You can also put yourself in someone’s shoes by shadowing them or helping them with some of their responsibilities.
| Develop Your Social Awareness You can improve your ability to recognize unspoken rules and the things that others value by developing your social awareness. In Emotional Intelligence 2.0, Jean Greaves and Travis Bradberry provide specific tips for developing this skill. To learn your organization’s unspoken rules, the authors recommend you: • Don’t assume others share your standards. Find out how others want to be treated and treat them accordingly. • Spend more time observing your surroundings than you typically do, and look for indicators of what kinds of behaviors are expected or considered acceptable. Consider taking a brief walk around your workspace twice a week. • Discuss your observations about your workplace’s unspoken rules with coworkers. Share what you’ve seen and heard, and then ask if they have any rules you hadn’t noticed. To recognize what other people value and what they see from their perspective, Greaves and Bradberry recommend you get better at observing your surroundings. Practice your ability to read emotions by going “people watching” or by watching films. Try to identify specific cues for the emotions people have in their daily lives or those being portrayed on screen. |
Mindset Shift #3: Believe You Can Make an Impact
Third, Wiseman writes that average contributors limit their impact by doubting themselves and what they can accomplish. By thinking they can’t contribute more value or handle difficult challenges, they don’t bother to look for hidden opportunities or think of creative ways to solve problems.
Impact players, on the other hand, believe in their ability to adapt to new challenges. This mindset encourages them to seize opportunities instead of fearing them, and to produce more valuable work.
| Overcome Impostor Syndrome The doubt that often limits people’s ability to make an impact at work is more commonly known as impostor syndrome. In Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg says women are more likely to be affected by impostor syndrome than men. Studies show that women typically feel like they perform worse than they actually do, whereas men typically feel like they perform better than they do. Because of this distorted self-perception and doubt, women may shrink from opportunities more so than men, which prevents them from making more of an impact at work. In How Women Rise, Sally Helgesen and Marshall Goldsmith explain that women tend to suffer more from impostor syndrome because of gender expectations that society places on them. For example, society praises women who are modest instead of ambitious and those who are caring toward others instead of focused on themselves. Because of these societal views, many women feel pressured to underplay their accomplishments and neglect their personal goals and desires. To overcome impostor syndrome, Sandberg recommends you first recognize that your self-doubt is a distortion of reality. Then, remind yourself of past successes and try to build up your confidence. If you don’t feel confident, then start by faking it. Sandberg says that faking confidence boosts your testosterone and reduces your stress, which makes it easier for you to overcome doubt and seize opportunities, which can then help you become more and more confident. |
Wiseman breaks down the four components of self-belief that impact players have:
- A strong sense of agency: Impact players recognize they have the power to take action and make decisions that can change and improve situations.
- An internal locus of control: Impact players believe they can influence events and their outcomes instead of being controlled by external circumstances like luck or fate.
- A growth mindset: Impact players firmly believe they can get better at what they do through hard work and learning, understanding that setbacks are just part of the process.
- A strong sense of self-worth: Impact players know that they are valuable. Importantly, their sense of self-worth isn’t tied to what other people think of them, which helps them accept feedback, change easily, and learn from mistakes.
| Where Do Our Beliefs About Ourselves Come From? Wiseman describes the four components of self-belief that impact players have, but how did impact players develop them in the first place? In Grit, Duckworth explains that three main influences shaped the beliefs you have about yourself: 1) Childhood feedback. Duckworth says that your self-talk mirrors the feedback you got from authority figures when you were young. If you were praised for your efforts instead of raw talent, you’ve learned to believe you have the ability to improve your skills and intelligence—a necessary belief for having a sense of agency, control, and self-worth. 2) Thinking habits. Duckworth writes that growth or fixed mindsets are self-reinforcing. If you believe you can improve through hard work, you’re more likely to overcome obstacles, which reinforces a growth mindset. Conversely, if you believe you’ll never be able to do any better, you’re less likely to overcome obstacles, which reinforces a fixed mindset. 3) Experiences overcoming adversity. Those who learn to overcome adversity at a young age can better manage adversity later in life. Duckworth explains that by overcoming adversity, you experience the feeling of making progress against obstacles. |
Why Should You Become an Impact Player?
Wiseman writes that becoming an impact player can be highly rewarding not only for your organization but also for your career: When leaders see the exceptional value you bring to the table, they invest more in your growth. Consequently, you’ll receive more rewards, greater access to mentorship opportunities, more exciting and challenging assignments, and a quicker advancement in your career.
(Shortform note: Research suggests that the more complex your job is, the more impact you can make. In simpler jobs, high performers tend to be four times more productive than their average-performing counterparts. However, in more complex jobs such as management or software development, high performers can be eight times more productive. So, while leaders find impact players valuable and worthy of investment in all jobs, you could especially stand out and get rewarded for your contributions if you have a more complex job.)
Wiseman points out that the amount of your impact isn’t bound to your intelligence or talent. Many smart and talented people end up as average or even below-average contributors, failing to live up to their potential. To increase your impact, you must cultivate the right mindset and habits that make you more valuable at work.
(Shortform note: In Grit, Angela Duckworth argues that we often fall below our potential because we falsely believe the amount of impact we can make depends on our level of intelligence and talent. There are two reasons we think this way: First, we don’t usually witness how much hard work successful people put in to succeed, so we assume they succeeded because of their natural intelligence or talent. Second, when we attribute others’ successes to talent, we can feel better about ourselves, as we can justify why we haven’t achieved as much as other people have. These are misconceptions, however, and Duckworth argues that grit—a mix of perseverance and passion—ultimately matters more for success than talent or intelligence.)
