All talks
Creativity15 min

The surprising habits of original thinkers

Watch directly on YouTube

About this talk

Organisational psychologist Adam Grant studies "originals", people who have new ideas and act on them. He found they aren't fearless or first: they procrastinate a little, doubt their ideas, fear not trying, and have lots of bad ideas on the way to good ones.

  • 15 min
  • Creativity
  • by Adam Grant
Watch the talk

Key notes

What to take away.

  1. 01
    Quick to start, slow to finish

    In Grant's experiments, people who put a task off for a little while came up with more creative ideas.

  2. 02
    You don't have to be first

    To be original, you just have to be different and better.

  3. 03
    Doubt the idea, not yourself

    Self-doubt freezes you; doubting an idea pushes you to test and improve it.

  4. 04
    Question the default

    Originals ask whether there's a better option instead of accepting what they're handed.

  5. 05
    Fear not trying

    Our biggest regrets tend to be the chances we didn't take.

  6. 06
    Have lots of ideas

    The greatest originals fail the most because they try the most. You need many bad ideas to find a few good ones.

Read next

Books by Adam Grant

Watch next

More talks like this

All talks