Angela Duckworth is a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, founder of The Character Lab, and the reason “grit” has become a ubiquitous term in modern performance development. Grit is a prized mental disposition, and Duckworth literally wrote the book on it. Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance has become an international bestseller and a paragon of pop psychology.
Duckworth’s research has shown time and again that high levels of grit map onto uniquely high achievements. She has tracked it in professors, professional athletes, Army cadets, and National Spelling Bee champions. To reach the finish line of any meaningful accomplishment, grit seems to be an essential component.
Importantly, she has taken an abstract concept and provided a usable definition: grit is the tendency to sustain interest in and effort toward very long-term goals.
Before Duckworth and her colleagues studied and named it, grit was commonly associated with effort and toughness. On a football team, receivers might be referred to as flashy while linemen were described as gritty, grinding away in mud-stained trenches. (To be clear, from my experience, there are plenty of gritty wide receivers.)
Popular associations and research-based definitions are distinct, and educators should work to understand the difference if they hope to cultivate the quality in young people. Before one can teach grit, one must first understand it. Duckworth’s definition includes three key components: sustained interest, sustained effort, and long-term goals.
The Differentiating Factor
A deep understanding of human performance acknowledges that luck plays a role in high achievement. Good genetics, fortunate timing, and financial security might set someone on a solid life path, but those factors cannot be counted on. They are exceptions to the rule. Even in a pool of individuals with the genetic gifts required to make the NBA, grit often becomes the determining factor in high achievement.
Talent squandered is a tale as old as humankind.
Have you ever heard of Shawn Bradley? He was one of the most prized recruits in BYU history and, at 7 feet 6 inches tall, a dominant presence. After blocking 5.2 shots per game in his only collegiate season, he was selected second overall in the 1993 NBA Draft. As a professional, he has often been referred to as one of the greatest “busts” of the last few decades.
His genetic gifts kept him in the league for 14 years, but he started for only four of those seasons, averaged an underwhelming 8.1 points per game, and was never a true impact player. Critics have noted that he never committed to the weight room in a way that would have allowed him to fill out his 7-foot-6 frame. Instead of being a dominant presence, he was often pushed around by grittier opponents.
Nate Robinson, on the other hand, was often considered the epitome of grit. At 5 feet 9 inches tall, the All-Pac-10 performer from the University of Washington was viewed by some as an NBA risk. He played all four years of college basketball and won the Frances Pomeroy Naismith Award, given to the nation’s best senior player under six feet tall. Some refer to recipients as the nation’s finest overachievers.
Robinson did not allow his stature to limit him. A dedicated weight room athlete, he was drafted 21st overall by the New York Knicks, played 13 seasons in the league, averaged 11.0 points per game, and remains the only three-time winner of the NBA Slam Dunk Contest. Michael Jordan won twice.
What is the difference between the 7-foot-6, second overall pick and the 5-foot-9, 21st pick? Some would say the difference lies in grit. Certainly, something within Duckworth’s equation of sustained interest, sustained effort, and long-term goals skews in favor of Robinson.
Shawn Bradley is a perfectly nice man and was undoubtedly a dedicated athlete. To be clear, he is elite. But highlighting the success of the underdog allows us to recognize that luck and genetics are not the sole determinants of success. Robinson was genetically gifted in many ways, but in a pool of athletes who were equally or more gifted, he found a way to stand out.
The Trouble with Grit
Is grit good? Absolutely. That is, if we stay within the boundaries with which it has been studied and described. But when it is misapplied, it can be dangerous.
Not everyone who is underachieving is lacking grit. Their circumstances matter. Reactive thinking on the part of a leader can lead to the misdiagnosis of a situation and the misapplication of grit. Often, we see that people don’t need to more grit, but could use more support. This can happen at a larger scale as well. In those cases, over-indexing on grit is not only thoughtless, but it can be dangerous.
Many schools have necessarily added the teaching of social-emotional learning as an essential part of their curricula. Grit is one of those skills. On the south side of Chicago, where a classroom’s broken window has been covered by cardboard and masking tape, wherein students have to wear their winter coats indoors through frigid winter days, it would be absurd to suggest that the reason they cannot pay attention in math class is a lack of grit.
Those kids have plenty of grit, but it might be all used up by midday.
As those schools teach grit, they must simultaneously identify the areas in which the demand for a student to be gritty exceeds a reasonable level. Broken windows. Crime. Hunger. Lack of support. Grit alone does not solve sincere environmental issues.
In part, grit requires the belief that things will get better. Not an obsessive focus on it, but a belief in it. After all, if there is no light at the end of the tunnel, why keep walking?
Understand, Then Share
Educators witness gritty behavior daily. Students put in long hours of study, forgo activities they enjoy, and brave winter commutes in pursuit of academic achievement. Their effort may be aimed at strong grades, standardized test performance, or college acceptance. Others strive to make a varsity team, earn a leading role in a play, or build meaningful relationships.
All of these pursuits require grit.
For some, swapping The Simpsons for a science textbook is simple. It comes naturally. For most, developing grit would be beneficial.
In our professional development workshops, coaches often ask how to build a grittier team. They want toughness and increased effort. An intense pursuit of the abstract command to “try harder” can leave leaders – and those they lead – exhausted.
Grit does not need to remain abstract. Duckworth and her colleagues have defined it clearly. As noted, grit includes sustained interest, sustained effort, and long-term goals. In the absence of these components, a behavior is not a strict demonstration of grit.
How to Do It
Identify the motives of your people. It is important to ask what they want and what they enjoy, what matters to them, and listen carefully. If a leader consistently imposes personal ideals, the team is less likely to demonstrate grit. It is difficult to sustain passion and effort in pursuit of someone else’s goals. To motivate someone, you must first align with their motives.
The second component is effort. This is not effort for its own sake. It is effort directed toward long-term goals. Coaches must help athletes understand why they should finish a sprint through the line, squat heavy, push hard, and tolerate discomfort. In a professional setting, make it clearwhy booking a certain number of meetings for the month is important for the organization’s shared purpose. Be sure your people understand what they are supposed to do, know why they are doing it, then hold them accountable.
Frame the hard parts of any experience by using the language of the people you lead. Remind them of their long-term goals. Keep the light lit at the end of the tunnel as you drive (and support) them through.
While working with athletes, we often ask them to notice the moment they feel the instinct to ease up. Are they conserving energy strategically, or are they indulging comfort? Energy conservation is part of sport. Avoiding challenge is different. When athletes recognize that moment, they encounter an opportunity to display grit.
Develop people who are willing to work hard toward a shared purpose. If you continue when your opponent pulls up, you win.
A Continued Effort
Building grit is a process. Like all psychological skills, it must be cultivated, reevaluated, and consciously applied. A person does not wake up one morning possessing grit. They build the capacity for it.
Some days will be harder than others. In certain circumstances, one’s reservoir of grit may feel depleted by noon. The gritty respond by reconnecting with long-term goals, renewing interest, and choosing to exert effort once more. In that repetition, capacity grows.
In being gritty, they build grit.
A coach once told me, “The only way to get tough is to do tough things.” Experience matters. As long as those difficult tasks are meaningful to the individual performing them and aligned with long-term goals, Angela Duckworth would likely agree.
