Turia Pitt is an Agile Learner. She has a Growth Mindset and knows how to take on challenges and overcome adversity.

Completing a double bachelor’s degree in Engineering (Mining) and Science at the University of New South Wales in 2010, Turia went on to successfully apply her learning as a mining engineer at a prestigious diamond mining company in Western Australia.

Not content with only pursuing academic and career goals, Turia excelled in many other areas of her life. She was a contestant in the Miss Earth Australia contest, a professional model, and a successful ultramarathon runner.

Tragically, on 2nd September 2011, while competing in a 100km ultramarathon in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, Turia was caught in a grass fire. She suffered burns to 65% of her body, including her face. Turia was placed in a medically-induced coma for six months, underwent more than 200 operations, had her left foot amputated, and lost all the fingers on her left hand and two on her right. In...

I’m fortunate to work with many organisations around the world. Not only do I get to share my work with them; I get to learn about the goals they see as most important to their organisation.

Developing resilience is one of the most common goals I hear about. In fact, it is often the reason why organisations are drawn to my work with Growth Mindsets and Learning Agility.

But recently, I’ve been questioning resilience. By making “resilience” our goal, do we set the bar too low? Could we do better?

Let’s take a look at what resilience is and why organisations are so interested in it.

What is resilience?

Dictionary.com defines resilience as: “The capacity to recover quickly from difficulties. The power or ability to return to original form.”

Toni Noble and Helen McGrath, authors of Bounce Back!, discuss resilience in terms of the “ability to cope or ‘bounce back’ after encountering negative events, difficult situations, challenges or adversity and return to almost the same level of emotion...

Agile Learners thrive in the most challenging and unpredictable environments.

Whether it’s increasing the bottom line in business, responding to disruptions in the workplace, achieving academic success in schools, improving parenting skills or triumphing in any other challenging task, the Agile Learner achieves more.

Why? Because the Agile Learner recognises that they can develop their most basic abilities. They know they can increase their talents and intelligence, and they understand that becoming comes before being. In other words, they have a Growth Mindset. 

"More importantly, the Agile Learner understands how to translate their Growth Mindset into actual growth. They recognise that a Growth Mindset is simply an invitation to grow. To achieve growth, they develop their Habits of Mind, constantly step outside their comfort zone, challenge themselves to raise their standards and do more difficult things. They engage in what I refer to as Virtuous Practice."

Anders Ericsson,...

There is a fable about Spanish artist Pablo Picasso that illustrates an important principle underpinning the Growth Mindset - the importance of building a backstory of growth.

Picasso was sitting on a park bench in Central Park, New York, when a young woman came up to him and asked, “Could you draw a sketch for me, please?”

Picasso got out his sketchpad and pencil and quickly sketched a portrait of the young woman.

She beamed as he handed her the sketch. “Oh, it’s so lovely!” she exclaimed.

Before the young woman turned to leave, Picasso said, “That will be one million dollars, please.”

“A milliWhile we often place value on the end product, the true value of expertise is derived from the years spent developing abilities that make it possible to produce the end product.on dollars!” she said in surprise. “But it only took you two minutes.”

“Ah,” said Picasso. “I think you’ve misunderstood. You see, that sketch didn’t take me two minutes. That sketch took me a lifetime.”

This fabl...

In her landmark book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, Carol Dweck introduced the concept of Fixed and Growth Mindsets to the world. She highlighted the influence our Mindset has over our behaviour, and she gave dozens of examples of how peoples’ Fixed or Growth Mindset impacted their lives.

But we must remember that Dweck was introducing her ideas. She gave examples designed to highlight the importance of Mindsets, and she made us sit up and take notice. But Mindsets don’t end with fixed and growth – there’s so much more depth and complexity behind Dweck’s ideas.

"In the real world, there aren’t two types of people. We don’t live in a world where some people have a Fixed Mindset, and others have a Growth Mindset."

In reality, our differences are much more subtle and complex. Our Mindset doesn’t fall into one of two categories; rather, it falls along a continuum between the extremes of fixed and growth.

The Growth Mindset Continuum

Take a moment to reflect on the Mindset Cont...

Agile Learners thrive in the most challenging and unpredictable environments.

Whether it’s increasing the bottom line in business, responding to disruptions in the workplace, achieving academic success in schools, improving parenting skills or triumphing in any other challenging task, the Agile Learner achieves more.

Why? Because the Agile Learner recognises that they can develop their most basic abilities. They know they can increase their talents and intelligence, and they understand that becoming comes before being. In other words, they have a Growth Mindset.

More importantly, the Agile Learner understands how to translate their Growth Mindset into actual growth. They recognise that a Growth Mindset is simply an invitation to grow. To achieve growth, they develop their Habits of Mind, constantly step outside their comfort zone, challenge themselves to raise their standards and do more difficult things. They engage in what I refer to as Virtuous Practice.

Anders Ericsson, the worl...