Name: The Outward Mindset
Rating: 4 (57 reviews)
Author: The Arbinger Institute

What’s in it for me? Shift your mindset and transform lives.

Many of us go through life with one aim: What can we do for ourselves? We make decisions based on what we can get out of a situation, often with little regard for how others fair.

However, concentrating on what we each want all the time causes many problems; instead, we should focus on what others want. Imagine you are a manager and you desperately need to improve productivity. Which tactic do you think would work best: forcing employees to put in more hours so that the metric improves or asking them what you can do to make them happier at work?

But how do you develop a mindset that puts others first? These blinks will show you the way.

In these blinks, you’ll discover

how one police officer reduced crime by offering coffee and public restrooms; and
why you shouldn’t force your children to play sports.

Making the right decisions in life means adopting the appropriate mindset.

Do you ever wonder what determines the actions you take? Many people think that the things they do are just products of their personality, but the truth is more straightforward.

It’s your mindset that controls your behavior. Basically, your mindset is the way you think of and see the world. It goes beyond your core beliefs about yourself to encompass the way you think about everything, including how you consider and treat others in society.

Because it’s so far-reaching, your mindset is hugely important. As a result, making even small changes to it can result in dramatic differences in behavior and actions.

Just take the Kansas City Police Department’s SWAT team. They had long been criticized by locals for their penchant for excessive violence. For example, many citizens had complained that the team would shoot pets during raids.

Confronted by their own poor reputation, the SWAT team had no choice but to change its mindset and begin focusing on the feelings of suspects as well as their relatives.

Suddenly the team began treating people with respect. Instead of acting aggressively, they strove for cooperation. In one example, before rushing off to question the suspects, the team took the time to calm a baby in the house. This new approach really paid off and actually improved the results of their crime fighting.

So, a change of mindset can transform behavior but – best of all – it doesn’t even require much effort. Just imagine a company that’s in dire financial straits. To keep themselves above water they’re micromanaging costs and firing people left and right while slashing employee benefits and customer service.

This mindset is based entirely on saving money, but is it really the right one for them?

Instead, they could focus on making money, which would mean making decisions that bring in revenue. They’d begin looking at developing markets and technological innovations that could potentially solve their financial problems while keeping both their employees and customers happy.

But why does so simple a change of mindset have such beneficial effects? You’ll find out in the next blink.

To achieve success, you must take your focus off yourself and consider the needs of others.

When something in life goes wrong, people tend to search for excuses. Say someone has an interview for their dream job but doesn’t get an offer. The candidate immediately assumes that the failure is a result of, for instance, his parents not teaching him properly, or because his interviewer didn’t ask the correct questions.

Such excuses are far from helpful; they’re the result of a negative inward mindset that focuses solely on the individual in question and what he wants for himself. So, how does such a mindset emerge?

Developing an outward mindset means listening to others.

Now that you know how an outward mindset can help you make positive changes in your life, it’s time to learn how to adopt one. To do so, just follow three easy steps based on the acronym SAM.

The S stands for “seeing the needs of others.” That means focusing on other people rather than yourself. This is simple as long as you consider what other people need and want from any given situation.

One individual with an outward mindset can impact the world positively.

So, you can effect change in others by leading by example, but how exactly?

Well, a great way to apply the power of your outward mindset is to use it to find a collective goal. After all, your outward mindset offers you the opportunity to identify mutually beneficial objectives, and working toward such goals helps produce shared solutions.

Kernaussagen in The Outward Mindset