From a personal success point of view, it’s a good idea to become an expert at something in life.

Be it your job, something you like, or something that is critical to your mission, becoming an expert at something is great for you.

And, from a power dynamics point of view, to fully reap the rewards of your hard work and the expertise you acquired you need to think, act, and publicly portray yourself as an expert and an authority.

Now the issue is that “learner” sometimes stands in contrast to “expert”, and an eternal and constant learner attitude and public behavior can detract from your reputation as an expert.

And, from that point of view, you lose authority when you adopt an extreme, “always-on” growth mindset and approach every person, situation and criticism as if you need to learn more.

When you acquire a public reputation of a learner without enough reputation for an expert, you personally lose out.
You lose authority, status, money, and networking opportunities. And you also come across as lower value than you truly are because the learner overlaps with “beginner”, and beginners are lower value than experts.

Learners Are Victims of Teachers’ Frames & Power Moves

It may be sad, but it’s true:

An extreme growth mindset overlaps with naivete and can easily cost you.

It can cost in poorer learning, rather than better learning.
Similar to open-mindedness, an extreme growth mindset opens you up to all kinds of BS -and to all kinds of bullshitters-.

And it can cost you in your social and professional life as well.
For example, an extreme growth mindset would never push back against criticism because it sees criticism as the best learning opportunity.

But the criticism sometimes is wrong -and, as a matter of fact, the better you become, the more likely it is to be wrong-.
And sometimes the criticism is a power move.

Growth Mindset Power Moves

The growth mindset has become hyper-popular in the self-help world.

And as the growth mindset spreads, so does its use for Machiavellian, selfish, aggressive, and value-taking purposes.

For example:

• Employer manipulation, as Bel noted. It works like this: the more they can pay with “learning”, the less they will pay with you, you know, actual money. Plus, they can ask you to do far more than your job description since, after all, you’re learning, you don’t even know what’s good for you, so you better do everything you’re asked.
  At the lowest level of “job for learning”, you are the “errand boy”, who has to say yes to everything, and still be grateful for the opportunity.
  • Mistake scalping, exaggerating or even making up mistakes on your part to keep you and bury you deeper in the “learner and beginner” role (thanks to Bel again)
• PR stunt, to look open minded, “better” and more honest
• A cover for personal attacks, or to avoid owning up and apologizing –example in the forum-. With the “growth mindset” cover, people are never wrong or mean because it’s you who need to develop a growth mindset. And they can keep taking swipes at you and you can’t defend unless you’ll get labeled a “fixed mindset” (see “covert power moves“)
• A cover to social climb on you (teacher/pupil frame): so they self-frame as “teachers”, and you become the “student” (of theirs).
  The most extreme forms, the “teacher/pupil” frames are both very disempowering, and annoying
• Social exchange manipulation, as in “I’m giving you feedback and criticism that will help you improve, so you owe me”.
  In that regard, I highly recommend you avoid formats such as “learn this and thank me later”
• Trap to lower your defenses. Then you’re complimenting them, maybe take a step back… And then they take your feedback apart to show why you’re wrong -I fell for this myself in the forum-.
• An excuse to be mean, as in “we give each other raw feedback here because we all have a growth mindset, and if you can’t take it, it’s your fault for not having growth mindset”
• Just another one-upping tool, as in “I’m more growth-mindset than you”

Since “teaching others” or pushing a growth mindset on them can be a disempowering -and annoying- power move, we advise caution in doing so and, unless they made it clear they accept you as a higher authority to learn from, refrain from self-framing yourself as a teacher to others.

Learners Are Lower Value Than Teachers

One simple fact proves that learners are lower power:

Teachers get salaries, learners get nothing -or must pay-.

That already tells you a low about who’s higher value between the two.

Top teachers are experts, and if they’re experts in any in-demand skill or field, they can get a lot of money, plus status, influence, admiration, and even attraction.
Learners and beginners get little of that.

Your Confidence Around “How Much You Know” Determines Your Authority…

… And your attitude around “what you need to learn” as well, of course.

Relevant to us and to your public attitude, experts are associated with high confidence, including high confidence in knowing what they know. Plus, sometimes, also an air of “been there, done that” and “elementary, my dear Watson”.
Learners are associated with lower confidence, higher curiosity, and with more doubts and tentativeness in their knowledge and expertise.
And we know here that low confidence and tentativeness equal low power and low influence.

That’s why, sometimes, simply acting like a learner frames you as a lower-value beginner.
That’s fine of course if you are a beginner, because you grow quicker acting as a beginner when you’re one.
But it’s a lot less OK if you’re not a beginner.

When dealing with others, that means that when you take a learner’s role to let someone else be a teacher you lose power to that other person.
That teacher isn’t also just getting power, but he’s getting power over you.
You disempower yourself, to empower that teacher -it’s a lose-win, a sucker’s trade-.
That’s particularly bad when you’re in the same industry, domain or field of work with that person, because it means you’re also indirectly competing with him.

Unluckily, people often know little about your level or expertise.
And even if they know of the benefits and importance of a growth mindset, as we know here, they will still judge you by your level of confidence and authority around what you know and what you need to learn.
And if you act like a learner, they will think you’re a learner. If that other person acts like a teacher, he becomes the teacher.

Result: they become the high-power expert, the one worth being listened to -and the one worth buying from-.
And you become the low-power, not-worth being listened-to guy (the true extent of your knowledge be damned).

Don’t Take People’s Word On Their Growth Mindset

This may sound cynical, but there’s just little room to go around human nature.

So, taking human nature into account, we advise not to take people’s verbal displays of growth mindset too literally.

On paper, a display of a growth mindset may seem like an invite for straight and honest talk, and for open feedback and criticism.
“Wow”, you may think, what a great person I’ve just met.

But if you’re not too sure about it, consider also that he may simply:

• Project what he wishes he was
• Posture for social status gains -the only users who had to be banned on TPM forum made a big display of a growth mindset–
• Say it to invite feedback, but then also punish those who make him feel bad
• Truly believe he has no ego, but instead…

Of course, it’s also possible he is indeed a great person.

And still, there is little room to go around ingrained and inborn laws of human nature.
So, more times than not, you pay for your criticism with a loss of goodwill and social capital.

People may still say they’re grateful for the feedback, and they may even be… But chances are that you’ll still be passed up for a more loyal squire when it comes to opportunities and promotions -and for a more “easygoing friend” and “supportive partner” in personal relationships. You know, someone who makes others feel good, instead of thread-expanding their lacks-.

People profess what they want and what they strive towards… But it’s in human nature to then prefer those who are encouraging, supportive, and complimentary, rather than those who are critical.

And it’s also human nature to secretly resent those who are critical and don’t respect the pecking order.
So, generally speaking, leave radical candor for the radicals, and you be a realist instead and don’t be too frank and open with feedback and criticism to your boss.

If you must give feedback, then use plenty of power protection, use positive frames on how to do even better rather than negative ones on how to fix issues, and always be tactful and strategic.

Beware Ego-Feeding Teachers

Some teachers aren’t helping you.

They’re feeding on you.

So remember this:

People who play the teacher role don’t want you to grow.

Being your teachers serves to feed their own ego and feel good about themselves.
If you grow, they don’t get to play teacher and feel good anymore.

So they’ll always be happy when you have problems, and they see it as a threat when you grow.
Even their advice tends to be:

• Feel good advice
• Naive self-help advice
• High-level concepts without any practical steps (including the “growth mindset” without “how to become an actual master”)
• Ethics and morals
• Therapy-like “help”, talking about problems, endlessly
• NEVER PUSHING YOU TO DO THE F*CKING THING

And never addressing the root causes.

Why?
So you never move forward!

You don’t need any of that.