Angela Duckworth on why grit isn’t enough

Inside game and outside game

0:00Hey, folks. Jeff Berman here. I am thrilled to share some of the new names who will be joining us at this year's Masters of Scale Summit. This may be our biggest stage yet. Reed Hastings, Meredith Whitaker, Van Jones, Amjad Massad, and more will be there with us October 20th through 22nd in San Francisco. If you're building something great or you want to build something great, we want you there with us, too. Join us at mastersofscale.com slash apply 26.

0:32That's mastersofscale.com slash apply 26.

0:42When human beings think about what determines behavior, they think intentions determine behavior. That's not wrong. But what social psychologists will point out is that we make an error when we forget about how powerful the situation is. I was astonished. I have never seen in all of my years of studying companies a culture where unvarnished negative feedback was taken with such maturity and even enthusiasm.

1:14I'm sure a lot of people hate me for saying so many, you know, negative things about working in your home office all day. And I know there are upsides, but I have to say I have so many misgivings about it. The NFL may be, you know, the last bipartisan community builder we have, whether you're red or blue, like, you know, E-A-G-L-E-S, go Eagles. Oh, Angel, please, no. No, no, no, we can't. We can't. No, no, no, no. That's where we're going to cut it. We can't have that. You're like, okay, we're going to edit that out.

1:45Fly, Eagles, fly. I'm a Philly girl. This is Masters of Scale. I'm Jeff Berman, your host. I am thrilled to be joined today by Angela Duckworth. Angela is a brilliant psychology professor and co-director of the Penn Wharton Behavior Change for Good Institute. With millions of copies sold, it's a good bet that her first book, Grit, is already on your shelf. She's now back with a fascinating follow-up. Angela, welcome back to Masters of Scale. It is good to be back, and it's good to be talking to you again, Jeff.

2:19It is great to be talking to you. It occurred to me that maybe you perceived that the market overcorrected toward Grit, and Situated almost reads as a response to that overcorrection. Is that a fair way to talk about why Situated is such an important follow-up to Grit? Jeff, I think that the idea of this second book is maybe not a correction of Grit, but it is a completion. I mean, I'm a psychologist who will always be obsessed with achievement.

2:50I think the completion of the story of Grit says that for all the things that we need to work on, so that the inside game, you know, our mental game, our mindset, our attitudes, our assumptions, our goals, the way we think about our goals, the inside game is always going to be important. If there's a message of Grit, it's that effort matters, and effort matters arguably more than natural talent. If there's a message of this second book, I mean, you call it a sequel in some ways, as we'll discuss, it may be a prequel.

3:22The outside game matters, too, because all of that effort pays off more and is more rational in some ecosystems, in some environments, in some cultures, in some places, with some people, and less so in others. And I think if you're going to achieve your potential, you need to master both the inside game and the outside game. But I don't think either negate the other.

Cody Coleman and the power of situations

3:43There's the story in the book of Cody Coleman, which I'm going to ask you to share a little bit about Cody. I met Cody Coleman through an email that he sent over the transom on a day in May 2013 that introduces himself as a senior at MIT studying computer science and electrical engineering. And he's apparently watched my TED Talk. He feels compelled to tell me that the journey he's taken from being born in a prison near Trenton, New Jersey, to be graduating from MIT with a nearly perfect GPA

4:19in the hardest majors that you can have at MIT, that this is a story of grit. What happened next? Well, an internship at Google, enrolling in the PhD program in computer science at Stanford, where he successfully earns his PhD, studying with some of the pioneers in artificial intelligence and becoming the third Black recipient of a PhD in computer science in Stanford's entire history. He is a paragon of grit. But the reason he's very relevant to this conversation is that he's more than that.

4:54He has very strategically oriented himself to situations that make the most of his grit. And he will tell you that the only way you get exponential growth in your personal development is by leapfrogging from a good situation to a better one, and yet a better one, and ever-improving. Now he's, you know, the CEO of an AI startup called Coactive in San Jose. Yeah, there's so much about Cody's story that stood out for me. But as our regular listeners know, I started my career as a public defender.

5:28And one of my very first clients, who I'll just call Brian here, I was heading out to the juvenile jail to meet with him for the first time. I'm reading through his file, and he's classified as extremely low IQ. Like, I'm worried that he's not going to understand what I'm doing, why he's locked up, what we're dealing with here. And, you know, I'm sitting down with him, and I remember it's like it's yesterday. It is almost 30 years ago that this first conversation with Brian happened. And I'm explaining his rights to him.

5:59And I'm just, Angel, I'm so worried. He doesn't get it. And he looks at me, he goes, is this what the Boston Tea Party was about? And I go, oh, interesting. Say more. And he's like, well, because, like, they didn't feel like they had their rights. And so they were fighting for their rights. And I was like, actually, yeah. Like, that's exactly right. It took me a beat. I'm like, right. Right. But that's why I was like, wait, say more. And over my time representing him, I was like, this kid is absolutely not low IQ. This is a smart young man who, similar to Cody, was born into just absolutely awful circumstances

6:33and wasn't able to encounter the mentors or the people who could guide him out of it or change his circumstances. And he grew up eight miles from my home where I grew up. Wow. Right. I grew up in a home where, as you talk about in the book, two parents, I've got a home full of books. I've got a dinner table with adults sitting around it talking about world events and national events. And I'm treated as an equal participant in those discussions. I'm in a world-class public school district, all of it. And it was the first time in the context of my public defender work where it just landed

7:06how deeply the accident of birth was for me. And so the thing about Cody's story for me that stood out in this context is it is one thing to be able to change the small things in our lives. It's another thing to be able to achieve at this level. And I'm just curious what you take from Cody's story that can apply for people who do find themselves in extremely difficult circumstances. You know, I was walking down a hill recently and a more experienced hiker passed me by and

7:38he turned around and he said, small steps, soft knees. And I thought, that's good advice. And I think it's good advice when it comes to changing your situation. I think if you imagine the biggest change you could make, you quickly convince yourself that it's not possible. Are you going to move where you live? Are you going to change where you work? Those are big decisions and very few of us can make those decisions on a dime. And the answer might very well be, no, it's not yet possible, actually.

8:11But the small steps, soft knees advice is do anything. So the soft knees part, I think, at least the way I'm taking it, I'm sure when you're downhill hiking on a sandy trail, it literally means just keep your knees soft. But I think there's this like suppleness that we need, especially now. I mean, you know better than I do, Jeff, like the world is changing under everyone's feet. And so the suppleness you need, the ability to be agile, to take small steps, but also to adjust to trajectory correct as needed. When human beings think about what determines behavior, they think intentions determine behavior,

8:44values determine behavior, character determines behavior. That's not wrong. But what social psychologists will point out is that we make an error when we forget about how powerful the situation is. So I think wherever we are, we can ask ourselves, not only what can't I do, which is fine. You can make a very long list of all the things you cannot change about your situation, and I encourage you to do so. But if there is anything on the list of things that you can change, people you can spend more

9:17time with, objects that you can place far away or near, if you're trying to, you know, remind yourself to do something, I think you should start working down the checklist and, you know, seeing how that changes everything. Yeah. And I mean, the other thing that Cody did, not all of us are going to have the opportunity to be PhD students at Stanford, but he did move to the center of the tech world. And if you're going to launch an AI company, there is no better place literally in the known universe than the Bay Area to do it.

9:47And you talk in the book about a word I've never heard of that puts name to a concept that I think we understand called agglomeration, where there are centers of excellence. It also feels like you've almost created your own agglomeration at Penn with Katie Milkman there, who's been on the show, with Adam Grant there, who's been on the show. The work that you all are doing, helping us understand what motivates us, what creates change, how we live our best lives. You know, the way that Katie and Adam and I wrote our first paper together is we all live

10:20here. And I was taking one of my daughters to a dentist appointment at Penn Dental. And I had this like narrow window that I knew I had to be in the waiting room from some indeterminate time. And like literally, Adam Grant, Katie Milkman, and I met in the corner of the Penn Dental office while my daughter got her teeth cleaned or something and, you know, hatched our first study together. And that co-location effect, you know, I know that there are many things to say about remote work, and that is its own complex topic.

10:50One of the things you lose when you are not physically in the same city, in the same room as other people, are those chance encounters and also those planned encounters where you get together and you hatch an idea. And I think that idea of agglomerations and the importance of place, I think it's important to emphasize now because sometimes people are like, I can live anywhere. I can work anywhere. And in some ways, that's factually true. It may not be the best thing for you.

Remote work and physical transitions

11:21Let's talk about remote work. Tricia and Masha, who are producing this today, are sick of hearing me talk about this. I haven't heard your speech yet on remote work. Well, I'm struggling with it because, as you know, I've jumped from industry to industry. Part of my great good fortune has been the ability to sit in rooms and watch people who are far wiser, far more experienced than I am work and to pick up what I can to apply to my own approaches to these things, but also to take the walk, to grab a coffee or tea after and ask all the dumb questions. And remote just makes that so hard to do, right?

11:54I don't want to say that every company should be five days in the office. I mean, that would be naive. I think that remote work, when it does work, is when there's a very intentional effort to bring people together physically all in one place, in the same room, breathing the same air, and having a synchronous experience, but also having some leeway. You know, that informality, the sort of spontaneous conversation. When you're on a video call, at least if you're on a video call with me, there damn well better

12:24be an agenda because I don't want to waste time. But nobody puts on the agenda like eight minutes of kibitzing. Right. But that's exactly what you do with a coffee machine. I also really worry, my kids, I think, are a little bit younger than yours, but they're in the same range as they're entering the work world soon. What this is going to mean for them, what it means for the more junior members of our team here in their own opportunities to grow and learn. And I guess I'm stuck because on the one hand, I feel almost captive by my own experience and how much I benefited from it. And on the other hand, I'm trying to imagine how this can work in the new world.

12:58And maybe it's a lack of my own imagination for how to make it better. I want to invite in a member of our team who is living the remote work life. Masha Makutinina is a producer on Masters of Scale and works across the Weight Watt properties. She's awesome. And I know she has a reaction to this every time we talk about it. So if it's okay, I'd like to invite Masha in. I approve. Love to hear what Masha has to say about remote work. Hi, thank you so much. What you've shared about the worries or the problems that young professionals like me are

13:31having really resonated as I was sitting in my bedroom right behind me. My bad. The only job experience I've had so far has been remote. I am working from my bedroom. I am embarrassed by my hair because I just thought that I'm going to work from home and no one is going to see me today. Why brush my hair? Why brush my hair? What is a behavior change that maybe someone like me could try? So how's it going first? Can I ask Masha? Like, how do you feel about working remotely?

14:02It sucks. Tell me, tell me how it sucks. I feel like I try to be a good sport and kind of, you know, do my small talk on Slack. But it is much easier to maybe choose to be off camera and hop off the call a little bit earlier. And then by the end of the day, I am somehow feel a little isolated, but drained at the same time. Yeah. And so I try to maybe seek those connections out in the wild world.

14:35But I just feel like I've worked the whole day. And I'm like, oh, my God. Like, what do I do? How do I force myself? Yeah. It's interesting that you use the word force. Okay. Well, I have two ideas. And without knowing a whole lot about your particular situation, you can tell me how these land. I think physically working in your bedroom all day is awful for most people, in part because there is no transition. There is no cue that now work is over. Oh, wait. Now work has started.

15:06It's just one blur. So I think a physical transition to work is one idea. You can tell me whether it's a good idea or not. But that could mean, you know, working in a coffee shop with good Wi-Fi for much of your day or, you know, going to a WeWork type place. So I think a physical separation, you know, where you like put on different clothing, for example. You are not old enough to have watched Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. But Mr. Rogers would always come in and he would take off his outside shoes and put on his inside shoes. And he would take off his outside jacket and put on his inside jacket.

15:40And the costumes that we put on to say, like, now I'm at work. Now I'm working out. Now I'm going to bed. I mean, with athleisure, it could be all the same outfit. Physically, that might work. But psychologically, I don't think it does. So you might consider these physical transitions that you can make that you don't have to make but you might choose to make. And the second option I would have for you is to go visit people. So I would say of these co-workers that you would probably like to have, you know, a friendship with, just go.

16:12Like, go and, you know, do work in their city for a day and go out to dinner and then get on a plane and go home and make Jeff pay for it. I love this. Thank you so much, Angela. I'm hearing intentionality, which sometimes requires discipline. But changing your situation takes a little bit of willpower, but that little bit of willpower pays off. So I think if you can take those small steps in the first case, bigger step when you get on a plane. But, like, you know, sure, it'll take a little willpower to get it organized. But I think it will be worth the investment.

16:43Well, the other note for me as an organizational leader is offering unlimited WeWork may not be enough. And what are the nudges that we can offer, the incentives that we can offer that make it easier for you, Masha, to get out of the home and go co-work with team members or with friends or what have you? And so I think it's fair for you also to say, like, I could use some help here. And I appreciate you jumping on and asking Angela for her advice. And you and I can work on this together to make things better. Yeah, sounds good. You have to keep me posted. I'll give you a grade when you're done.

17:15Please. We'll make it pass-fail. There we go. Thanks, Masha. So, again, I'm sure a lot of people hate me for saying so many, you know, negative things about, you know, working, you know, in your home office all day. And I know there are upsides. But I have to say I have so many misgivings about it. There was very recently a study in science, which is the top journal, arguably, in the field of all science, not just social science, but the hard sciences, too. And it was a study by economists on remote work. And what they did was they looked at professions that were easily transitioning to remote because they were things that could be done through video calls and Google Docs and so forth and compared them to professions where it was, like, nearly impossible.

17:57Like, it's just an in-person job. You have to be there physically. And when you look at the well-being of people who are employed in these different sectors, those who have, you know, been in sectors that are more likely to have gone remote are actually doing much worse than those who in some ways are forced to be in person. So that's the personal decision. But I think understanding how important social connection is is a big part of becoming, you know, situationally aware.

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Culture and peer accountability at De La Salle

20:19You talk in the book about Coach Ladd and DeSalle High School, which happens to be about 15 minutes from where I'm sitting today in Orinda, California, having this conversation with you, which had a pretty rough streak of losing seasons for a long time and then went on to rip off a 151-game win streak, which is mind-boggling in any sport. And I'd love for you to tell the story of how they built the culture there with commitment cards and the rituals around it,

20:50because we've already had a conversation about implementing it at Wait What, the company behind Masters of Scale, because it just struck me as so powerful. Coach Ladd was in his young 20s when he became the coach of the football team at De La Salle High School. It's a very small, modest Catholic school. I don't think they had ever had a winning season in their history as a school before Coach Ladd joined. And how does he turn it into the football team with the longest streak in history?

21:21I mean, John Madden took time out of his career and his life to make a full documentary on De La Salle High School because he thought the phenomenon was that worthy. And it is all about culture. So what Coach Ladd did was create a culture of peer accountability. You know, he discovered very early on as a coach and as a mentor that you can tell people what to do, but it doesn't work very well. And you can try to keep the people who report to you, in this case his players, accountable by the force of your authority because you are higher level than they are.

21:56But it's not very effective. And so what he discovered was that there is no higher force, there is no higher court than the court of peer opinion. And therefore he tried to get a culture going where you play your heart out and you practice your heart out, not because the coach told you to and not even to please the coach, but to please your fellow teammates. He had this commitment card idea, actually was a, I think an assistant coach at the time who was working for Coach Ladd, who had this idea.

22:29But, you know, together they ginned it up. You take a three by five blank index card and you as a player write down your goals for the next week. When you get to, you know, the end of writing this down, you end by saying, I commit to, and then you name another player and you exchange cards with that other player. And for those next seven days, your peer, your teammate keeps you accountable. They watch you in the weight room. They watch you at practice and they watch you on game day.

23:02And the following week, before you write your next commitment card, your partner stands up and they read out your goals to the whole team who's watching in reverent silence. And they'll say, failed, succeeded. So you kind of get this report card on how you did last week. When I witnessed this commitment card ceremony, I was astonished. I have never seen in all of my years of studying companies a culture where unvarnished negative feedback

23:33was taken with such maturity and even enthusiasm. Nobody that I watched that evening actually got a perfect score. It was like, you know, these are hard goals. And I think if you can develop a culture where it's not only that you're accountable to your boss or your manager, but you have the esprit de corps and the formal rituals and structures to be accountable to another person who is at your peer level. I think that, and I think this is what Coach Ladd would say, I think that is the magic of the De La Salle Spartans.

24:08There's a beautiful photo in the book because the other thing that Coach Ladd did was have the players, the pair who've committed to each other, they walk out on the field for each game holding hands, which it was such a powerful visual to see young men fully suited up in their football gear, walking out holding hands, knowing that they've made these commitments to each other. It's so beautiful. I know that not everyone can make a field trip to conquer California and to spend a day with De La Salle Spartans, but I feel like every leader would be changed if they did.

24:39So I feel like the challenge of leadership is how to create a culture with rituals, by the way, and I think those rituals are elemental, that is not only high standards, high expectations, but also this kind of unconditional support. That magical combination is something, whenever I see it, I know it, but I am not a leader, and I am always just in like kind of a stodish admiration at the leaders who are able to achieve that.

25:10We can agree to disagree that you're not a leader, but I think where we will agree is we're in a moment where not just nationally, globally, the leadership that is being lauded doesn't just lack empathy and lack love. It doesn't even really have accountability. It's lionized for its cruelty. And when you look at these institutions that have built cultures where the foundation is really the twins of love and empathy and accountability, real accountability, and you see how they flourish,

25:42why isn't that happening more nationally and globally? And why aren't we lionizing those leaders over those who lead with the lack of that? I wish I knew. I agree with you, and I don't have an answer. As a psychological scientist who has studied human nature, individual differences for her whole career, I don't have an answer. I wonder, Jeff, do you have like a pet theory, even if you don't have evidence for it yet? Well, some of it, I fear, goes back to the atomization of our society, right?

26:15We're living in these bubbles. We're watching algorithmically driven media. We don't have, you know, the monoculture had its problems, right? It was a lot of people who, frankly, looked a lot like me, who were deciding what you watched and what you read, what you engaged with. And so there's a lot of benefit to a world in which we have far more diverse sources of information entertainment. But when you're spending hours a day on TikTok, we're products of our environment in really meaningful ways. And so I fear that that's some of it. I agree with you. I mean, there are downsides of a monoculture.

26:47There are freedoms of a culture where like everyone's doing their own thing. Frankly, they're doing it in different places at different times. Like we're not experiencing, you know, the same perspectives.

Bridging capital and collective effervescence

26:58But there is a real cost. It's a dissolution of what Bob Putnam sometimes refers to as bridging capital. He distinguishes between two kinds of social capital. Bonding capital is like you and your kith and kin, you know, the people that, you know, you really care about and they're going to bring you chicken soup when you're sick. And those are very important. And that's a big part of social connection. I think it's what people think of when they think of social connection. They want a best friend. They want a romantic partner. They want to spend more time with their friends. But there's another kind of social capital called bridging capital. And that is you and your neighbors, you and the people that you go to mosque, synagogue, or church with, like you and the people who, you know, happen to like frequent the same coffee shop.

27:39So these are not your kith and kin. They're not your close friends or family. But bridging capital is very important because that is where America has created the cohesion of I don't look like you. I don't talk like you. I may not have even voted like you. But I recognize you as a human. Like, we can still talk about the game on Monday. Like, we can still smile at each other and share a cup of coffee. And that is one reason why my husband and I go to church. I mean, especially he has made the argument because I whine sometimes. I hate to be in the car.

28:10I'm like, oh, my gosh, the whole morning's gone. He was like, bridging capital. Bob Putnam, bridging capital. And I think he's right. And as you know, despite recent trends, attendance and allegiance to religious institutions, those are among the institutions that are really on the decline. And so I do think some of these macro trends lead me to the conclusion that the default settings of the modern world, the situation, if you don't change it proactively, is not a healthy situation. If you are not proactive about putting yourself in places and with people that are good for you, the default settings are not necessarily going to be for your best.

28:47Couldn't agree more on the third places, the religious institutions, the coffee shop where you go work, the office, whatever it might be. I'll tell you what gave me some hope earlier this summer was the World Cup and the experience not just of seeing the abject joy in people coming from outside the U.S. and experiencing our country and seeing them fall in love with Buc-ee's or Waffle House or whatever it is. But my wife and I were in a bar in Portsmouth, New Hampshire for the Cabo Verde Argentina game. And I guarantee you 80% of the people in that bar never heard of Cabo Verde before the World Cup.

29:21And yet there we were like all rooting on this little team for this little country in their David versus Goliath moment. And we had instant community that night. Right. Isn't that amazing? It's awesome. And it happens so fast. You're like, it's like you feel like it's like a chemical change. Like you're like, what neuromodulator is going through my brain right now? Like I had a similar experience during the war. I mean, we did not watch, you know, every game, but Philadelphia was a host. And just walking down the sidewalk and seeing people in their, you know, in their messy, you know, jerseys or, you know, whatever country.

29:54And there's this sort of like, you know, you look at each other, there's like a note of acknowledgement, like there's a smile. Yeah, that I think it is hopeful. I have a colleague, Todd Rogers. So Todd's a big sports fan, in addition to being a professor and a social scientist at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. And he has lately been studying the NFL. And Todd has some empirical evidence suggesting that when people watch NFL games, they experience this kind of like social connection. You know, Todd has convinced me that, you know, the NFL may be, you know, the last bipartisan community builder we have.

30:28You know, so whether you're red or blue, like, you know, E-A-G-L-E-S, go Eagles. Oh, Angel, please, no. No, no, no, we can't. We can't. No, no, no. That's where we got to cut it. We can't have that. We're going to edit that out. I got to, you know, fly Eagles, fly. I'm a Philly girl. But also, go Hawks. And yeah, like, they have my favorite teams. But anyway, I do think that gives you an example of what can happen. I also think that live events, you know, when we talk about situations that are electric, that like there's almost something chemical that feels like it's happening.

30:59The practice of going to concerts, if you asked me, like, 15 or 20 years ago, is concert going to go up or down, I probably would have shorted concerts. I would be like, oh, you're kidding. You know, music's getting digitized. You can have it whenever you want. The fidelity is better. Like, you know what? I think people are craving that feeling of being in the audience with other people. It's sometimes called in sociology, it's collective effervescence. It's the phenomenon of, like, joint attention to one thing happening and then this, like, collective emotion that is – it's not just that you're feeling something, but everyone's feeling something, but you know that everyone's feeling something.

31:39And it really actually is, to me, like, one of the things that explains why we are still going to concerts. And I hope it happens more. I hope there are – the World Cup only comes, what, every four years? Every four years and we don't get to host it every four years. Oh, yeah. That's so true. Yeah, it's not going to be back in the United States for a long time, but could we take it as a hopeful example? I mean, I think people should do things. I think people should do things together. You want to get situated. Like, get with other people.

The happiness of pursuit in an AI future

32:08I want to close by asking you, because I think legally I'm required to ask you some question about AI in this moment. It's in your contract. But I want to ask you a specific question about AI. In the more optimistic versions of an AI-driven future, we're working less and generating even more output. And so I want to focus on one of those more optimistic visions of that future. And in the event that we really are able to go down to a four-day work week or a three-day work week or a six-hour work day, and we do have that much more free time, how do you envision the use of that time in a way that can actually benefit us and propel our country in a better direction?

32:51I'll tell you what I hope it isn't, and then I'll tell you what I hope it is. I hope it isn't, you know, what we now do with a lot of our free time, which is just, you know, fill it with amusements, like entertainment, like just, you know, things that make you smile or laugh for a few minutes and then just like, you know, it's like the morning dew. It's like evaporates and it's gone. I mean, that is how Americans are spending a lot, I think maybe the majority of their time, just like scrolling, watching, you know, doesn't add up to very much. It is the nature of human nature to work.

33:23And that doesn't mean paid work necessarily. That doesn't mean that, you know, we all should be working 12 hours a day. But when I say it is the nature of human nature to work, what I mean is that it is part and parcel of our DNA to chase goals, to have aims, to try to go from here to there. That's what a goal is. A goal is the desired state of the world that you are trying to achieve. And we all know people who've retired and become abjectly miserable because now they have everything that they always thought they wanted, no responsibility, no deadlines, no checklists, just, you know, leisure.

34:00That's what happened to my own father. He always said to me in the years before retirement, when I retire, I'm going to do nothing. That is what my dad did. And he was never more depressed than when he left his, you know, 35-year career at DuPont. So what I hope it is, is that we fill the time that we have, should this scenario come to pass, with work of some kind, that something that is meaningful to us, a goal that we're trying to achieve. Maybe that is leisure related for some people, but it's not amusement.

34:35It's not like nothing. It's not only that nature abhors a vacuum. It's that happiness abhors a vacuum. When the founding fathers said that we have a country where there is life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, I always thought life, yep, liberty, yep. It's the happiness of pursuit. I think people are their happiest when they're starting a podcast, when they're trying to become a better writer, when they're trying to get this charity off the ground, when they're being a Girl Scout leader. You know, what I hope it does not become is just more relaxation, entertainment, and amusement.

35:09From your lips. Angela, we are not going to wait for you to have your next book out to have you back on. We're going to twist your arm to have you back soon. You're the best. So wonderful having you on Masters of Scale and can't wait to see you in person. Jeff, I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed this conversation. Thank you for having me.

35:27Thanks again to Angela Duckworth for joining us. Her new book, Situated, is out now. It is a terrific read full of insights that can help you improve your own situation. And I have to say, I read a lot of these kinds of books every year. I'm usually looking for one or two actionable insights, something that I can take into my daily life. If I'm lucky, I get that. Every now and then, you come across a book where you just can't count it and you're annotating basically every other page.

36:02This is one of those. I can't recommend it highly enough. I'm Jeff Berman. Thank you for listening. I'm Jeff Berman.

36:39By the legendary Ryan Holiday. Visit mastersofscale.com to find the transcript for this episode and to subscribe to our newsletter. And be sure to check out our YouTube channel. Thank you. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Thank you.