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Hidden Potential cover art

Hidden Potential

Written by: Adam Grant
Narrated by: Adam Grant, Maurice Ashley, R. A. Dickey, Evelyn Glennie, Sara Maria Hasbun, Francis Idehen, Alison Levine, Benny Lewis, Kari Louhivuori, Nelli Louhivuori, Brandon Payne, Richard Pine, Gil Winch, full cast
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Publisher's Summary

“This brilliant book will shatter your assumptions about what it takes to improve and succeed. I wish I could go back in time and gift it to my younger self. It would’ve helped me find a more joyful path to progress.”—Serena Williams, 23-time Grand Slam singles tennis champion

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of Think Again illuminates how we can elevate ourselves and others to unexpected heights.

We live in a world that’s obsessed with talent. We celebrate gifted students in school, natural athletes in sports, and child prodigies in music. But admiring people who start out with innate advantages leads us to overlook the distance we ourselves can travel. We underestimate the range of skills that we can learn and how good we can become. We can all improve at improving. And when opportunity doesn’t knock, there are ways to build a door.

Hidden Potential offers a new framework for raising aspirations and exceeding expectations. Adam Grant weaves together groundbreaking evidence, surprising insights, and vivid storytelling that takes us from the classroom to the boardroom, the playground to the Olympics, and underground to outer space. He shows that progress depends less on how hard you work than how well you learn. Growth is not about the genius you possess—it’s about the character you develop. Grant explores how to build the character skills and motivational structures to realize our own potential, and how to design systems that create opportunities for those who have been underrated and overlooked.

Many writers have chronicled the habits of superstars who accomplish great things. This book reveals how anyone can rise to achieve greater things. The true measure of your potential is not the height of the peak you’ve reached, but how far you’ve climbed to get there.

Featuring Maurice Ashley, William DeMerritt, R.A. Dickey, Jane Dutton, Kevin R. Free, Evelyn Glennie, Sara Maria Hasbun, Francis Idehen, Lauren Klein, Helen Laser, Alison Levine, Benny Lewis, Kari Louhivuori, Nelli Louhivuori, Brandon Payne, Richard Pine, Paul Stillwell, Julianna Wilson, and Gil Winch. Special appearances by Dave Barry, Eric Best, Amy Edmondson, Mellody Hobson, Steve Martin, Lin Manuel Miranda, John Spencer Jr., Gil Winch, Anita Woolley, and Julius Yego, and featuring members of the Golden 13 Samuel Barnes, George Cooper, John Dille, Frank Sublett, and William White.

This audiobook edition features clips from the TED podcasts WorkLife and ReThinking, courtesy of TED.

It also includes audio from the following sources:

“Anthem” by Leonard Cohen courtesy of Sony Music Entertainment. Written by Leonard Cohen, courtesy of Sony Music Publishing.

“Evelyn Glennie Improvisation on Drums” by Evelyn Glennie, © copyright 2023 Evelyn Glennie, used by permission of Evelyn Glennie.

“Golden 13 Interviews” Courtesy of the US Naval Institute.

“Julius Yego—The YouTube Man” courtesy of GoPro, Inc.

Stephen Colbert at the White House Correspondents Dinner: Courtesy CNN.

Excerpts of BORN STANDING UP reproduced with the permission of Simon & Schuster Audio, a Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc., from BORN STANDING UP by Steve Martin.

©2007 40 Share Productions, Inc. All rights reserved.

(P)2007 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

* This audiobook edition includes a downloadable PDF of charts, graphs, images, and actions for impact.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2023 Adam Grant (P)2023 Penguin Audio

What the critics say

“This brilliant book will shatter your assumptions about what it takes to improve and succeed. I wish I could go back in time and gift it to my younger self. It would’ve helped me find a more joyful path to progress.”—Serena Williams, 23-time Grand Slam singles tennis champion

“This is a book that should be read by parents, leaders, coaches, and every school board member in America. Adam Grant reveals that everything you think about developing potential is wrong.”—Mark Cuban, Shark Tank investor, owner of the Dallas Mavericks, and cofounder of Cost Plus Drugs

“I read Hidden Potential in one sitting, loved it, and have been thinking about it ever since. Which is the highest praise I can give a book. This is Adam Grant's finest work—it will inspire you to bigger dreams.”—Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers and host of Revisionist History

What listeners say about Hidden Potential

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Adams best book yet

The added narration cast made it super enjoyable. A lot of the examples in the book were super inspiring. Excited to brainstorm ideas and implement them from all the learnings in hidden potential.

Feedback:
- felt some of the concepts in the book could have been tied together a bit more and a few more examples given. The personal example from Adam at the end was a good one.
- some definitions of terms used often through the book felt a bit rushed/confusing for someone new to the concepts. Didn’t understand scaffolding fully until hearing more examples later. Probably still couldn’t explain it well to someone else, but will try :)

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Hugely impactful conclusion

I appreciated this uplifting and entertaining read and its science-backed insights within real human stories. I am left eager to continue learning how to inspire the inspired. The conclusion was very impactful for me, especially the epilogue.

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Another greet listen

Adam Grant is so engaging to listen to. This is a great production and thought provoking book.

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Insightful, inspiring and practical … probably my favourite book in a while

I love Adam Grant’s work (have read past books and listen to his podcast) … but this book exceeded expectations. I will be recommending this book to many in the future and will put it on my rotation of those books I re-read on a regular basis.

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Another not so hidden gem

This book is the guide I was searching for to help me achieve my personal vision: better today than I was yesterday, be better tomorrow than I was today. Along with Think Again, I have the opportunity to grow as a leader, and improve as a person thanks to the words of Adam Grant.

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Examples and how there presented! Love them!

Love the story telling and how practical they are to every day life! Well done

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Narrator's voice

Narrator's voice is very hard to listen to.. Listen to the sample before you purchase the audiobook to see if you can bear it. But overall, the book is very good and insightful.

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Adam Grant does it again

Adam is masterful of pulling together research, stories and personal experience in an easy to understand way.

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Over too soon or should I just relisten….

I’m a big Adam Grant fan. This book exceeded my expectations. There were valuable re-frames of ways to shift my perspective as well as a full shot in the arm of motivation to keep to my work in the mental health field. Because my work involves supporting some of the most vulnerable families in my community, this book spotlighted my values and inherent knowing of all people’s worth and hidden potential when provided with the deep belief from others and the significance of scaffolding to help them (and hey…even myself) recognize how far we’ve travelled to arrive here and the grit we possess to keep going. Off to start this book over again to pull out some nuggets I likely missed!!

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underwhelming

I don't like non fiction books that don't offer valuable lessons. the hidden potential is in other people's stories not the author. people are in need of unlocking their potential and this is not the book.

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