A reader asks:
I run a business that’s growing quickly so we’re having to hire a lot of new people… In the past, we’ve had problems with what I would call low agency employees—folks who don’t have much initiative, complain a lot, and are just kind of passive. Any advice for identifying high agency people early, ideally during an interview?
Another reader asks:
I’m really struggling with dating… I have a pattern of dating people who initially seem exciting and confident, but then turn out to be pretty passive, dependent, and pessimistic, which is not a good fit for my personality. I heard you reference the idea of agency in one of your videos and was wondering if you had any advice for how to identify people who have a lot of agency, since I think that’s a big part of what I’m looking for in a partner—ideally as early as possible in the dating process.
Agency is the belief in your ability to positively influence yourself and the world around you…
- People with a low agency mindset tend to be fairly passive and pessimistic—they see life as happening to them. You get the sense that they’re supporting actors in the story of their life, and that that story—the story of their life—is being written by others.
- People with a high agency mindset tend to be assertive and positive—they see life as something they do and have a lot of control over. They see themselves as both the hero and the author of their story.
The ability to identify people with a high agency mindset is valuable is all sorts of context from business to love. But as our two reader’s have learned, it’s relatively easy to project the appearance of high agency without actually possessing it.
What follows are 10 qualities that I’ve found to be pretty reliable indicators of a high agency mindset—including some specific ideas on how to identify or “test” for them in situations where you have relatively little information and a short time horizon, like hiring and dating.
NOTE: If you’re interested in learning more about agency and how to cultivate a high agency mindset, this article of mine is a good place to start: The High Agency Mindset →
1. Bias for Action
People with a high agency mindset often have a bias for action. They identify problems before those problems are raised by others and try to solve them without being asked. Instead of I need to understand this before I can try it, they usually think I need to try this in order to understand it. They’re experimental in their approach to problems and goals. They go after what they want without waiting for the circumstances to be ideal.
In work this might look like someone who, during an interview, mentions that they noticed some technical issues with the resume submission process on the company website and took a stab at mocking up a redesign to be simpler. If you wanted to ask about this directly, here’s a good question: What do you think of the advice: “Better to ask for forgiveness than permission”? How they answer the question is often telling of their relationship to action.
In dating this might look like someone who takes the initiative and plans a fun weekend outing despite not being sure what you enjoy or not. They’re willing to try something, learn from it, and try again. A counter-signal could be someone who does a lot of reassurance-seeking before trying new things or taking action.
2. Rational Optimism
People with a high agency mindset are frequently enthusiastic and positive. They rarely complain, gossip, or whine. They’re often skeptical but almost never cynical. They usually look on the bright side and are surprisingly good at finding silver linings without being naive or foolhardy. They are positive-sum thinkers with abundance, not scarcity, mindsets. Being around them gives you energy rather than draining it.
In work this is difficult to assess early on because it’s so easy to temporarily fake it. A question I’ve found helpful to ask is: Tell me about the most difficult person you ever worked with. How they respond to this prompt can tell you a lot about their proclivity towards negativity or positivity. Look specifically for how negative vs constructive they are.
In dating the trick is to be willing to notice signs of chronic negativity and pessimism instead of glossing over them because you’re smitten. One heuristic I’ve found to be helpful is people who are capable of being critical without being judgmental. While they’re generally positive, they are capable of being critical but do so in a way that doesn’t feel like it’s about them and boosting their own ego.
3. Creative Persistence
As a rule, people with a high agency mindset don’t take no for an answer and will flexibly and creatively look for new ways around obstacles most people would simply accept as immutable. They are, in the words of Paul Graham, “relentlessly resourceful.”
In work it might look like the employee who, after being told there’s no more money in the budget to address a frustrating process pays a couple hundred bucks out of their own pocket for a piece of software that fixes the issue, documents why it’s so helpful, and writes up a proposal for the company to use the software. When interviewing someone, you could ask them directly about a time they were initially told no but found a creative way to solve the problem anyway. If people have done this, it’s usually easy for them to come up with an example. And it’s actually a pretty tough example to fake convincingly.
In dating imagine you’re out on a first date at a restaurant. After initially being seated in a poorly located table with no view and right next to the kitchen, your date asks to be reseated. Despite the hostess denying the request, your date then asks to speak to the manager who apologizes and reseats you in a much better location.
4. Assertive Communication
Communicating assertively means that a person is maximally respectful of their own wants and needs and those of other people. They ask for what they want, express themselves freely, give feedback honestly, and they are willing to say no and maintain good boundaries.
In work one question I’ve found to be helpful in an interview is to ask the interviewee to reflect on something about your hiring or interview process that they think is poorly done or needs improvement. Most people will get very uncomfortable when faced with this question and squeak out a vague and relatively meaningless answer. But people who are assertive will readily have at least one suggestion and will let you know in a way that’s direct, specific, and respectful.
In dating they don’t impulsively go along with or agree to everything you suggest. They are willing to suggest an idea or give feedback despite knowing it will be uncomfortable to you. They are willing and able to talk freely about their emotions in the context of the relationship—you don’t have to guess at how they feel because they’re willing to tell you in an honest and respectful way.
5. Low Defensiveness
People with a high agency mindset rarely get defensive or take things personally (this doesn’t mean they don’t feel defensive, btw, but that they don’t act out their defensiveness). They admit when they’re wrong and they take negative feedback remarkably well.
In work Criticize or give tough feedback about some aspect of their performance during an interview and see how they handle it in real time. Those with a high agency mindset usually welcome feedback and criticism and will even ask you to elaborate more, whereas folks with a low agency mindset will usually clench, bristle, or even criticize back.
In dating Give feedback early and often: If they’re late, tell them punctuality matters to you and ask them to please be on time next time; if they make an off-color joke, tell them why you don’t appreciate it and ask them not to in the future; if they have a tendency to interrupt you, point it out and ask them to stop. The two things you’re looking for are: 1) How do they handle the feedback in the moment—are they thoughtful and respectful about it or do they seem irritated and/or push back? 2) Do they change their behavior based on your feedback? In other words, does communicating assertively bring out the best or worst in them?
6. Self-Updating
Individuals with a high agency mindset are usually introspective about their own thoughts, beliefs, and behaviors and frequently update them based on new data and experience. They learn from their mistakes quickly and efficiently. They’re accommodators, not assimilators.
In work something you can look for early in a person’s work experience—even during interviews—is the quantity and quality of good questions they ask. Contrary to popular wisdom, there definitely are dumb questions—or at least lazy ones. And people with a high agency mindset tend to avoid asking them because they can and do figure them out on their own. Consequently, the quality of their questions is surprisingly high.
In dating Look for someone who admits when they’re wrong and generally seems to relish being flexible and adaptable. Rigidity is a strong counter-signal for agency. When in doubt, just ask them: What’s an important thing you’ve changed your mind about recently?
7. Values Clarity
They know what they want and what they believe in. But they accept that values frequently come into conflict and they’re willing to make tradeoffs and compromises among their values when necessary.
In work during an interview, simply ask a person to state and briefly explain two or three of their most important personal values. Then follow up with: What was a professional situation where two of your values came into conflict and how did you manage that? You’re looking for clarity, fluency, and logic in the way they talk about their values and how they apply them in life. You want evidence that they obviously think about and understand their values. Trite or cliched answers are a strong countersignal. You don’t want people who copy and paste values.
In dating here’s a good question to get at this: What qualities do you admire most in a friend? Someone who reflects on and is relatively clear about their values will have little trouble answering this question. In fact, you might not be able to shut them up after asking it! But a person who hasn’t thought much about their values—perhaps because they tend to just absorb other people’s values passively—will likely struggle with this question, get uncomfortable, and likely give you some vague, cliched answers.
8. Radical Responsibility
While they frequently take bold action, people with a high agency mindset are well aware of the risks and tradeoffs that go along with their actions and take full responsibility for them. They ask for help if they need it, but not simply because they want it. They acknowledge mistakes quickly, easily, and give high-quality apologies—but at the same time, they don’t dwell on mistakes or get consumed by past failures. They don’t hold grudges. They’re capacity for ownership and self-compassion are equally high.
In work pay close attention to how they handle mistakes or failures, and look for demonstrable behaviors indicating they have taken responsibility and are willing to move on productively. When interviewing someone, here’s a question that gets at this quality: Tell me about a time you made a significant mistake and then handled it poorly. This question usually works because people who are low in responsibility tend not to be very insightful about their own mistakes—especially being able to understand clearly when they handled a mistake poorly and why.
In dating pay close attention to when the person you’re dating makes a mistake. How do they handle it? You’re looking for someone who quickly acknowledges and owns up to it, apologizes if necessary, but doesn’t ruminate on it. Obliviousness and self-criticism are both countersignals for healthy responsibility. And if you don’t notice someone making mistakes, you’re probably not paying close enough attention.
9. Self-Efficacy
Individuals with a high agency mindset have a strong belief in their ability to succeed in specific tasks or domains where they’ve established experience and expertise. They see this belief not as innate but the predictable result of significant effort, experience, practice, and patience. They have a strong internal locus of control. They’re creators, not consumers.
In work try this as an interview question: Tell me about a professional mentor who didn’t know they were mentoring you. People high in self-efficacy have a tendency to seek out role models and actively learn from them without necessarily forming an explicit mentor-mentee relationship.
In dating people high in self-efficacy have a pattern of setting meaningful and ambitious goals for themselves and following through on them. A good way to explore this quickly with someone is to ask them about their hobbies, then gauge the extent to which their hobbies are primarily passive and consumption-oriented (movies, video games, concerts, etc.) vs active projects they work on (volunteering, coaching, building, painting, writing, etc.)
10. Contrarian Curiosity
One mark of the high agency mindset is a distinctive blend of wide-ranging curiosity with a contrarian streak. They tend to challenge the status quo or look at things from novel perspectives. But they’re not contrarian in order to boost their ego or impress people; it’s a natural consequence of deep curiosity and desire to learn and grow.
In work try this question during an interview: What’s something about (your company’s industry) you believe that most people would disagree with you on? Again, how they answer the question is at least as important as what they say. If they really struggle with the answer, that suggests a pretty conventional mindset. But if they can at least have one or two interesting ideas, that suggests a history of thinking carefully about the topic and engaging with it in a novel way.
In dating here’s a great question to ask your date that’s similar to the above: What’s something you strongly believe that most people don’t? Again, the way they answer the question—their level of curiosity vs anxiety, the degree to which their energy levels rise or fall, and their willingness to be vulnerable talking about uncomfortable or socially-awkward topics—is a strong indicator of high vs low agency and contrarian curiosity specifically. Also, do they even have strong beliefs? And how flexibly vs rigidly do they hold them?
Next Steps
If you enjoyed this article, here are a few others you should try next:
- The High Agency Mindset →
- 5 Limiting Beliefs of Anxious High-Achievers →
- How to Take Feedback without Getting Defensive →
And if you’re working on building more agency, reach out directly and say hi: hello@nickwignall.com
p.s.
I don’t believe a high agency mindset is necessary or sufficient for a satisfactory relationship in work, love, or anywhere else. And there are plenty of other qualities—from compassion and intelligence to humility and self-awareness—that probably matter at least as much in our relationships. So if especially high levels of agency aren’t all that important to you, that’s perfectly okay. Still, I suspect many of us value agency more than we realize, both in ourselves and others.
