1. That getting good at something can sometimes be quick; if you have the right background. But when it's not quick - that doesn't mean you can't get good. It s

1. That getting good at something can sometimes be quick; if you have the right background. But when it's not quick - that doesn't mean you can't get good. It simply means it's a process. Experiencing the part where I'm bad at something as simply the "beginning of a progress bar" and knowing it's going somewhere, and that practice is necessary allows me to persevere and not experience frustration or a feeling of inadequacy. I would tell this (along with a real life story to match about myself) to my employees whenever they got discouraged. As a team lead, I would often do the same work they did, so they compared themselves to me, thinking something should be easy for them just because it's easy for me at this point in time. I would tell them it's not a fair comparison to make - I have several years of additional experience doing this compared to you, and I've done this a thousand times, while they're doing this the first time. Of course it appears easier to me - I've had practice, and that's all the difference between them and me, not intelligence or some other trait they have no direct effect on. 2. Evaluating my own and others' ideas through a set of explicit criteria (asking yourself "what does the solution to this problem need to solve in order to be considered adequate?") keeps me from falling in love with my ideas or solutions to problems. For example, my specific implementation for some software might look good to me. If someone else shows up with a different solution (e.g. during code review), then those criteria are the questions I need to ask them to verify that it is indeed a better solution, and that it doesn't overshoot what's needed. If it is better by those criteria, then there's no reason not to toss my idea aside and use theirs. Of course, this concept also applies to the criteria themselves - someone else might convince me that my criteria are wrong, by noting that some of them are not explained by a greater goal (such as the larger task at hand -- the company's mission, turning a profit, etc.), and so on.