The Hardest Promises to Break: Peer Accountability (With Angela Duckworth)

The people around us can make goals easier to achieve—or easier to abandon. Find out why social influence matters more than you might expect.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:05Katy Milkman?

  A blank page can be a terrifying thing, especially when you're a perfectionist.

• 0:16Katy Milkman?

  It's the 1930s, and an Oxford professor sits alone in his study, staring down a monumental goal he set for himself. Write an epic fantasy sequel to a children's book he'd published a few years prior. But he's his own worst enemy. Working in isolation, he spends weeks agonizing over a single paragraph, getting completely lost in the minutia of his invented world. His latest manuscript has been gathering dust in a desk drawer for years now, and he's on the brink of abandoning the project entirely. Until he decides to drag his work out of the dark. He joins a small circle of literary peers

• 0:59Katy Milkman?

  who meet weekly in university rooms and local pubs. They call themselves the Inklings. The group has an important rule. To remain an Inkling, every week, he's required to bring his raw, unfinished pages to read aloud. If he shows up without much progress, he'll be met with admonishments. If he wants to quit, the Inklings will protest, demanding that he produce another chapter.

• 1:28Katy Milkman?

  Week after week, not wanting to disappoint the room, our Oxford professor perseveres and keeps writing.

• 1:37Katy Milkman?

  That once hopeless author is none other than J. R. R. Tolkien, agonizing over a book trilogy you might have heard of: The Lord of the Rings. Oh, and the fellow Inkling he relied on the most for encouragement? His closest friend, author of The Chronicles of Narnia, C. S. Lewis.

• 2:00Katy Milkman?

  In this episode, we explore how the simple act of making your progress on a goal or intention visible to other people can change whether you abandon that goal or follow through.

• 2:20Katy Milkman?

  I'm Dr. Katie Milkman, and this is Choiceology, an original podcast from Charles Schwab. It's a show about the psychology and economics behind our decisions. We bring you true and surprising stories about high-stakes choices. And then we examine how these stories connect to the latest research in behavioral science. We do it all to help you make better judgments and avoid costly mistakes.

• 2:57Speaker 01

  The Slim Ones.

• 3:01Speaker 01

  The Trim Ones. Who are they? They're the Metrical for Lunch Bunch. At lunchtime, instead of fattening food, they have delicious Metrical Milkshake flavors to help stay slim and trim.

• 3:17Katy Milkman?

  Turn on a TV in the early 1960s in America or flip through a magazine, and you'd be surrounded by a vision of sleek, shiny progress: bright new homes in the suburbs, shiny new appliances,

• 3:33Katy Milkman?

  innovative new conveniences. It was an era where technology promised to solve every human problem, including your weight. And nowhere was that promise bigger than the grocery store, where you could simply sip your way to an ideal body.

• 3:50Speaker 01

  Join the Metrical for Lunch Bunch.

• 3:54Speaker 02

  This is the era of American abundance, and specifically, abundance of food and calories. This is a moment when food science actually really takes off.

• 4:08Speaker 02

  Hi, my name is Natalia Milkman-Petrazella.

• 4:12Katy Milkman?

  Natalia is a historian of American culture and the author of Fit Nation: The Gains and Pains of America's Exercise Obsession. And what Americans were obsessed with in the 1960s was abundance.

• 4:29Katy Milkman?

  They were being encouraged to consume more than ever before, while at the very same time being told they should look like they hadn't.

• 4:37Speaker 02

  So you have these dual factors in this period, where you have more calories that are available to people, greater abundance, wartime rationing is over, and food that is less healthful and more processed. And then, a kind of judgment of enjoying it. Because if you look like you're consuming too much, well, you're a problem.

• 4:59Speaker 02

  And so, what happens in the 1960s is you also have a growth in diet culture, which is targeted particularly towards women. Managing your weight, getting slim, taking off those pounds is emphasized or sold as your duty. And so, there are diet pills, there are fad diets, there are exercise programs.

• 5:23Katy Milkman?

  If you couldn't maintain that picture-perfect physique, the culture offered very little grace. Extra weight wasn't treated as a biological reality or the predictable byproduct of a changing food environment. It was framed as a personal failure.

• 5:40Speaker 02

  One thing that's important to acknowledge is how unforgiving this diet culture was and how much a lot of women were made to believe that if they were a little too heavy, don't ask by whose standards, that it's their fault and that it is their responsibility to struggle in private.

• 6:02Katy Milkman?

  In Queens, New York, one woman was living and struggling inside that painful culture of body shaming every day. Her name was Jean Niedich.

• 6:14Speaker 02

  She's married to a bus driver. She has two children. She described herself as being overweight, being married to an overweight man, having overweight children, and even a fat dog. That's how she talked about herself. She really struggled with her weight. It was not something that she was happy with. This was a struggle that she dealt with every single day, that this drama of seeing food, wanting food, eating it, not eating it, overeating it, not fitting into her dress. This was a cycle which really consumed her and a lot of other women.

• 6:49Katy Milkman?

  Desperate to break the cycle, Jean turned to the official channels of the time: a weight loss clinic run by the New York City Department of Health.

• 6:59Speaker 02

  And the advice is pretty common sense. I think it was eat fish five times a week, more fruits and veggies, maybe only two slices of bread a day. But she can't stand the delivery of this generally sound advice.

• 7:15Speaker 02

  For one, the nutritionist who is running the seminar is really thin. And the nutritionist was like, "Well, when I see a huge plate of food, I'm just disgusted at the sight of it."

• 7:27Katy Milkman?

  Looking around the room, Jean realized she wasn't the only person struggling with dieting. The air was thick with shame. Most women were so embarrassed to be there that they sat at the back with their winter coats on. The women in that room didn't need to be told what to eat or to eat less. Most of them had heard some version of this advice before. They needed something more.

• 7:53Speaker 02

  There was no check back. There was no, "And I'm gonna see how you did."

• 7:58Katy Milkman?

  Everyone left that day with the same list of rules. But Jean Niedich left with something else: an idea.

• 8:12Katy Milkman?

  A few days later, Jean picked up the phone. She invited a handful of women who she knew were also trying to lose weight but struggling to her small, three-bedroom apartment.

• 8:23Speaker 02

  She knows that just getting some instructions is not enough. She knows that just being at home on her own in her typical environment with family who has the same eating habits that she does is not going to be the key to her success.

• 8:38Katy Milkman?

  Jean opens the meeting by admitting to hiding Malo Mars, chocolate-covered marshmallow-y cookies in her bathroom. This confession allowed the other women to be equally honest.

• 8:50Speaker 02

  Jean put them at ease, one, because she was a kind of valuable, like, friendly person. And of course, these were women that she knew. But she was also struggling with the exact same thing that they were. I cannot underestimate how much this very basic fact would have changed the dynamics of any kind of diet-related intervention during that period. It was really different to sit among peers and to look eye to eye with women who were struggling just like you than the experience of sitting there listening to a lecture from this thin, expert nutritionist who's supposed to know everything and you're supposed to know nothing. I think that made a big difference.

• 9:33Katy Milkman?

  Jean decided to keep holding gatherings in her home for friends with the shared goal of losing weight. And as more and more people joined, she ran out of places for people to sit. So neighbors would carry their own chairs down the street to her building. And as these gatherings grew, a structure began to form. For example, to kick off every meeting, members would get in line to stand on a scale.

• 9:59Speaker 02

  You commit with one other person to weigh in each week. And then after that, you sit in a group all together. There's a leader. First, it was Jean. Then it was others, who's kind of facilitating conversation. And there's both a celebration of wins, like moments of great willpower or losing weight, and then also an acknowledgement of slip-ups and a kind of encouragement to get back on track.

• 10:26Katy Milkman?

  Words spread, and eventually, the meetings became too big to host in Jean's living room or her building's common area. So they rented a larger space above a movie theater, expecting a modest crowd. Instead, hundreds of people poured through the doors.

• 10:45Speaker 02

  400 people show up. So if you can imagine that, when Jean had this idea to invite 10 people over to her living room, and now 400 people are coming over to a dedicated space to talk about their struggles with weight loss based on her model, it's pretty remarkable. People were willing to come together in semi-public about something that had been so private because it's encouraging to know that other people are in it as well. You're not alone. You're not uniquely undisciplined, or unvirtuous, or unattractive. Other people are struggling like you are.

• 11:24Katy Milkman?

  What began with a few women in a queen's living room had become something much larger. Eventually, it turned into one of the most recognizable wellness companies in the world. We know it today as Weight Watchers.

• 11:38Speaker 03

  Losing weight has never been so tasty.

• 11:41Speaker 02

  By the time you get to the 80s, there are all of these branded products. There are TV commercials.

• 11:46Speaker 04

  It's not what it looks like. I thought we were on a diet. We are. Yeah, sir, don't try to fool me.

• 11:52Speaker 02

  And cookbooks, and food, and frozen dinners that have sometimes Jean's face on them, but that are endorsed by celebrities.

• 12:02Speaker 04

  This isn't a diet. This is freedom.

• 12:07Speaker 02

  Weight Watchers is absolutely a household name. And so it really is this cultural touchstone, which is absolutely everywhere in the culture.

• 12:18Katy Milkman?

  Looking back, the reason people were so willing to come out and diet together is complex. And many, including those involved with today's version of Weight Watchers, would probably call it problematic.

• 12:30Speaker 02

  Weight Watchers, while providing a form of support, never really interrogated the underlying goal of getting thin as something women should be investing a lot of energy in.

• 12:42Katy Milkman?

  We see it now, and the company has evolved.

• 12:46Speaker 02

  It has really responded to our changing attitudes towards weight loss. Just a few years ago, it was seen as undesirable to admit you wanted to lose weight once again, and that was not body positive. And they actually changed their name to WW, taking out the Weight Watchers formally. But now, they're back. They're Weight Watchers again, and they have a partnership with GLP-1 companies. So I think you can really see the way Nyditch's vision, which was revolutionary for the 1960s, has in some ways remained very true to what it's always been.

• 13:23Katy Milkman?

  It's always been about achieving weight loss goals. But it's been about something more fundamental, too.

• 13:31Speaker 02

  What Nyditch really understood, and was a pioneer in understanding it, is that having that group accountability, telling people that you're going to do something, having to show up and talk about your food choices, and yes, even weigh in, that was so new at that time. Struggling alone, at home, making promises to yourself that nobody else knows about is just not a way to accomplish anything. And I think that that sounds very obvious, and maybe it is from a humanity or human psychology perspective, but I think that around the question of diet and women's bodies in the era that she came of age, it was not obvious at all.

• 14:17Katy Milkman?

  Natalia Melman-Petrazella is a historian of American political culture and an expert on how our social values shape our personal habits. She's also the author of the book Fit Nation: The Gains and Pains of America's Exercise Obsession. You can learn more about her work in our show notes and at schwab.com/choicology.

• 14:48Katy Milkman?

  Weight Watchers has evolved substantially since its founding. We now know far more about the science of why we weigh what we do, and that biology and genetics play an important role, making some of Weight Watchers' early diet instructions sound quite dated. But Jean Nyditch had a powerful insight that she leveraged to help people achieve their goals, something many behavioral scientists would later confirm. She understood that the hardest promises to break are the ones other people expect us to keep. My next guest has spent years studying exactly how the situations and people we count on to help us pursue our goals can influence our personal success. Angela Duckworth is my friend, colleague,

• 15:32Katy Milkman?

  and collaborator at the University of Pennsylvania, where she's a fellow professor. We co-direct the Behavior Change for Good Initiative at Penn, and Angela is the bestselling author of Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. More notably, she has a terrific new book out, which we'll talk about, called Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best. Hi, Angela. Thank you so much for being here today. I really appreciate it.

• 15:59Speaker 05

  Katie, it's always good to be together. I know we spend a lot of time together, but it never gets old.

• 16:05Katy Milkman?

  Aw, likewise. I'm particularly excited to be with you today because of this amazing book you've written, Situated, which shares so many important lessons about how we can accomplish more by changing our situation. One of my favorite chapters in the book talks about accountability. And I want to start by just asking if you could explain how you define accountability, because it's a commonly used word, and some of its common uses don't really map onto the way we think about it as behavioral scientists.

• 16:35Speaker 05

  I think when a lot of us think about our goals, our New Year's resolutions, "I want to sleep more. I want to exercise more. I want to snack less," we think about it as ourselves. I think that's natural. "I am going to do this. I'm going to do better." But accountability is making a goal in a social context, and in particular, asking another person to keep you accountable. So you're not just achieving this goal for yourself, but you are, in some sense, achieving it for the two of you if you're reporting to one other person, even if that goal still is personal. So you could say to me, Katie, "I really feel like I need to get to bed earlier.

• 17:17Speaker 05

  I commit to you, Angela, that I'm getting to bed by 10:00 PM." So it does benefit Katie to do that, and Katie's the one who has to do the work. But now, if I'm your accountability partner, you're doing it in some ways for both of us.

• 17:32Katy Milkman?

  And I think we all know intuitively that it can be helpful to have someone holding us accountable, but I'm not sure most people are familiar with how much evidence there is that supports this. Could you talk a little bit about some of the research suggesting that accountability can be a valuable way to increase goal success?

• 17:51Speaker 05

  What the research suggests from many, many studies that have been aggregated and analyzed is that goals are even better when they are public, not private. So rather than making a private New Year's resolution to get to bed at 10:00 PM-- by the way, I'm projecting that is a resolution of mine. I do want to go to bed earlier. So rather than keeping that a private goal, I could share it with another person. And the research suggests that the very best way to share that goal is not through Facebook, but through a one-on-one interaction, a face-to-face interaction, where I look you in the eyes and I say, "Katie, I commit to going to bed

• 18:34Speaker 05

  at 10 o'clock every night," and then to ask you to keep me accountable to that. So knowing that I'm going to have to report back to you, knowing that you're going to ask me about what my bedtime has been, say, a week from now, two weeks from now, that amplifies the benefits of goal setting.

• 18:50Katy Milkman?

  You mentioned that it's best when it's a one-on-one commitment. What do we know about who we should make these kinds of commitments to? And where can we see this approach working really well?

• 19:00Speaker 05

  You know, I've been writing about the situation, and I became very obsessed, if you will, with a certain Catholic high school in Concord, California, called Dillisal High School. And I became obsessed with them because they have the winningest football record in football history, and they had 151 consecutive wins over 12 years, and without exception, I think, have been winning six times as many games as they lose. And it really is remarkable, because California is not an easy state to have a winning football team in. There are many larger schools, schools that give out athletic scholarships, schools that do special recruiting. And this is practically a walk-on team.

• 19:43Speaker 05

  And the secret the coaches will tell you is peer accountability. So what they do in this football team is that every week, on a three-by-five index card, each player, from the star, the quarterback, the captain, to the guys who don't really get to see a lot of playtime, but everybody writes down their goals for the week. And that is, again, what we've known for many years in research, like you're making your vague intentions articulate. You're making a commitment. But what's key is that instead of everybody taking this three-by-five index card, folding it in half and putting it in their back pocket, they are handing it to another person on the team. So every boy on the team has to pair off

• 20:28Speaker 05

  and hand their card to someone else. They read their goals aloud to their commitment card partner. And by the way, they do it one by one. So it takes a long time. It takes at least well over an hour for each player to read out what they intend to do. They commit to one other person, but they do it in front of all 52 other players and the coaches. And then they sit down. There are no fines. There are no financial incentives. It's simply the power of peer accountability. And this practice began right before they started their winning streak. And what the coaches will tell you, including Coach Ladd, who's the now-retired coach who started this,

• 21:13Speaker 05

  is that there is no higher power than peer accountability. It's even more powerful than making a commitment to your coach or your mentor. And what the magic is, I think of this, is that in some ways, you ask me, "Well, who should we be reporting to?" I think for the boys, they see each other all week. So if somebody has a weightlifting goal or a conditioning goal that's otherwise observable, if they have a practice goal or a game day goal, your accountability partner sees everything. I do think-- Exporting this to our own lives, you know, like, you're not going to be in my bedroom at 10 o'clock at night, I hope, when I, you know, pull out my Anne Patchett book.

• 21:54Katy Milkman?

  We normally split off earlier than that.

• 21:56Speaker 05

  Yeah, we spent a lot of time together, but we haven't quite gotten that far. So, so I do think that is one of the challenges of making this wonderful tip. Like, oh, my gosh, I'm going to make a commitment card and I'm going to read it out loud to someone else. But at the De La Salle Spartans, the system for keeping tabs on your accountability partner is sort of built in. So I will say that we have to like, do a little creative engineering, but I think the general logic is clear and we will do for others what we will not do for ourselves.

• 22:26Katy Milkman?

  I love the example of the Spartans. It's such a clear way to implement this. And one of the things I really like about it is that you're highlighting two things. One, these are peers who care about each other. They have a shared goal. And the other is also that they can see performance. So we know it's visible, not just that I could lie to you and tell you, hey, yeah, I did my weightlifting because you're going to be in the gym with me and you're going to see if I did it. Angela, it makes me think of this study we used to teach together when we co-taught a seminar that was about how to drive voter turnout, where these researchers, Gerber, Green and Laramo, sent out messages to Michigan voters in a primary and told them that they were tracking their voter history,

• 23:11Katy Milkman?

  which is a matter of public record, and giving them a list to show that they could do this of their turnout at recent elections. And then they randomized some people to also see the turnout of their neighbors. Some people only saw the turnout of their families and other people didn't see anyone else's turnout. And they were told they'd get an update after the election on the same information. So in other words, what happened here is some people are just told, you're being watched. Some people are told you and your family are being watched and I'm going to keep you all in the loop about who turns out. And some are told you and your family and your neighbors are being watched and I'm going to keep you all in the loop. And if I'm remembering correctly, I think there was something like an eight percentage point boost

• 23:54Katy Milkman?

  in voter turnout from sharing this information about neighbors and a four percentage point boost from sharing information about family, suggesting, first of all, this is wildly effective to make you feel accountable to these other people. But second, that it was more powerful to make you feel accountable to your neighbors than your immediate family. And I have always found that really interesting. I know we've talked about it a lot with our students. I'm curious if you have thoughts on why it is that that neighborhood unit is more potent than the family unit as an accountability tool in this particular case? And if there's any takeaways we can leave with from that insight?

• 24:34Speaker 05

  I think when I tell Jason, my husband, that I'm going to go to bed at 10:00 PM. And he, by the way, is a great accountability partner in some ways because like, he is in the bedroom with me and he knows exactly when I go to sleep. And so you could say like, well, the more intimate the accountability partner, the better. The better they know you, the more time they spend with you. But then again, you have the finding that you just mentioned. And my guess is that what's wrong with Jason as accountability partner is he knows me so well that he's going to forgive me for, you know, all the slips and like, oh, yeah, well, of course, well, that night, you know, I mean, come on, you had so much work to do, or, or some other excuse. So I think there is something about the distance, the social distance from our neighbors.

• 25:18Speaker 05

  It's, it's kind of the sweet spot of, well, you do care what they think, but they're not so close to you that they can give you a pass. I think that's primarily my intuition.

• 25:29Katy Milkman?

  One thing that I think is interesting about accountability is that it can be really unpleasant to be held accountable for things, right? You can see, in fact, the example we talked about a moment ago with voter turnout, people hated getting these mailings saying, your neighbors are going to find out if you vote in this election or not. Like, they were furious. And, you know, a lot of the places where we want to support goal pursuit are not as friendly as your classroom or a sports team, right? It might be a large employer that's trying to get people to follow through on goals related to work productivity and it might feel manipulative.

• 26:10Katy Milkman?

  And I'm curious what you think leaders can do to ensure they use accountability in a way that inspires and is effective without creating anger or backlash?

• 26:24Speaker 05

  Well, there is this term in psychology that I know you're very familiar with, reactance. You know, like, turn left. No, I'm going to turn right. Sit down. No, I'm going to stand up. I mean, there is this resistance that is reflexive for many of us. And I think what, what's really going on is that we all have a need for autonomy. I remember when my daughters were young, that my younger daughter, Lucy, would say to my older daughter, Amanda, you're not the boss of me. And I think that is true of human nature, that we don't want anyone to be the boss of us, even our boss in some ways. So how do you, how do you engineer a system of peer accountability without reactance?

• 27:07Speaker 05

  I don't have a random assignment study, but I do have the example of the De La Salle Spartans. You know, one of the reasons I think that the symmetry was very important to Coach Ladd is that he said that when you are in the system and somebody is keeping you accountable and you are keeping them accountable and you do it week after week after week and season after season, which means year after year, you develop a sense of appreciation for how hard it is to be on the receiving end and on the giving end of feedback. Because one thing that I, you know, maybe didn't emphasize enough is that when the next week rolls around and your commitment card partner stands up, they will report on what you did and what you didn't do.

• 27:52Speaker 05

  And when I sat there listening to these like, you know, 15 year old boys say with complete,

• 27:59Speaker 05

  unvarnished candor, goal number one, not achieved. Goal number two, achieved. Goal number three, not achieved. Goal number four, not achieved. I was trying to keep tabs in my head of, you know, the, the success rate. And I think it was like, I'm wildly guessing, but maybe 50% of goals had been achieved, meaning there was a lot of failure feedback. And when Coach Ladd said the symmetry is very important, it's because when you're in the system as a giver and a receiver, when you're being held accountable, but you're also holding someone else accountable, you can appreciate how hard it is to give somebody that kind of accountability feedback, how hard it is for everyone to receive it. And I think that built in empathy sort of, you know, works against, you know, you're not the boss of me.

• 28:43Speaker 05

  Like, this is coming as a directive. And as a leader, then, that means that you have to do what Coach Ladd did, which is to create a system where there's enough buy-in that people feel like, okay, like, we're doing this. We're all getting better, but it doesn't feel hierarchical. It doesn't feel like a mandate. And of course, there's a lot of culture building that goes into it. But I, I have to say, I really respect leaders.

• 29:09Speaker 05

  They have to do so much, right? They have to like, pick up little tips like the commitment card, but somehow integrate it into a culture where because there's enough trust, you know, because there's enough communication, like, you can try something like this and not have it backfire.

• 29:23Katy Milkman?

  That's a really great message, Angela, that the culture matters and that we can't expect accountability to work in a vacuum. It has to be in a culture of trust. Getting back to the book, Situated, your core argument is really that we can make ourselves far more successful by strategically adjusting our situation to make goal achievement easier. And one way of doing that, right, is by finding people we trust who will hold us accountable for sticking to our commitments. But you also note that we tend to neglect the power of the situation, including this kind of peer accountability that we've been talking about. So I wanted to ask you why it is that you think we're so resistant to admitting that we need to change our situation?

• 30:07Katy Milkman?

  We need this kind of outside help?

• 30:09Speaker 05

  We live in a culture that says that what can be controlled is on the inside. And since what cannot be controlled is the outside, therefore, we should not talk about what is the outside. We should not talk about, you know, whether this teacher is good, whether this field is good, whether the hospital rules are good. It is what we tell our children too. Like, don't complain about the team and about the unfairness of your teacher's rules. And, you know, don't complain about the situation. You should control what you can control and what you can control yourself, right? I think that is incomplete and possibly even dangerous advice in the following way. I also don't want to say it's without merit, right?

• 30:54Speaker 05

  I, I'm sure I said a version of this to my own daughters, but, but I do think that when people point to the situation and say, this is not a great situation. I am in a losing situation. It's working against me. It's my enemy, not my ally. We should not say, well, stop talking about that, you know? That's cowardly. You're a slacker. I think the reason why we say that is because we do want people to take agency and control over what they can change. But it's an incomplete prescription because why can't they change the situation? Like, I feel like I've come to that realization later than I should have because I was trying to focus on the inside things, you know, my mindset and, you know, my attitude

• 31:38Speaker 05

  to the exclusion of thinking about how I could also change my situation.

• 31:43Katy Milkman?

  I want to ask you for what parting advice you have for our listeners about how they can make use of the insights you've shared today about accountability. What should they do differently in their lives to use accountability to their advantage?

• 31:58Speaker 05

  I think that if you make a to-do list, and it could be big or small, I mean, it could be things that you're trying to get done this week, or it could be like a New Year's resolution, those tend to be more ambitious, you could not only write down what you're trying to do differently, but you could write down who is going to keep you accountable to each of those goals. And I will say that, you know, for many of us, the following analogy will ring true. How many people will really make a nice dinner for just themselves versus like, oh, if it's just me, I'm going to pour a bowl of cereal, right? Like, because, you know, it's

• 32:41Speaker 05

  just not worth the effort and energy if it's just for you. I think so many things are like that. We will do for others what we will not do for ourselves. And if we can use that, then all to the better. And if you ask someone, like, do you want to be my accountability partner and I will be yours, then it's symmetric, the way Bob Lattiser at the De La Salle Spartans would want it to be. And, you know, everyone wins. And I don't think you're expecting that every week you're going to say like, yes, achieved, achieved, achieved. It could be like, achieved, not achieved, like, working on it. But I really do believe that it is the way we should go. And as you know, Katie, we're spending

• 33:24Speaker 05

  more time alone in society. People are eating alone. They are exercising alone, entertaining themselves alone. I think it's high time we get together. And, you know, changing goal setting from a private activity to a communal, social activity is one way to do that.

• 33:44Katy Milkman?

  That's a fantastic place to end. I so appreciate you taking the time to do this interview, Angela, and tell us about your amazing book and about the power of accountability. And also, thank you for being an amazing accountability partner to me. I really appreciate it.

• 33:59Speaker 05

  You're my accountability partner. As you know, you're my academic BFF. So I'm very happy to be in this conversation. And I will see you soon.

• 34:05Katy Milkman?

  I will see you soon. Thank you, Angela.

• 34:11Katy Milkman?

  Angela Duckworth is the Rosa Lee and Egbert Chang Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, where our office is two doors down from mine. She and I also co-founded and co-direct the Behavior Change for Good Initiative. And Angela is the author of the mega bestseller, Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. She also has a fabulous, brand-new book out September 1st called Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best.

• 34:43Katy Milkman?

  To learn more about how the phenomena we explore on Choiceology can impact your portfolio and finances, check out our sister podcast, Financial Decoder. You can find it at schwab.com/financialdecoder or in your favorite podcast app.

• 35:02Katy Milkman?

  What I hope you'll remember from this episode is that there's real power in making yourself accountable to your teammates, your friends, and your neighbors. When you make your goals and progress visible to other people, you gain an added motive to succeed and much-needed support when you stumble. Without that insight, Weight Watchers might never have become a household name, and the world might not have The Lord of the Rings. But the best part about this idea is that you can use it to accomplish more right away. I'll bet you can find a colleague, teammate, friend, or even a stranger online who'd be glad to pair up so you can both accomplish more together.

• 35:57Katy Milkman?

  That wraps this episode of Choiceology, an original podcast from Charles Schwab. If you're ready to learn more about goal setting, you can find plenty of actionable strategies in Angela Duckworth's terrific new book, Situated. Or for broader lessons about the psychology behind our decisions, you can join a community of fellow Choiceology enthusiasts over at my Milkman Delivers newsletter on Substack. And if you learned something today about the power of accountability, we'd be so grateful if you could share by leaving the show a rating on Spotify or a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps other listeners find the show. And while you're there, hit follow so you never miss an upcoming episode. I'm Dr. Katie Milkman. Talk to you soon.

• 36:55Speaker 06

  For important disclosures, see the show notes or visit schwab.com/choiceology.