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A mental model is a certain way of looking at the world. It is a tool or a set of tools you use to think about things—a mental framework for thinking about a situation or approaching a problem, if you will. It’s the stories you tell yourself about what you expect to see, what’s going to happen next, what’s happening now.
Great thought leaders agree that it’s critical to have a wide range of mental models at your disposal. You can think of each mental model you have learned to apply to a situation as a tool. As you move through life and career, you want to have as full a toolbox as possible, and you want to be as adept as possible in selecting and using each of the tools in your toolbox.
A toolbox that only contains one hammer would be of limited use. The same goes for mental models—if you always fall back to the same one, regardless of the circumstances, you won’t be nearly as effective as you could be. As Abraham Kaplan notes in his book, The Conduct of Inquiry, the law of the instrument provides that if you “give a small boy a hammer, [] he will find that everything he encounters needs pounding.” And if you have but a single framework for looking at the world, you’ll be forced to fit every problem you encounter into that framework, whether it really fits or not. Your ability to solve problems will be drastically limited.
And, notably, this limitation can become even more pronounced as you grow more skilled in a certain area. As you gain knowledge and expertise, you may be more likely to believe that the framework you’ve developed to achieve success in one area of your life applies uniformly to solve problems in all areas of your life. This is a fundamentally flawed assumption, as is the assumption that the same mental model that has enabled you to effectively problem solve so far will continue to do so indefinitely. Life is fluid and ever-changing, and each day brings new circumstances and problems. The more time and energy you spend mastering a single mental model, the more likely it is that this particular mental model will become a crutch, rather than a tool.
But if you are able to develop a larger, more diverse toolbox of mental models, you'll automatically improve your ability to solve problems. You’ll simply have more tools and paths to get you to the right answer. This is one of the main ways truly brilliant people separate themselves from those who are merely smart. Smart people have one or two ways of approaching a problem, but brilliant people have developed multiple ways of looking at the same problem, and can select the model that will get them to the best result.
There are two effective ways to build new mental models.
The first: read books outside of your area of expertise. Read books you wouldn’t normally read, and books your colleagues wouldn’t normally read. If you study the same material as everyone else, you’ll always be thinking in the same way as everyone else. You’ll approach problems using the same old frameworks. Instead, look for answers in unexpected places and expand the way you think about problems and solutions.
The second way to build new mental models is to learn how to write down or sketch out a web of ideas that demonstrates to you how seemingly unrelated ideas connect. For example, next time you read a new book or listen to a lecture, write or sketch the different ways this new information connects to information you already understand. This will force you to view information and knowledge as connected and interrelated, rather than separated into different worlds. Who’s to say that principles of economics can’t inform someone who studies medicine? That a yoga routine can’t be beneficial for someone who wants to work on her golf swing? That a book about art can’t inspire a chef creating a new dish?
As noted previously, a large toolbox of different mental models is critical, because these models give us a framework for the information with which we’re constantly being bombarded. They help us think about problems creatively, decide where to focus our time and energy, and make decisions effectively, rather than just reacting. Here are the mental models most commonly used by successful people.
10/10/10 Rule. This mental model gives us a way to think about long-term problems versus short-term problems. Most of us have at some point been guilty of making decisions without thinking about long term consequences. To avoid this, we can use the 10/10/10 rule to reflect on the long-term by asking ourselves the following three questions:
1. How will we feel about this 10 minutes from now?
2. What about 10 months from now?
3. What about 10 years from now?
It is sometimes easy to make decisions thinking only about the short-term—what may make us happy 10 minutes from now or 10 months from now. The problem with these types of decisions is that they very often don’t serve us in the long term. The 10/10/10 rule is a great way to shed light on whether a decision will be something we will regret in a few short months or years down the road. Use it when you’re trying to get yourself to the gym or resisting the piece of cake in the fridge or struggling with whether to end a toxic relationship or considering your next big career move.
True Fans. A true fan is someone who is so into you or your product that they will buy pretty much anything you’re selling. Money, time, and distance is no object. The “True Fans” mental model provides that, rather than trying to please or influence the general public, we should instead create a product or message that speaks to a few (it may be 100 or 10,000) true fans. This model most obviously applies to artists and entrepreneurs, but the True Fan mental model can be applied to anyone’s personal and professional relationships. After all, having one powerful mentor who thinks you’re great and is willing to go to bat for you is better than having a hundred co-workers who merely know who you are and what you do. Likewise, having a partner who loves you unconditionally is better than having dozens of casual acquaintances who think you’re pretty cool.
Pareto’s Law (the 80/20 Rule). Pareto’s Law, which is also known as the 80/20 Rule, is about being effective, not just being efficient. It’s about being productive, rather than just keeping yourself busy. This mental model provides that, in nearly everything we do, twenty percent of the activity delivers eighty percent of the results. The model originated with Italian Economist Vilfredo Pareto, who observed that 80% of wealth and land in his country were controlled by just 20% of the people.
Today, Pareto’s Law is widely used and enthusiastically lauded. It can be adapted to apply to health, business, spending, and time management. For example, you might notice in your own life that 80% of your happiness comes from 20% of the people you spend time with. You might notice that 80% of your company’s profits come from 20% of your customers. You might notice that 80% of your business contacts provide 20% of your referrals. Use this mental model to keep yourself from getting caught up in busy work that makes you feel productive but doesn’t substantially propel you toward your goals. You can apply the model to determine which 20% of the tasks you perform or the people you spend time with or the money you spend give you 80% of what it really is you’re looking for.
Minimization of Regret. This mental model is similar to the 10/10/10 Rule, but a bit broader. It encourages you to think broadly of the long-term effects of a decision or certain course of action by projecting yourself out to the age of 80 (or 70 or 90) and asking yourself “what would the 80-year-old me suggest?” This gets you away from the bits of daily minutia that can cloud your judgment and confuse you, so that you can make decisions that you won’t regret decades down the road. This mental model is a great way to approach big decisions about your personal and professional life, whether it’s to leave an unhappy marriage or change careers or start your own business.
The Eisenhower Matrix. President Dwight Eisenhower once said, “What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.” Whether or not you agree with his policies, it is clear that President Eisenhower was an incredibly productive person. He was responsible for launching programs that led to the development of the interstate system, the internet (DARPA), space exploration (NASA), and the peaceful use of alternative energy (Atomic Energy Act).
One of President Eisenhower’s favorite mental models, which he used to make smart decisions about allocation of his time and resources, was what later became known as the Eisenhower Matrix. Whenever President Eisenhower was faced with a decision or task, he categorized it into one of four categories:
1. Urgent + important = Do immediately.
2. Important but not urgent = Schedule for later.
3. Urgent but not important = Delegate.
4. Not urgent or important = Eliminate.
Productivity is all about making smart choices about where to allocate our time and energy. This mental model allows us to make time for the important things by eliminating or delegating the tasks that contribute only minimally to our objectives.
Parkinson’s Law. This mental model provides that any given task will expand to fill the time available for its completion. If we have two hours to complete a task that normally would take one hour, we’ll find a way to make the task take two hours. But if we have only thirty minutes to complete a task that normally takes an hour, we find a way to get it done on time.
This is a mental model that must be applied on a personal (rather than organizational) level, because it requires you to place artificial time limitations on yourself. It’s an incredibly effective way to get more done in less time, stay focused, and eliminate superfluous tasks. Next time you have a project that should take a week to complete, don’t give yourself a week. Instead, break the task into smaller activities, and set multiple deadlines over the next four or five days to finish them.
Circle of Competence. The Circle of Competence mental model encourages you to double down on your strengths, rather than focusing on improving in your areas of weakness. A study of the most successful leaders, entrepreneurs, athletes, and influencers reveals that those people who are able to ascertain their aptitudes and increase their edge over others in those areas are more successful.
If you try to beat your competition in their own arena, you will lose, but if you play within your own circle of competence, you have a good shot at winning. For example, you may be an excellent rainmaker in your company, but your marketing reports stink. Rather than devoting a ton of time and energy to improving the quality of your marketing reports, which will never be as good as those of the company’s best report writers, you would be wiser to gain recognition within the organization by expanding your rainmaking efforts and providing even more value that way.