Marshall Goldsmith > Quotes

“Fate is the hand of cards we’ve been dealt. Choice is how we play the hand.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“getting mad at people for being who they are makes as much sense as getting mad at a chair for being a chair.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“Successful people become great leaders when they learn to shift the focus from themselves to others.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“Mojo” is, “That positive spirit toward what we are doing now, that starts from the inside and radiates to the outside”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Mojo: How to Get It, How to Keep It, How to Get It Back If You Lose It

“People who believe they can succeed see opportunities where others see threats.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“If we do not create and control our environment, our environment creates and controls us.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“A leader who cannot shoulder the blame is not someone we will follow blindly into battle. We instinctively question that individual’s character, dependability, and loyalty to us. And so we hold back on our loyalty to him or her.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“Never wrestle with a pig—because you both get dirty but the pig loves it”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Sparking positive change and making it last

“Peter Drucker, who said, “Our mission in life should be to make a positive difference, not to prove how smart or right we are.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Sparking positive change and making it last

“People will do something—including changing their behavior—only if it can be demonstrated that doing so is in their own best interests as defined by their own values.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“We spend a lot of time teaching leaders what to do. We don’t spend enough time teaching leaders what to stop. Half the leaders I have met don’t need to learn what to do. They need to learn what to stop.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“To avoid undesirable behavior, avoid the environments where it is most likely to occur.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“Just because people understand what to do doesn’t ensure that they will actually do it.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“The more aware we are, the less likely any trigger, even in the most mundane circumstances, will prompt hasty unthinking behavior that leads to undesirable consequences.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“When we presume that we are better than people who need structure and guidance, we lack one of the most crucial ingredients for change: humility.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Sparking positive change and making it last

“people only change their ways when what they truly value is threatened.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“inside each of us are two separate personas. There’s the leader/planner/manager who plans to change his or her ways. And there’s the follower/doer/employee who must execute the plan.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“But the higher up you go in the organization, the more you need to make other people winners and not make it about winning yourself.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“An excuse explains why we fell short of expectations after the fact. Our inner beliefs trigger failure before it happens. They sabotage lasting change by canceling its possibility. We employ these beliefs as articles of faith to justify our inaction and then wish away the result. I call them belief triggers.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“Overcommitment can be as serious an obstacle to change as believing that you don’t need fixing or that your flaws are part of the reason you’re successful.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“An old Buddhist parable illustrates the challenge—and the value—of letting go of the past. Two monks were strolling by a stream on their way home to the monastery. They were startled by the sound of a young woman in a bridal gown, sitting by the stream, crying softly. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she gazed across the water. She needed to cross to get to her wedding, but she was fearful that doing so might ruin her beautiful handmade gown. In this particular sect, monks were prohibited from touching women. But one monk was filled with compassion for the bride. Ignoring the sanction, he hoisted the woman on his shoulders and carried her across the stream—assisting her journey and saving her gown. She smiled and bowed with gratitude as the monk splashed his way back across the stream to rejoin his companion. The second monk was livid. ‘How could you do that?’ he scolded. ‘You know we are forbidden to touch a woman, much less pick one up and carry her around!’ The offending monk listened in silence to a stern lecture that lasted all the way back to the monastery. His mind wandered as he felt the warm sunshine and listened to the singing birds. After returning to the monastery, he fell asleep for a few hours. He was jostled and awakened in the middle of the night by his fellow monk. ‘How could you carry that woman?’ his agitated friend cried out. ‘Someone else could have helped her across the stream. You were a bad monk.’ ‘What woman?’ the sleepy monk inquired. ‘Don’t you even remember? That woman you carried across the stream,’ his colleague snapped. ‘Oh, her,’ laughed the sleepy monk. ‘I only carried her across the stream. You carried her all the way back to the monastery.’ The learning point is simple: When it comes to our flawed past, leave it at the stream. I am not suggesting that we should always let go of the past. You need feedback to scour the past and identify room for improvement. But you can’t change the past. To change you need to be sharing ideas for the future.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How successful people become even more successful

“It works because helping people be “right” is more productive than proving them “wrong.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“the best solicited feedback is confidential feedback. It’s good because nobody gets embarrassed or defensive.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“Sometimes the better part of valor—and common sense—is saying, “I’ll pass.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Sparking positive change and making it last

“If you know what matters to you, it’s easier to commit to change. If you can’t identify what matters to you, you won’t know when it’s being threatened. And in my experience, people only change their ways when what they truly value is threatened.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How successful people become even more successful

“Every decision in the world is made by the person who has the power to make the decision. Make peace with that.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts--Becoming the Person You Want to Be

“If you keep your mouth shut, no one can ever know how you really feel.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“There’s nothing wrong with understanding. Understanding the past is perfectly admissible if your issue is accepting the past. But if your issue is changing the future, understanding will not take you there. My experience tells me that the only effective approach is looking people in the eye and saying, “If you want to change, do this.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“When you start a sentence with “no,” “but,” “however,” or any variation thereof, no matter how friendly your tone or how many cute mollifying phrases you throw in to acknowledge the other person’s feelings, the message to the other person is You are wrong.”
― Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here, Won't Get You There

“Integrity is an all-or-nothing virtue (like being half pregnant, there’s no such thing as semi-integrity).”
― Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Sparking positive change and making it last