MARSHALL GOLDSMITH

When you say, 'I'm sorry,' you turn people into your allies, even your partners.

It can be more productive to help people learn to be 'right' than prove they were 'wrong.'

One of the most dysfunctional beliefs of successful people is our contempt for simplicity and structure. We believe that we are above needing structure to help us on seemingly simple tasks.

I do three things: speaking or teaching, which I enjoy the most, coaching is where I learn everything, and writing is where I reach people.

The people I coach are very successful people, so it's very hard for winners to not constantly win. Even if it's trivial and not worth it, we still want to win - because we love winning. It's a very deep habit.

In one of the largest studies ever done on the effects of executive coaching - over 70,000 respondents - we learned that the biggest mistake coaches make is in not following up. It didn't matter who the coach was or what method they used. Failing to follow up made any approach to coaching ineffective.

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.

Coaching works best with high potential people who are willing to make a concerted effort to change, not as a religious conversion activity.

We deify willpower and self-control - and mock its absence. People who achieve through remarkable willpower are 'strong' and 'heroic.' People who need help or structure are 'weak.' This is crazy - because few of us can accurately gauge or predict our willpower.

As I've gotten older, I've gotten simpler - my level of aspiration has actually gone down and down. But my level of impact has gone up and up.

A leader who is self-aware enough to know that he or she is not adept at everything is one who has taken the first step toward being a great leader.

Life is short. Do whatever you can to help people - not for status, but because the 95-year-old you will be proud if you did help people and disappointed if you didn't.

Put your goals on paper, or an Excel spreadsheet. Measure every day, 'Did I do my best to...?' Your problems won't disappear, but you will exist in a different relation to them, and you will improve.

If we become aware of what's happening before we act, behaviour becomes a function of choice rather than a result of an impulse or trigger. You begin to control your world more as opposed to the outside world controlling you.

If we can sacrifice something comfortable, that we're 'too good at,' that might even be holding us back, we'll have more room to grow into the person we want to be.

Active questions are the alternative to passive questions. There is a huge difference between, 'Do you have clear goals?' and 'Did you do your best to set clear goals for yourself?' The former is trying to determine the employee's state of mind; the latter challenges the employee to describe or defend a course of action.

An excuse is the handy explanation we offer when we disappoint other people.

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.

Americans get fatter and fatter and buy more and more diet books, but you don't lose weight by buying diet books - you go on a diet. It's easy to read a diet book, but it's hard to go on a diet.

Remember that when criticism is difficult to accept, there is probably some truth to it.

The only thing I don't think people don't understand about good leaders is that they're both good and lucky. A lot of it is timing.

Gratitude is not a limited resource, nor is it costly. It is abundant as air. We breathe it in but forget to exhale.

I regard gratitude as an asset and its absence a major interpersonal flaw.

One of the greatest mistakes of successful people is the assumption, 'I behave this way, and I achieve results. Therefore, I must be achieving results because I behave this way.' This belief is sometimes true, but not across the board.

If somebody is going in the wrong direction, behavioral coaching just helps them get there faster. It doesn't turn the wrong direction into the right direction.