Book Summary - What go you here, won't get you there - Marshall Goldsmith
As I was embarking on a new career journey with my transition into the #FutureOfWork space, I got hold of the book - What Got you Here , won’t get you there.
This book was instrumental in me taking a deep look at my own behaviors and helping me change for the better. I hope that this summary will be useful to you and I recommend that you buy this book.
The summary of the book is quite simple -
“It’s not that people don’t know who they are or where they are going or what they want to achieve. They tend to be very successful. What’s wrong is that they have no idea how their behavior is coming across to the people who matter - bosses, colleagues, subordinates, customers, client and also home and personal life”
The higher you go, the more your problems are behavioural
The so-called 20 habits are the most common flaws, but they are not flaws of skills, intelligence or personality. They are challenges of interpersonal behavior, often leadership behavior.
Winning too much: The need to win at all costs and in all situations – when it matters, when it doesn’t, and when it’s totally beside the point.
Adding too much value: The overwhelming desire to add our two cents to every discussion.
Passing judgement: The need to rate others and impose our standards on them.
Making destructive comments: The needless sarcasms and cutting remarks that we think make us sound sharp and witty.
Starting with “No,” “But,” or “However”:The overuse of these negative qualifiers which secretly say to everyone, “I’m right. You’re wrong.”
Telling the world how smart we are: The need to show people we’re smarter than we think we are.
Speaking when angry: Using emotional volatility as a management tool.
Negativity, or “Let me explain why they won’t work”:The need to share our negative thoughts even when we weren’t asked.
Withholding information: The refusal to share information in order to maintain an advantage over others.
Failure to give proper recognition: The inability to praise and reward.
Claiming credit that we don’t deserve: The most annoying way to overestimate our contribution to any success.
Making excuses: The need to reposition our annoying behavior as a permanent fixture so people excuse us for it.
Clinging to the past: The need to deflect blame away from ourselves and onto events and people from our past; a subset of blaming everyone else.
Playing favorites: Failing to see that we are treating someone unfairly.
Refusing to express regret: The inability to take responsibility for our actions, admit we’re wrong, or recognise how our actions affect others.
Not listening: The most passive-aggressive form of disrespect for colleagues.
Failing to express gratitude: The most basic form of bad manners.
Punishing the messenger: The misguided need to attack the innocent who are usually only trying to help us.
Passing the buck: The need to blame everyone but ourselves.
An excessive need to be “me”:Exalting our faults as virtues simply because they’re who we are.
How can we change for the better
The 7 Step method
seven-step method for already-successful people to change their interpersonal relationships and to make these changes permanent.
Step 1: Feedback
Successful people only have two problems dealing with negative feedback, but that they are big problems: (a) they don’t want to hear it from us and (b) we don’t want to give it to them. However obtaining honest, confidential feedback is critical to understanding what a person needs to change. Conducting a 360-degree feedback review, soliciting input about his client from all the people he or she works with regularly.
Step 2: Apologising
Apologizing is “the most magical, healing, restorative gesture human beings can make.” Without the apology there is “no recognition that mistakes have been made, there is no announcement to the world of the intention to change, and most important there is no emotional contract between you and the people you care about.” The healing process begins with an apology. A simple process for apologizing is to say “I’m sorry. I’ll try to do better in the future.” And then…you say nothing. Don’t explain it. Don’t complicate it. Don’t qualify it. Merely apologize and then move on to telling the world.
Step 3: Telling the World, or Advertising
After you apologize, you must advertise. It’s not enough to tell everyone that you want to get better; you have to declare exactly in what area you plan to change. It’s a lot harder to change people’s perception of your behavior than it is to change your behavior, and that you have to get 100% better in order to 10% credit for it from your coworkers. But the odds improve considerably if you tell people that you are trying to change and how hard you are working at it, repeating the message week after week. And your odds improve even more if you ask everyone for ideas to help you get better.
Step 4: Listening
80% of our success in learning from other people is based upon how well we listen. However listening is not, as many people believe, a passive activity where you sit there and don’t do anything while you hear someone out. Good listeners regard what they do as a highly active process – with every muscle engaged, especially the brain. Basically, there are three things that all good listeners do: They think before they speak; they listen with respect; and they’re always gauging their response by asking themselves whether what they’re about to say is worth what the other person will feel after hearing it.
Step 5: Thanking
Thanking works because it expresses one of our most basic emotions: gratitude. Saying “Thank you” is a crucial feature of etiquette and being mannerly, and, if done sincerely, can create closure in any potentially explosive discussion. What can you say after someone thanks you? You can’t try to prove them wrong. You can’t trump them or get angry or ignore them. The only response “is to utter two of the most gracious, inviting, and sweet words in the language: “You’re welcome.” It’s music to anyone’s ears.” So, get used to saying “Thank you.”
Step 6: Following Up
Once you master the subtle arts of apologizing, advertising, listening, and thanking, you must follow up – relentlessly. Go back to coworkers every month or so and ask for them for comments and suggestions. If you do this your colleagues will eventually begin to accept that you’re getting better – but not because you say so but because they do. The bottom-line from Goldsmith’s research is that people don’t get better without follow-up. Following up shows that you care about getting better. Following up with your coworkers shows that you value their opinions. And following up consistently shows that you are taking the process seriously. Becoming a better person is a process, not an event.
Step 7: Practicing Feedforward
With the previous six skills, you’re now ready for feedforward (as opposed to feedback which focuses on the past). It’s a simple idea that has four simple steps:
1) Pick the one behavior that you would like to change which would make a significant, positive difference in your life
2) Describe this objective in a one-on-one dialogue with anyone you know
3) Ask that person for two suggestions for the future that might help you achieve a positive change in our selected behavior (these two ideas represent feedforward)
4) Listen attentively to the suggestions. Don’t judge, rate, or critique the suggestions in any way. The only response you’re permitted is “Thank you.” Then repeat this four-step process with others. It works because we can change the future but not the past.
That’s it ! I hope this summary encourages you to take a look at your own behaviours that might be holding you back without realising !
Wishing you all a wonderful 2021 …