Last week, ActionCOACH Business Coaching held its annual North American Conference. Each year there is a well known thought leader, author, and speaker that is a headlining presenter. Over the years, we have seen the likes of Darren Hardy, Jack Canfield, Jay Conrad Levinson, and many more powerful business influencers.

Our headliner in New Orleans was Marshall Goldsmith. Marshall is the author of notable books like What Got You Here Won’t Get You There and Mojo: How to Get it, How to Keep it, How to Get it Back if You Lose it. He has been recognized as one of the most influential leadership thinkers in the world and the world’s top ranked executive coach by WWW.THINKERS50.COM.

During the 3 hours of interaction and audience engaged presentation, Marshall shared powerful insights on how everyone can coach their team, their organizations and themselves to better results, relationships and overall lives.

Here are my 5 learnings from Marshall Goldsmith:

1. The title of the presentation was ‘Helping Successful Leaders Get Even Better.’ Where do we tend to spend most of our time? On those not performing. Leaders need to stop trying to change those team members who have no interest in changing. We can only help people change what they want to change. Focus on the team members who want to improve and grow. And those that aren’t willing to change, either let it go or let them go.
2. Ask for input or feedback from others by asking ‘how can I be better at…..’ and insert a specific area. Areas could include relationship, communication, follow through, etc. Choose an area that you really want to improve. Once the other person has shared a few actions, listen, write them down and say – thank you. Do not respond, get defensive or try to explain. Say thank you, take the feedback, and choose an action to follow through on.
3. The words that we use every day impact our relationships our productivity and our confidence. Every one of us need to improve at controlling our words and eliminate those that are destructive. Destructive words include not, but, and however. We all have given feedback and said that someone did something great, but…. What does the but do in the sentence? It negates the positive statement that was made. Be conscious of your words and eliminate the destructive ones.
4. From Peter Drucker – “We spend a lot of time helping leaders learn what to do, we don’t spend enough time helping leaders learn what to stop.” What a great statement. We as leaders need to teach other leaders what to stop doing that is holding them back or distracting them from their priorities. Ask your team “what do you need to stop doing that is not helping you move forward in your job, your priorities, or your goals?” Have them write them down and keep the statements in front of them as a reminder.
5. Implement a daily question process into your life for self or peer accountability. Identify 4-6 specific questions that will confirm behaviors that you want to express daily. The answers can be yes or no, or you can give a rating of 0-10 on how well you did. For example: Did I do my best at building positive relationships? Did I do my best at making progress toward a goal achievement? Did I set 2 appointments with prospective clients today? This activity certainly takes courage, humility, and discipline. In the end, it will be well worth it.

All of the above work. They won’t work if you don’t do them. The challenge in life is doing what we know should be done.
Keep growing and leading yourself so you can help others grow. To your success!
Monte