Non-fiction Book Review
What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
by Marshall Goldsmith
“Feedforward”: 1. Pick one behavior that you would like to change which would make a significant, positive difference in your life. I.e. I want to become a better listener 2. Describe this objective in a conversation with anyone you know; the person you choose is irrelevant. You tell them you want to be a better listener. They do not have to be an expert on listening or know you intimately to be helpful. l; in fact someone who has no past experience with you and who cannot possibly hold your past failings against you, or even bring them up may be an ideal feedforward partner. 3. Ask that person for two suggestions “for the future” that might help you achieve your selected behavior in this case becoming a better listener. (If you are talking with someone who knows you or who you have worked with the only ground rule is that they do not bring up the past.) I.e. Would you suggest two ideas that I can implement in the future that will help me become a better listener? The other person makes two suggestions. 4. Listen attentively to the suggestions. Take notes if you like. You are not allowed to judge, rate, or critique the suggestions in any way. You can not even say anything positive about the suggestions; the only response you are permitted is Thank you. Repeat the same process with as many people as you like.
These are conversations that could and should take place in the workplace and in our lives everyday. They would help accelerate our development and keep us open to the influence of others. To make these interactions safe, we must resist the inclination to judge the quality of the response or debate its viability. This is particularly true if we are requesting suggestions from a subordinate in the workplace. Feedforward eliminates the two biggest obstacles people often encounter with “feedback; people in positions of power do not want to hear it (regardless of what they say), and subordinates do not want to give it because speaking candidly can make them vulnerable to backlash.
While people never like to hear criticism, people love getting ideas for their future growth. “Feedforward” focuses solely on solutions, not problems. It is hard to get offended by suggestions aimed at helping us get better, particularly when we are not forced to implement them. “Feedforward forces us to ask, and in doing so we dramatically enlarge our universe of support and useful ideas. Asking provides the other person with the license to answer, and that is critical because people often resist giving unsolicited help.
Such is one of the many exceedingly simple yet powerful tools that Marshall offers in Goldsmith’s What Got You Hear Won’t Get You There. One of the worlds most highly regarded coaches he has worked with executives at many Fortune 100 companies. In What Got You Here Won’t Get You There, he targets successful people, offering them numerous techniques for increasing their self-awareness and facilitating meaningful behavioral change, thereby expanding their accomplishments.
He offers 20 transactional flaws in interactions with other people – 20 habits that keep us from being more successful then we already are:
1. Winning too much: even when it is not helpful. 2. Adding too much value: the overwhelming desire to add our two cents to every discussion. 3. Passing judgment: the need to rate others and impose our standards on them. 4. Making destructive comments: needless sarcasms and cutting remarks we think sound good. 5. Starting with “No.” “But,” or “However:” the overuse of negative qualifiers that say to everyone “I am right and you are wrong.” 6. Telling the world how smart we are: the need to show people we are smarter than they think we are. 7. Speaking when we are angry: using emotional volatility to control others. 8. Negativity, or “Let me explain why that won’t work:” the need to share our negative thoughts even when we are not asked. 9. Withholding information: refusal to share information with others in order to maintain an advantage over others. 10. Failing to give proper recognition: the inability to praise and reward. 11. Claiming credit we do not deserve: an annoying way of overestimating our contribution to any success. 12. Making excuses: The need to reposition our annoying behavior as a permanent fixture so people will excuse us for it. 13. Clinging to the past: The need to deflect blame away from ourselves and onto events and people from our past; a subset of blaming others. 14. Playing favorites: failing to see that we are treating someone unfairly. 15. Refusing to express regret: the inability to take responsibility for our actions, admit we we’re wrong, or recognize how our actions affect others. 16. Not listening: The most passive-aggressive form of disrespect for colleagues. 17. Failing to express gratitude: the most basic form of bad manners. 18. Punishing the messenger: the misguided need to attack the innocent who are trying to help us. 19. Passing the buck: the need to blame everyone but ourselves. 20. An excessive need to be “me:” exalting our faults as virtues simply because they are who we are.
Even the well-meaning men of M3 committed to self-improvement will each see at least some of these traits in themselves.
Regardless of how successful any of us becomes, we will always have opportunities for significant improvement. In fact, the very activities that have led to our successes may also be the ones that hold us back from future accomplishments.
For example, he suggests that we all engage in what he calls superstitious behavior. That is, when we engage in an activity that is followed by positive reinforcement, we assume that our behavior has actually caused the reinforcement, and seek to repeat the activity. Superstition is merely the confusion between correlation and causality: “I behave this way, and I achieve results. Therefore I must be achieving the results because I behave this way.”
Marshall also presents four beliefs that prevent successful people from making changes that will move them forward:
- “I have succeeded,”
- “I can succeed,”
- “I will succeed,”
- “I choose to succeed.”
These beliefs keep people from the awareness that often they have succeeded despite their need to make changes in certain areas.
While readers will not likely agree with all that is presented here; only by remaining honest with ourselves and open to the information our environment provides us can we continue to grow and achieve. Marshall offers a variety of tools and insights to help us do that.
© 2009 Robert Hackman, M3 Trustee Member, MS, SPHR