464: Reinventing Yourself To Earn Career Fulfillment With Dr. Marshall Goldsmith

Marshall Goldsmith 00:01

What advice would a wise 95 year old you, looking at death, who knew what mattered and what didn't? And what was important and what's not important? What advice would that old person have for you who’s listening to me right now?

Introduction 00:19

This is the Happen To Your Career podcast, with Scott Anthony Barlow. We help you stop doing work that doesn't fit you, figure out what does and make it happen. We help you define the work that's unapologetically you, and then go get it. If you're ready to make a change, keep listening. Here's Scott. Here's Scott. Here's Scott.

Scott Anthony Barlow 00:44

How many versions of you are there? No, I'm not talking about alternate universes or anything crazy like that. Here's what I mean. Do you think you're the same person you were 10 years ago? About five years ago? I'm gonna say probably not. Yet, so often when I talk to people about making a career change, they feel stuck on a career path that 18 year old or 20 year old them selected and said "Hey, this is what I want to do." And ultimately, they're scared to make a change because they believe they'll regret leaving their career comfort zone.

Marshall Goldsmith 01:22

Carrying around regret is actually a choice. You don't have to carry this stuff around you, you choose to carry this stuff around.

Scott Anthony Barlow 01:30

That's Dr. Marshall Goldsmith. Dr. Goldsmith has been recognized as one of the top 10 Business thinkers in the world. And he's also a top rated executive coach, actually, he pretty much invented the word executive coach. He's been coaching for nearly 40 years and has traveled around the world to share his groundbreaking, yep, groundbreaking is the right word, leadership development tools. His coaching clients include CEOs of Ford, Pfizer, Walmart, Mayo Clinic, and many other high level executives. Dr. Goldsmith is also a prolific author with 49 books under his belt, including six best sellers. This was such a fun conversation. Marshall and I discussed so many topics. And I'm really excited for you to learn from him. Specifically, though, I want you to listen for, in our conversation, about how he talks about perpetually reinventing yourself. All right, here he is talking about where he started out in his career.

Marshall Goldsmith 02:30

Well, you know, I was a college professor and I met a very famous man named Dr. Paul Hersey. And he got double booked. And, you know, I basically was wise enough to carry the bags and serve coffee and, you know, just do whatever grunt work, so I could just sit in his classes for free. And so I just watched him teach and he was invented "Situational Leadership" with Ken Blanchard and he got double booked. And he said, "Can you do what I do?" I said, "I don't know." He said, "I need help. Can you do this?" I said, "I don't know." He said, "I'll pay $1,000 per day." I was making $15,000 a year. I was 28 years old. It was 43–no, it was 45 years ago, that was a lot of money for a kid from Kentucky. And I said, "Well, I'll give it a try." I did a program for the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. They were incredibly pissed off when I showed up because it wasn't him. But I got ranked first place of all the speakers. And they said, "Well, this guy was good. Send him again." Paul said, "Do you want to do this again?" I said, "I'm making 15,000 a year, you're paying me 1000 a day? Yes, I will do this again." And that's how I got into the speaking and then coaching, also, largely by accident. I'm a quote "pioneer" in something called customized 360 degree feedback, a pioneers and I may give you when you get old. So I'm a pioneer in this customized 360 degree feedback. And I was working with a CEO and I said, "I get this kid working for us– young, smart, dedicated, hard working, driven to achieve, brilliant jerk." And I said "It'd be worth a fortune to me if he changed his behavior. So admired to turn fortune us and maybe I can help him." He said, "I doubt it." I said, "I'll try." He said, "I doubt it. But, I came up with an idea." I said, "I work with that guy for a year. If he gets better pay me, if you don't get better it's free." You know what he said? "Sold." There was nothing called executive coaching. I made that up. That's how I got into coaching.

Scott Anthony Barlow 04:21

I love that. It also begs the question then... what was it, really, initially just the opportunity where you're looking at it, going, "Hey, I'm gonna make $1,000 a day here versus the $15,000 a year there." And if it was, initially, what caused you to keep going?

Marshall Goldsmith 04:42

Well, I like being a teacher. I mean, it wasn't like I was unhappy being a college professor. It was just very similar work, actually. I was still teaching, I enjoyed it even more. Because I got to work with real world executives, it was more exciting. So yeah, I'd love to work. It wasn't that I didn't like my previous work though, I enjoyed it, too, I just enjoyed the new work better.

Scott Anthony Barlow 05:03

One of the ideas that you talk about in your new book, "The Earned Life" is really the concept of what you call "the fulfillers", or those pieces and parts that create fulfillment, but also what takes away from fulfillment. So I want to get deep into both of those here in just a minute. But first, what do you consider to be those fulfillers?

Marshall Goldsmith 05:30

Well, if you look at life, there's six things I have people to really focus on. One is, do you have a sense of purpose? And then do you have some sort of an achievement? And then basically, you find meaning, are you happy? Are you building great relationships? And then are you engaged in President what you're doing? So that's that. And in the book, I kind of combined some of those and I talk about these three factors– our aspirations, which I think are the bigger purpose, "Why am I here? What does all this mean?" And our aspirations don't have a finish line. Then we have our ambitions, which revolve around actually the achievement of goals. And then we have our actions, which are day to day activities. And that part of the book has probably received the biggest positive risk reaction, because so many people are addicted to achievement. And so the people, historically, human beings have just been focused on the day to day action phase, you know, they're wandering through life, doing what you're told. And you know, they're not bad people, but they're just doing what's in front of them. Some people are kind of lost in the aspiration phase, or living up in the clouds. They don't do much for the world, but they have lofty thoughts. The people I work with, and probably most people on your calls, they're focused on achievement– they're achievers. And if you over focus on achievement, you can have some problems. One is in the book, I talk about this, I define "The Earned Life" as it's not based on results– never become ego attached to the results of what you do for a couple of reasons. One, you don't control the results of what you do. The end outcome is many factors outside of your control. And two, what if you do achieve these results? What happens next year? You have a more, more...how long does it make you happy, you know, week? So really, it's very counterintuitive, because almost all self help books are focused on, here's what's good about achievement. And this is unique in terms... this is– don't become attached to result, don't become over focused on achievement, you should try to achieve to achieve but don't think achievement is going to make you happy. Don't think achievement is going to make you feel good about yourself as a human being because it won't.

Scott Anthony Barlow 07:52

It does do a really nice job of guiding us towards... I'll be happy when the next thing or this thing or that thing occurs. That said, let me ask you about what you said a moment ago, though, you said "never become ego attached", if I heard you correctly, to what you do to results. So let's talk about that for just a moment. Because I found that, well, that is very useful. I found a lot of benefit out of that. I've also found that in many different ways, even though I know that it can be hard to do from time to time. So help me understand what you've seen is highly effective ways or things that even have worked for you or your clients to separate out the results from the ego attachment.

Marshall Goldsmith 08:43

Well, one of the guys in my... and I talked about our LPR groups in the book and one of the people...I had over the COVID the privilege of spending every weekend with 60 brilliant people and, you know, I mentioned their names in the book, and one of them was Safi Bahcall. Safi is a brilliant guy, probably has an IQ equal to mine and yours combined. Just a brilliant guy, PhD in physics from Stanford, and he wrote a book "Loonshots" and he's worth 10s of millions of dollars, started companies, work for presidents, you know, on and on. And you know, Safi finally said, he realized something that he thought–and he talks like a scientist–he thought that happiness was a dependent variable based on achievement. And he finally realized that happiness and achievement are independent variables. That you can achieve a lot and be happy, you can achieve a lot and be miserable, you can achieve nothing and be happy and you can achieve nothing and be miserable. They're basically independent variables. And the problem we have in the West is the, I'll be happy when... when I get the money status BMW condominium, when I achieve this stuff, and the reality is just doesn't work. Because we never get there. And by the way, this is hard because it's been hammered into our brains constantly. The most popular Western art form sounds like this...there is a person, the person is sad. No, they spend money, they buy a product and they become happy. This is called a commercial. I don't know if you've ever seen one of those, but that message has been hammered into our brains over and over and over again. It's totally pervasive. And the idea that, no, not really. You're not going to find happiness out there, there is no product you're going to buy, there's no achievement, there's no amount of money you're going to make. Half the people I coach are billionaires, there's no amount of money you're going to make, it's gonna make you find peace in life or happiness. Nothing wrong with making money to make money. Nothing wrong with achievement for achievement's sake. As long as you don't believe that, that's going to give you value as a human being. As long as you don't believe that's gonna make you happy. Because I can tell you it won't.

Scott Anthony Barlow 10:53

Let's talk about the opposite of fulfillment for just a minute here. In your book, you say that regret is the polar opposite of fulfillment. I thought that was a really interesting way to think about it. Also, you said one other very curious thing, and I'd like to ask you about it here. You say that regret is a devilish cocktail of agency and imagination.Can you explain that a little bit for me?

Marshall Goldsmith 11:19

Yeah, our regrets are when imagining what would have happened had we done something else. So, you know, it's like, "I could have done it. And I didn't do it." That's the combination of agency and imagination. "And here's what would have happened, had I done it."

Scott Anthony Barlow 11:35

Okay, so here's what I'm really interested in knowing from you because you've been diving into this for a while. And regret is not a... understanding regret is not a new thing for you. Also, I'm curious what have you have found to be the biggest misconceptions with regret today?

Marshall Goldsmith 11:55

I think a couple of misconceptions with regret. One misconception with regret is you have to keep carrying it around, and it sort of doesn't go away. And I think that a big misconception is that because you don't have to carry it around. Carrying around regret is actually a choice. You don't have to carry this stuff around, you choose to carry this stuff around. And one of the things I like in the book is called "The Every Breath Paradigm". And one of my reflections based on your good question is that, if you breathe and you think, "All right, think of those people in the past as a previous version of you." Well, you know, I tell people, take a breath. Think of all the previous versions of you. Now think of all of those people and all that they've given to you that's here. And into they make some mistakes, think about how hard they tried. Did they make some mistakes? Sure. Just forgive those people for being who they were. And the point is, you aren't those people. You see, when I say I feel regret is, you know, you're acting like you were those people. The 'you' that's listening to me right now is not the 'you' of 10 years ago. The father of this listening to me right now is not the father when your children were little, you've changed. And what you did then was done by a different person than you. One of my favorite stories in the book is that the husband and wife are in the car, and they're having a great weekend with the kids. And then he's driving home. And she starts in on what he did 10 years ago. And it's too bad he didn't do this and this. And what he says is, "I'm a different person than I was 10 years ago. And that guy, 10 years ago, did some stupid things. And I'm not that person. And you're not talking to that person anymore. I am a different person." And his wife said, "You're right. You are a different person. Why am I dredging up some 10 years ago, old person. That's not you. That was somebody 10 years ago." So I think a good way to get over regret is realizing in an existential or Buddhist way, that's not you. You're not the same person you were 10 years ago, you're not the same person who made that decision. We change as we go through life. Key point of the whole book is, you know, impermanence and the Buddhist concept of, you know, it's always a new me.

Scott Anthony Barlow 14:22

That was also one of my favorite stories in the book, coincidentally. And you casually mentioned something about "The Every Breath Paradigm". I can't remember... it must be pretty towards the beginning of the book, pretty much towards the beginning of the book. You mentioned that you started using that with clients quite a while ago, when other things that you were leveraging at the time just weren't working. So it just makes me curious about, where did you start to find that people were resonating with that? I would say it's a highly effective way to shift or reframe and I found it very helpful when I read it. But it makes me curious, like, where did you start finding that was working for people?

Marshall Goldsmith 15:06

Well, you know, one of the things I've always tried to help my clients with is not put themselves in stereotypical boxes. I mean, as long as we say, "that's just the way I am", there's a high probability you won't change very much. And most of us go through life saying, "That is me. That's just the way I am" as opposed to, "That was a previous rendition of me. I don't have to continue doing that." So for example, I'll be coaching some guy and he said, "Well, I can't listen, I've never been able to listen, I can't listen." So you got something stuck in your ears? You know, raise your right hand. Repeat after me. "My name is Joe, I do not have an incurable genetic defect. I can listen if I want to." Well, you know, I mean, we talk about ourselves, though, as if we have these incurable genetic defects. And one of the things that I think is helpful is getting people the every breath idea of "Hey, look. That was the me of the past. All right, the ‘me’ of the past didn't listen." Fine. And it's fine to apologize, say, "I'm sorry, I didn't listen, then. This is the 'me' of now. And 'me' of now doesn't have to repeat that. I can be a different person. And it's okay." And by the way, to me, that's not being a hypocrite or phony. That's been what you need to be in the situation.

Scott Anthony Barlow 16:20

To me, it feels like it is more realistic in some ways. I don't love the word realistic, because it gets tossed around in very negative ways. However, I think that it applies here so well. You talk about the idea of impermanence. And then that's where you showcase "The Every Breath". And I loved the idea of impermanence because it seems to be much more true with how life is. We don't stay in the same state forever. But I'm curious what for you, why do you think we latch on to this? Especially Western wise, we latch on to this idea that things are permanent in so many different ways. What do you believe causes that in your opinion?

Marshall Goldsmith 17:11

I think the whole worth Western ethos is the real 'you'. That there is this quote "real you" or this "fixed you". And as you journey through life, that is the 'you' that's here, and it's pretty unchangeable. You know, I mean, the whole concept of the same 'you' that lasts for eternity and all that, that's a much more western concept than the concept of the 'you' that's here today is not the same 'you' that was here a week ago, that we're ever changing, and that we're not really locked into this quote, "real me" thing. One of the things that I teach all my clients is, is to be what you need to be, you need to be what you need to be in the situation. And one of the chapters I like in the book is one on empathy. Because, you know, before this is something new for me, I thought of empathy was kind of a uniformly good thing. And then when I wrote the book, I realized empathy can be a very negative thing. Empathy can do more harm than good. For example, one type of empathy is the empathy of caring. Well, that sounds good, caring. And I love one example, in the book of the hedge fund manager, you don't think a hedge fund managers caring at all. So that's one reason I love the example. I'm listening to this one hedge fund manager interview another one. And he says, "Why don't you have a fund?" He says, "Because I'm not as good as I used to be." And he said, "What do you mean?" He said, "Well, in the old days, obviously, I'm worth billions of dollars. So I made 10s of billions, but I lost 10s of billions." but he said, "You know what, I didn't care." Then he said, "I started caring." I thought these are people's health care and retirements and...I started becoming much more conservative, much less effective. That's quite quit investing other people's money. Well, in the same way that the medical doctor doesn't operate on their kids. I'm the coach of the, you know, CEO of St. Jude's Children's Hospital, he watched this kids die every day. He can't carry that home with him. He's got to let it go. So to me, empathy is being what you need to be for the people you're with now. So for him, it's tough when a little kid dies, but he's got a family. They need him. He's got a wife, he's got kids. Well, when he comes home, he needs to be with them. He doesn't need to be back at the hospital. He needs to be with them. So the whole idea is really, "I am what I need to be now." Empathy is...I'm the person I need to be for the people with me now as opposed to this is what I feel like at the moment.

Scott Anthony Barlow 19:44

How do you reconcile that idea of, "be what you need to be" with the idea that you mentioned just a moment ago, where we, as Westerners, have a tendency to think more, like, I forget how you said it, but figure out who I am or be more of 'me', In your mind, how do you think about that in terms of, maybe reconcile the wrong word, but just tell me a little bit about how you think about that.

Marshall Goldsmith 20:09

The way I deal with that as a concept of professionalism. To me, when I coach a CEO, they need to, maybe, be nine different people in one day, you know, they can wake up, and then they have to do a performance appraisal, they have to have a board meeting, they go to a funeral, they give positive recognition. They're in all these different roles on the same day. They need to be the person who is in that role at that time. That is not to me being a phony, that's been a professional. One of the guys in the book I talked about Telly Leung. Telly literally played Aladdin on Broadway 1000 times. So I asked Telly, "How'd you do it? 1000 times, same role." And, you know, Telly's gay. And he said, "You know, I go out there, and I fall in love with the Princess every night." And every night, he said, "I was a little boy, eight years old, and I went to a Broadway play, and it was so nice, and the music and everything and it just...I loved it." And he said, "Every night, I think of the little boy." And it shows for the little boy. And the point is, it doesn't matter how he feels on, you know, like, my foot hurts, my aunt died last week, you know, suck it up, you're a professional! The kid in the audience, it's not their problem. You need to be who you need to be if that little kid in the audience, not because it's what you feel like being. So I actually had him come and talk to the Children's Hospital, which was really great for them.

Scott Anthony Barlow 21:39

That is fantastic. Interestingly enough, I remember having a conversation with Daniel Pink, another author. We've had him on the podcast, but he said something very similar in terms of, "Not be who you need to be." But he thinks about that idea, that concept in terms of professionalism. So that's resonating highly with me for a variety of different reasons. It also leads me to another topic, the greater topic of the book, like the book is, it's called "The Earned Life". Right? And even, you have a couple exercises in there. One in particular, is the idea of establishing, "what is earned even means to you." And you go on to provide a little bit of a definition throughout, of what earn might mean to you personally. However, I am interested in, not just what your definition of earned is, although I will ask you to share that for our audience. But also what are some of the lesser known examples in your own life that fit that definition of earned for you?

Marshall Goldsmith 22:44

Well, to me, you don't live an earned life, you're living an earned life. So what that means is, I'd say it's your efforts, your risks, and it's not focused on the results of what you do, it's tied to a higher level of aspiration. So the idea is not that you are live...you live an earned life, and you say, "Well, I did this. Now, I'm declaring victory. I won. I've done it. I earned it all." It's a constant process of returning. Bob Dylan said, "He who was not busy being born is busy dying." Well, I believe that. I think the very important as we go through life, we're constantly restarting. And the people that think they won, Michael Phelps after his 25th Gold Medal, thought about killing himself, you know, NFL players, disasters on the whole. My friend Curtis Barn is trying to help as many as he can. Many with drug problems, depression, suicide, you know, then with divorces, they lose their money. Why? They're looking for that result, that glory, and it has to be better than last year. It's a fool's game. So I think, you know, "The Earned Life" is every day you start over. You're the ex football player, okay? You're not the football player anymore. You're not living in Super Bowl Three. You're not living there anymore. You're a different person. That person that won the football game was nice, you're not that person. That was some kid. You're different. So how are you earning your life now, as opposed to just thinking about what you did in the past? And from my experience, thinking about what you did in the past just doesn't work.

Scott Anthony Barlow 24:24

What do you mean by that? Tell me more about that. When you say, what you did in the past or thinking about your experience from the past doesn't work.

Marshall Goldsmith 24:31

It's almost like vicarious living. In terms of the way I'd talked about it is vicarious living. One of the problems in our society is vicarious living. The average kid that's flunking out of school spends about 55 hours a week in non academic media, you know, movies, TV, video games, they're living vicariously, they're not living their own lives, they're living through other people. You can't have a great life if you're not living your own life. Vicarious living is living through other people. In the same way that vicarious living is living through the Kardashians or something like that, the football player who's living on Super Bowl Three is living vicariously. They're not the same person that won the Super Bowl, that's over. And to the degree, their value as a human being is tied up on that person, they can't win. Because the person who's talking to me now is not that person, and it's trying to live through that previous person, as opposed to saying, "Here I am now. How am I finding meaning in life now? How am I finding happiness now? How am I building relationships now? As opposed to what I did 30 years ago?"

Scott Anthony Barlow 25:38

What do you believe is most difficult or that people don't realize, as they are trained to shift how they're living, to focus on living in their own life?

Marshall Goldsmith 25:52

I think that we in the West, particularly, as we've discussed, are just lost in results, and the belief that somehow when I get to a certain point, it's all going to be okay. You know, what type of book ends with the same phrase–and they lived happily ever after– is a fairy tale. Well, I think we're chasing a fairy tale. That somehow I'm going to get there and then I'm going to live happily ever after, wherever there is that there is a there. And once, quote, "I get there" I will achieve this permanent state of happiness forever. As opposed to saying, "I'm starting over. I'm starting over every breath, I'm starting over it's a new me, and I'm going to enjoy what I'm doing. And I'm going to try to achieve something meaningful, and it's tied to a higher aspiration in my life." To the degree you can do that, you win. I mean, I've got some pretty clear research on this, assuming that you're healthy. And assuming that you have good relationships with people you love. And assuming that you have a middle class income, what matters in life? What matters in life is you have a purpose, you're doing something that you think is meaningful, you're achieving something connected to that purpose, and you love the process of what you're doing. If the answer is "yes" you just won the game of life. That's about all there is. If there's any more I'm not aware of what it is.

Scott Anthony Barlow 27:12

What advice would you give to people who are in transition? They're beginning to think about what they really actually want out of life. They're beginning to think more about their purpose, we have so many people that are listening right now that are in that spot, where they're reconsidering how they're living their life, and what they actually want, in so many different ways. So what advice would you give to that person who is in that state of transition?

Marshall Goldsmith 27:39

Well, I do a lot of work with former CEOs who are living your roles too. So I'm very familiar with this discussion. So I've done a lot of work with people of various transitions in life. So I would first say to people, be open minded. Be open minded. You don't know exactly what you're going to love. So be open minded. You may not think, well, I don't think I'd like to be a college president. Well, maybe you wouldn't like to be some college president. But maybe you'd like to be one college president. So be very open minded. Offers are good. I always encourage people get offers. You can always say no, but you can't say no to offers you don't have, be open minded, get offers and think, "Am I going to be doing something that, number one, I can achieve something? Number two, it's meaningful for me. And number three, I'm going to love doing it?" And the great answer is "yes". Do that. You're never gonna get it perfect, but get as close as you can.

Scott Anthony Barlow 28:32

You have, well, let me say that I think one of my favorite things about you is that you seem to ask so many questions that other people just wouldn't ask, or be afraid to ask or not ask for one reason or another. And I'm curious, what drives that for you?

Marshall Goldsmith 28:49

Well, I think for me, it's, one, is curiosity. And two is unkind of different. I mean, I've been studying Buddhism since I was 18. I'm kind of different. And I think that I'm just constantly looking for new and different things to do. And I always have a feeling I'm reinventing myself, I'm reinventing my own life as well. So, you know, that's it. And as I've grown older, the people I work with now, it used to be...my coaching has changed. My coaching used to be strictly helping successful leaders achieve positive long term change in their behavior. Now, though, I really work with people...so many people I work with now are already ridiculously successful. I've already achieved so much that now a lot of my life is just trying to help people have a better life. Help people find happiness, help people find meaning in life. Help people as I said, find fulfillment. So that's a large part of my work right now which I think is very important for me and fun. And again, they don't need me to help them achieve more. You know, they're doing quite fine on their own without me.

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:04

I would agree.

Marshall Goldsmith 30:06

They don't really need me. On the achievement scale, they're already 99.999.

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:11

They're doing fine.

Marshall Goldsmith 30:12

You really think going from a 99.999 to a 99.9999 is going to make any difference? No.

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:19

We'll call them marginal.

Marshall Goldsmith 30:20

It won't make any difference. Now, before we wrap up, can I finish with my favorite advice?

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:26

Yes, please.

Marshall Goldsmith 30:27

I always like to give people my favorite advice that is this: "take a deep breath". Ah, imagine that you're 95 years old, and you're just getting ready to die. Right before you take that last breath, you're given a beautiful gift, the ability to go back in time and talk to the person that's listening to me right now. The ability to help that person be a better professional, much more important, the ability to help that person have a better life. What advice would the wise 95 year old you looking at death, who knew what mattered and what didn't? What was important was not important. What advice would that old person have for the 'you' is listening to 'me' right now? Stop and breathe. Whatever you're thinking now, do that. In terms of a performance appraisal as the only one that will matter. Nettle person says, "You did the right thing." That old person says "You made a mistake." You really don't have to impress anyone else. Some friends of mine interviewed all folks who are dying got asked this question, "What advice would you give? On the personal side, three things. Thing number one, be happy now. That's what a lot of the book is– be happy now. Not next week, not next month, not when I get this or that. Find joy in the process of life itself. Because the process is all there is– be happy now. Number two is friends and family, don't get so busy climbing the road of success, you forget the people that love you. And then number three, if you have a dream, go for it. Because you don't go for it when you're 35, you may not when you're 45 and probably won't when you're 85. Business advice is much different. Number one, life is short, have fun. We're all gonna be equally dead here. Just have a good time. Enjoy the journey of life. Number two, do whatever you can do to help people. The main reason to help people has nothing to do with money or status or getting ahead, the main reason ill people's much deeper than 95 year old 'you' will be very proud of because you did and disappointed if you don't. And if you don't believe that's true. And if you any CEO who's retired, I've interviewed very many and asked him a question, what are you proud of? None of them have ever told me how big their office was. All they've ever talked about, so people would help. And then finally go for it. World's changing, your industries are changing, your life is changing, do what you think is right. You may not win, at least you tried. Back to regret old people, we almost never regret the risks we take and fail, we usually regret the risk we fail to take. And finally, as I've grown older, in some ways, my level of aspiration has gone down and down, my level of impact is going up and up, I quit worrying about what I'm not gonna change. So my goal on our little podcast here, number one, thank you so much for inviting me is pretty simple. If a couple of people listening to our little podcast have a little better life, I feel very good about our time together.

Scott Anthony Barlow 33:24

I appreciate it immensely. I have heard some of that advice. And you give it before and I've personally benefited from it. So I appreciate the opportunity to hear it live in conversation now. And thank you so much for making the time and taking the time. And also for people listening, I highly recommend the book. It's called "The Earned Life". And where can people find that, Marshall?

Marshall Goldsmith 33:51

They gave me a million dollar advance. So my guess is it's gonna be pretty much everywhere.

Scott Anthony Barlow 33:55

Everywhere. All the places you buy books go and search the area.

Marshall Goldsmith 34:00

I think it shouldn't be that hard to find. And then and also go to my website, www.marshallgoldsmith.com, my LinkedIn, my YouTube, I give everything away. I'm glad you brought that up, I forgot. All my material, you may copy, share, download, duplicate using church charity business nonprofit. And by the way, not only do I give it all away, if you want to modify it, modify it, you want to change it, change it, you want to put your name on it, put your name on it, I don't care. My feeling is if it helps anybody, please use it and I'll be honored if you use it in any way that produces any good in the world.

Scott Anthony Barlow 34:42

Many of the stories that you've heard on the podcast are from listeners that have decided they want to take action, and taking the first step of having a conversation with our team to try and figure out how we can help. And if you want to implement what you have heard, and you want to completely change your life and your career, then let's figure out how we can help. So here's what I would suggest, just open your phone right now and open your email app. And I'm going to give you my personal email address, scott@happentoyourcareer.com just email me and put 'Conversation' in the subject line. And then when you do that, I'll introduce you to the right person on our team. And you can have a conversation with us, we'll try and understand your goals and what you want to accomplish in your career no matter where you're at. And we can figure out the very best way that we can help you and your situation. So open up right now and send me an email with 'Conversation' in the subject line; scott@happentoyourcareer.com.

Scott Anthony Barlow 35:46

Hey, I hope you loved this episode. Thanks so much for listening. And if this has been helpful, then please share this podcast with your friends, with your family, with your co-workers that badly need it. Here's a sneak peek into what we have coming up in store for you next week.

Scott Anthony Barlow 36:05

Today, it's just you and me, talking about how to find the time to make a career change even when you are insanely busy. And the reason that we've wanted to do this type of episode for a really long time is this is one of the biggest things that stops people again and again and again. If you are wanting to make a career change, finding the time, making the time, prioritizing the time, those sound like they should be easy, and we all know they're not. And I don't want you to have to feel bad when it isn't easy. And instead, I wanted to be able to give you some ways to be able to find that time, take back that time and do something about it here.

Scott Anthony Barlow 36:52

All that and plenty more next week right here on Happen To Your Career. Make sure that you don't miss it. And if you haven't already, click Subscribe on your podcast player so that you can download this podcast in your sleep, and you get it automatically, even the bonus episodes every single week, sometimes multiple times a week. Until next week. Adios. I'm out.