highlights
130 highlights saved, filed under building.
- 01
Your ability to succeed is based on the quality of the people in your life.
- 02
“Try not to become a man of success, but a man of value. Look around at how people want to get more out of life than they put in. A man of value will give more than he receives.” —Albert Einstein
- 03
The moral to the story: Don’t reach out to someone unless you have something meaningful to offer them. That “something” needs to be real and relevant, not just a compliment or flattery. True and real value. And if you want the relationship to continue, you must continue creating value.
- 04
“You have to work less to make more money.”
- 05
“Successful givers are every bit as ambitious as takers and matchers. They simply have a different way of pursuing their goals. . . . If you insist on a quid pro quo every time you help others, you will have a much narrower network. . . . Givers succeed in a way that creates a ripple effect, enhancing the success of people around them.” —Adam Grant
- 06
Joe loves this quote: “Be nice to the people on your way up, because you’ll meet them on the way down.”
- 07
Unless you’re committed to the “What’s in it for them?” mind-set, and continue to nurture your relationships, then you’ll burn a lot of bridges along the way.
- 08
“Surround yourself with people who remind you more of the future than the past.”
- 09
“Self-made is an illusion. There are many people who played divine roles in you having the life that you have today. Be sure to let them know how grateful you are. Example: the person who introduced you to the person who introduced you to your spouse or business partner or client. Go back that far.” —Michael Fishman
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“The deepest craving of human nature is the need to be appreciated.” —William James
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Always ask “What’s in it for them?” rather than “What’s in it for me?”
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Get to know them, their context, and their goals. Give relevant value. Don’t waste their time. Do your homework.
- 13
If you want to develop transformational relationships, then approach relationships in a transformational, rather than transactional, way.
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Bring a result to the table. Make the pie bigger for everyone involved. Don’t come with big promises of future results. Bring immediate results. Don’t promise what you can’t deliver.
- 15
“Intelligence is the ability to make finer distinctions.” —Robert Kiyosaki
- 16
She imagined and designed her circumstances, how she worked, who she worked with, and what her life would look like.
- 17
“If you work on something important for twenty years, it will transform everything around you.”
- 18
“When deciding whether to do something, if you feel anything less than ‘Wow! That would be amazing! Absolutely! Hell yeah!’—then say ‘no.’”
- 19
“Look, there’s absolutely no pressure for you to work with us. This is a two-way interview, and we are both evaluating if it’s a great fit. If you choose a different advisory firm, we will be absolutely fine. We only want to work together if we are excited and 100 percent on the same page for goals and expectations. Being aligned and upfront with each other from day one is crucial to a successful long-term relationship. And in the end, that’s what it’s all about.”
- 20
“We remain young to the degree that our ambitions are greater than our memories.”
- 21
“Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.” —attributed to Mark Twain
- 22
“Personal confidence comes from making progress toward goals that are far bigger than your present capabilities.”
- 23
In order to have Freedom of Relationship, you can no longer engage with people that don’t align with your vision.
- 24
“No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team.” —Reid Hoffman
- 25
“Technology is a team member that keeps getting smarter and faster.”
- 26
“A painting is never finished—it simply stops in interesting places.” —Paul Gardner
- 27
“Eighty percent is already getting results while a hundred percent is still thinking about it.” —Dan Sullivan
- 28
Finally, get used to “publishing” or sending out imperfect work. Nothing is ever truly “finished,” only “done.” Done is better than perfect.
- 29
“Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it.” —Viktor Frankl quoting Spinoza’s Ethics in Man’s Search for Meaning
- 30
“Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary. The people we trust with that important talk can help us know that we are not alone.” —Mr. Rogers
- 31
Dan says, “Always make your learning greater than your experience.”
- 32
“Ambition and success need no justification.”
- 33
“Getting results doesn’t take much time at all. It’s not getting the results that takes up all the time.”
- 34
You don’t have all the answers. It’s wise to consider yourself ignorant on most things, and to seek other people’s perspectives and solutions.
- 35
Seek to be a hero to those you work with, and you’ll do your best work for them.
- 36
“A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.” —Ayn Rand
- 37
Said Viktor Frankl, “Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.”
- 38
“Entrepreneurs base their lives on results. It’s not about time or effort.”
- 39
“Too much self-centered attitude, you see, brings, you see, isolation. Result: loneliness, fear, anger. The extreme self-centered attitude is the source of suffering.” —Dalai Lama
- 40
“Competition is for losers.” —Peter Thiel
- 41
“The only way you can make your present better is by making your future better.”
- 42
“If you have enough money to solve a problem, then you don’t have a problem.”
- 43
Our culture has brainwashed us into avoiding costs rather than making powerful investments in ourselves and our futures. As a result, we willingly do all sorts of “busy” or ineffective work outside our expertise and passion, falsely believing that “working hard” or engaging in such tasks is worth it.
- 44
“No one ever lost any advantage by being humble, interested, and useful.”
- 45
“Only once you give yourself permission to stop trying to do it all, to stop saying yes to everyone, can you make your highest contribution toward the things that really matter.” —Greg McKeown
- 46
Whos, when selected properly to fit within your vision, are never a cost. Whos are an investment.
- 47
“You can survive without a community, but you can’t thrive without one.”
- 48
Believing that doing all of the Hows yourself is noble is a limiting belief. It’s not noble.
- 49
When you focus on How, it’s often based on a scarcity mind-set and cost avoidance.
- 50
“You’re either in communication or trying to escape.” —Joe Polish
- 51
“Commitment is a statement of what ‘is.’ You can know what you’re committed to by your results, not by what you say your commitments are. We are all committed. We are all producing results. The result is proof of a commitment.” —Jim Dethmer, Diana Chapman, and Kaley Klemp
- 52
Psychologists call this Escalation of Commitment: Every time you invest yourself in something, you become more committed to it.
- 53
“There are two kinds of suffering: long suffering and short suffering. The choice is yours.”
- 54
The focus for entrepreneurs always has to be on results or there’s no revenue coming in.
- 55
According to Self-Determination Theory, every human being has three basic psychological needs related to their work: A sense of competence Autonomy in how they do their work Positive and meaningful relationships
- 56
Interestingly, though, research has found that teams who have high levels of autonomy but low goal clarity, as well as little performance feedback, actually perform worse than teams with low autonomy. However, when a team has 1) high autonomy, 2) high goal clarity, and also 3) gets regular feedback on their results, then their performance shoots through the roof.
- 57
Instead of providing radical clarity, giving profound trust and autonomy, and being committed to the results and flexible to the process, too many leaders obsessively micromanage the process of their Whos.
- 58
By having clear Success Criteria, meaning what has to be true when this project is finished, you can ensure your Who doesn’t get lost. At the same time, you give them full autonomy in how they make that Success Criteria real.
- 59
“Always reward creators. Never reward complainers.”
- 60
Transformational leaders invest in their Whos, challenge them, help them clearly see the vision, and ultimately, get their Whos just as committed and invested as they are.
- 61
Leaders should be committed to results, not to a particular process.
- 62
“Lessons are repeated until learned.” —Dr. Chérie Carter-Scott
- 63
“As an individual, your time and attention are linear and finite. You only have so much. So, when you ask yourself, ‘How?’ then you have to be the one to find out where to learn, you have to be the one to actually learn how to do it, and once you’ve learned how to do it, then you have to be the one to actually do the task for the unforeseen future. If at some point in the future, you decide to hire someone to do it for you, then you’ll have to train them.”
- 64
Unlike technical problems, adaptive problems do not have a known answer, according to Dean. Because they don’t have a known answer, they require a creator. That’s where you are the “Who.” Everything that has ever been invented or innovated was done by a Who, acting as a creator, solving an adaptive problem.
- 65
“The most useful thing you can do for other people is appreciate their value.”
- 66
“Civilization advances by extending the number of operations we can perform without thinking about them.” —Alfred North Whitehead
- 67
“Once I made a decision, I never thought about it again.” —Michael Jordan
- 68
In psychology, there is a concept known as decision fatigue. What it means is that, having lots of things on your mind and weighing decisions can really exhaust your energy and willpower. Even small stressors, like finding a parking spot or worrying about being late for a meeting, can tax your mind.
- 69
You’ve got to step up and commit to doing things better and smarter, not solely working harder.
- 70
“You can have everything you love in life as long as you give up what you hate.”
- 71
Will Durant, explained it this way: “The ability of the average man could be doubled if it were demanded, if the situation demanded.”
- 72
Only those who value their time can become increasingly free in the realm of money.
- 73
“Don’t twist yourself out of shape to be attractive to people you don’t want to work with.”
- 74
You can’t have money freedom until you achieve time freedom.
- 75
By freeing up your time, you get the invaluable benefit of freeing up your mind.
- 76
Making the single decision to add a Who to a specific area of your life eliminates decision fatigue in that area.
- 77
Eliminating decision fatigue from your life should be one of your primary goals if you want to be a high performer and increase your income.
- 78
“Creative people are always inventing their past, present, and future.”
- 79
“What is the ultimate quantification of success? For me, it’s not how much time you spend doing what you love. It’s how little time you spend doing what you hate.” —Casey Neistat
- 80
Rather than asking, “How are we going to do this?” he asks, “Who are we going to get, either internally or externally, to make this happen?”
- 81
You get in life what you tolerate.
- 82
“Isolation is fertile ground for hallucination.”
- 83
Here are the questions on the one-page Moving Future process, which will help you improve your time every 90 days: Looking back over the past quarter, what are the things you have achieved that make you the proudest? What are the current areas of focus and progress that make you the most confident? Looking ahead at the next quarter, what new developments, projects, or goals are giving you the greatest sense of excitement? What are the five new “jumps” (progress) you can now achieve that will make your next 90 days a great quarter regardless of what else happens?
- 84
“It’s more satisfying to be useful now than to be remembered later.”
- 85
Your potential is virtually limitless when you stop asking “How?” and start asking “Who?”
- 86
“Efficiency is doing things right. Effectiveness is doing the right things.” —Peter Drucker
- 87
Yet, none of this would have happened if Michael had tried to do everything himself. Sure, he may have won one or two championships. He would’ve had an incredible stat sheet. But he would not have emerged as a legend in one of the most dominant dynasties in sports.
- 88
However, the most crucial lesson may be that Michael Jordan was not a self-contained entity. His “potential” was not innate or fixed, but rather, contextual and relational. Michael Jordan was literally changed and expanded through his team, coaches, and experiences.
- 89
If Michael Jordan couldn’t get to, let alone win, a championship by himself, why would you even consider trying to pursue your goals on your own?
- 90
What are YOU trying to accomplish? Do you have Whos in your life that give you the perspectives, resources, and ability to go beyond what you could do alone? Or are you keeping your goals so small to make them easier to accomplish them on your own?
- 91
It can be easy to focus on How, especially for high achievers who want to control what they can control, which is themselves. It takes vulnerability and trust to expand your efforts and build a winning team. It takes wisdom to recognize that 1) other people are more than capable enough to handle much of the Hows, and 2) that your efforts and contribution (your “Hows”) should be focused exclusively where your greatest passion and impact are. Your attention and energy should not be spread thin, but purposefully directed where you can experience extreme flow and creativity.
- 92
Results, not effort, is the name of the game. You are rewarded in life by the results you produce, not the effort and time you put in.
- 93
Yet, this “How” question is what you’ve been taught to ask your whole life. Our public education system is entirely based on “How.” We’re taught from a young age that we need to do everything ourselves. We’re taught that getting help from others is “cheating,” and something we absolutely shouldn’t do.
- 94
If you’re ready to realize a much bigger and more powerful future, then you must stop asking yourself, “How can I accomplish this?” That question, although common, leads to mediocre results, frustration, and a life of regrets. A much better question is: “Who can help me achieve this?”
- 95
That’s what real leadership is: Creating and clarifying the vision (the “what”), and giving that vision greater context and importance (the “why”) for all Whos involved. Once the “what” and “why” have clearly been established, the specified “Who” or “Whos” have all they need to go about executing the “How.” All the leader needs to do at that point is support and encourage the Who(s) through the process.
- 96
When you’re trying to accomplish something challenging or difficult that you’ve never done before, you probably need a Who. Let me say that another way: You absolutely need a Who if you’re trying to accomplish something new and challenging, unless you’re fine not getting the result you want in the near future.
- 97
“There is no limit to the amount of good you can do if you don’t care who gets the credit.” —Ronald Reagan
- 98
According to Kegan, the basest form of psychological development is the Socializing Self, which is when a person operates out of fear, anxiety, and dependence. You don’t make your own decisions. You don’t have your own goals. Instead, you are simply trying to be accepted by your peers and will do anything you can to conform with them.
- 99
Above the Socializing Self is the Authoring Self, which is when you’ve gone from unhealthily dependent to a much more healthy independence. You’ve developed your own sense of self. You have a worldview, goals, and an agenda. However, you have a perceptual filter that you cannot see beyond. Everything you do is to confirm your bias and achieve your narrow goals. This is where most people stop in their development, highly convinced of their own perspectives and unwilling to alter those views.
- 100
The Transforming Self is different from the Authoring Self in that rather than being individualistic and competitive, it is more relational and collaborative. When at this higher level, you engage in collaborative relationships for the sake of transformation. All parties have their own perspectives, beliefs, and agendas. Yet they come together for the purpose of having their own views, and even their own identities and sense of self expand. The whole becomes new and greater than the sum of all parts.
- 101
“The only way to make your present better is by making your future bigger.”
- 102
“Ben, the thing that would make Dan happiest is if you, as the primary Who, would fully own the How. So go own it!”
- 103
Not only must the Who fully own the How, but they must have complete permission to do so.
- 104
If you’re going to apply higher levels of teamwork in your life, you’ll need to relinquish control over how things get done.
- 105
As Albert Einstein has said, “Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.”
- 106
A core aspect of leadership is being explicit about the vision. The more explicit you are in what you want, the faster you’ll attract the right Whos to help you achieve that vision. The leader explains the “What” and “Why” and then allows the “Who” to execute the “How.”
- 107
“Someone once told me the definition of Hell: The last day you have on earth, the person you became will meet the person you could have become.”
- 108
“How” is linear and slow. “Who” is non-linear, instantaneous, and exponential.
- 109
Today Is My Everything.
- 110
“You live as if you were destined to live forever, no thought of your frailty ever enters your head, of how much time has already gone by you take no heed. You squander time as if you drew from a full and abundant supply, though all the while that day which you bestow on some person or thing is perhaps your last.” —Lucius Annaeus Seneca
- 111
Time is finite. We all have 24 hours. Before you can master any of the other freedoms, you must become a master of your own time.
- 112
“Creators don’t complain; complainers don’t create.”
- 113
If you’re focused on doing everything yourself, then you are dramatically limiting the resources you can direct toward your goals.
- 114
“Our eyes only see and our ears only hear what our brain is looking for.”
- 115
“You pile up enough tomorrows, and you’ll find you are left with nothing but a lot of empty yesterdays.” —Meredith Willson
- 116
As Dan has said, “Personal confidence comes from making progress toward goals that are far bigger than your present capabilities.”
- 117
Research has shown that the number one deathbed regret for most people is that they never took steps to do what they truly wanted to do with their lives. Instead, they procrastinated when it came to realizing their deepest dreams and settled for less.
- 118
“A man who dares to waste one hour of life has not discovered the value of life.” —Charles Darwin
- 119
Procrastination is a very powerful signal telling you that it’s time to get another Who involved. You’re stuck. You need help. The question is: Will you find that help or just sit by yourself?
- 120
#1: BE RADICALLY EXPLICIT ABOUT YOUR GOALS
- 121
“When you speak of what you want, and even one person hears, it may begin a generative loop.” —Joshua Wolf Shenk
- 122
The Impact Filter, as a one-page document, solves this most pervasive leadership conundrum, and is comprised of the following questions: What is the project? Purpose: What do you want to accomplish? Importance: What’s the biggest difference this will make? Ideal Outcome: What does the completed project look like? Best Result: If you do take action? Worst Result: If you don’t take action? Success Criteria: What has to be true when this project is finished?
- 123
As a rule, most people do not take the time to 1) clarify their goals or 2) adequately explain their goals. Rather than being explicit about their aims, it is common for people to keep those to themselves. By answering the Impact Filter questions, you’ll be equipped to explain to other people what you want, and why it is so important. Being able to articulate and express your goals is one of the most important and fundamental skills necessary for success. Only when your goal is clearly defined and persuasively expressed can you start getting the support you need to achieve your goals.
- 124
# 2: ASK YOURSELF: “WHO CAN HELP ME ACCOMPLISH THIS GOAL?”
- 125
Dan often says, “The purpose of the Impact Filter is first to sell yourself on the vision, because you can’t sell other people unless you’re sold yourself.”
- 126
I’m not entirely sure of her process for hiring because it’s her process, not mine. That’s part of the magic, I don’t need to do it because I don’t want to do it. I’m not the Who for that job. Therefore, I would never tell Whitney “How” to do this. She’s brilliant at it and loves doing it.
- 127
That’s one of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs and leaders make: micromanaging their Whos and insisting that they do their jobs in a particular way, when the only thing that matters is the end result. Once success has been defined, restrain yourself from needing to know or care “How” it gets done. Your only concern should be that it gets done.
- 128
“Having a capability is not an obligation to use it.”
- 129
Procrastination is the by-product of having a goal and asking “How?” instead of “Who?”
- 130
Procrastination has many negative effects, such as decreased well-being, frustration, and ultimately, a loss of ambition.