6 Comments

Very good reminder on where to focus for impact. Thank you!

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Loved this article - it is so true!

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OMG-This was so funny! Thanks for being the great coach you are, Marshall-You have certainly changed my life...keep it up:) I look at my limited time as my "life-time" and teach my clients to BE aware of what they can not get back...Is what they are doing a great use of their time, i.e. "life-time"?

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Another great and as always to the point piece Marshall. Something I've observed is that most people don't do what's important to them, they do what they care enough about. I've heard that research demonstrates that people are more motivated by having something they care about taken away from them than by something being given to them. When dealing with unmotivated people I think it's a good idea to calmly share with them specific and observable consequences of not changing or changing and to make sure the consequences fit the action or inaction. If the consequences are too lenient, they won't work and if they're too harsh, you might have to ratchet back from them and lose your credibility.

All of that said, I agree with you Marshall that our time and energy - especially as some of us grow older - are too valuable to spend on someone who is unwilling to change.

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Thank you for sharing. Great insights, as always! :-)

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Marshall, recently I encountered a person like that who happens to be in a senior leadership role and told me in the first coaching conversation, " I do not need to change, I am what I am". I noticed resistance in myself in accepting the fact that this person says I do not want to change. Slowly and gradually I observed how he started giving excuses for not wanting to change. That's the time I realized, its time to accept that if he does not want to change, so be it. May be some other time he chooses, if does so. to change. Thank you for sharing your Dad's story, it just made me accept my client's choice not to change.

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