From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
I am not a big fan of the word hope, I am a big fan of the word determination. Being determined is a moral position, when you are depend on the word hope you are lazy.
There's an innate tendency in human-beings to sort ourselves by how much we want power. Some of us don't want it at all, some of us are absolutely obsessed with it. The interaction between the individual and the system is therefore critical.
What happens if your true self is not a good leader? Or obnoxious to your colleagues? Or a narcissist? What if your true self is an axe murderer? We should be talking about bringing our best values to work.
If you want other people to open their minds, you have to open yours too.
Success really is a team sport. There are very few successful people who competed the journey solo, and figured out how to do everything themselves.
Life is not a race against other people. Life is a competition with yourself. One of the greatest achievements in life is to outperform yourself and live your greatest life possible. Greatness lives in all of us, but we must all find what it is that ignites our souls.
If I could change only one thing about public understanding of the meritocratic structures in our world, it would be to give more recognition to our hidden heroes.
As I progressed in my career, there were always moments where I asked myself whether I was good enough for that next challenge. I was often the youngest person in the room, and typically the only brown face in the room. I took the fact that I felt I wasn't good enough as a challenge.
My wife Freada coined a phrase, distance travelled. We're very interested in where somebody started in life, and what hurdles and barriers they have already overcome in their journey – and how that grit has got them to where they are now.
One of the things I love most about my job is the diversity in the pace of work across the organization. I truly enjoy being with people from different parts of the world and working with individuals who operate on completely different approaches.
We don't fail because we make mistakes; mistakes can be fixed. We fail because we quit. And we quit because belief collapsed, not because the strategy was wrong.
The zeitgeist of this moment is not about charismatic leaders but about an awakened citizenry. This isn't an era of soloists. It's an era of change led by the choir, where everyone is learning to sing their own note by living as authentically as we can.