Marshall Goldsmith - Professional History

Professional History

In 1977, Marshall met Dr. Paul Hersey, a consultant in leadership development, and began teaching managers. He later co-founded of Keilty, Goldsmith and Company. He is currently a founding partner of the Marshall Goldsmith Group.

Goldsmith was a pioneer in the use of customized 360-degree feedback (confidential feedback from direct reports, peers and managers) as a leadership development tool. His early efforts in providing feedback and then following-up with executives to measure changes in behavior were precursors to what eventually evolved as the field of ‘executive coaching.’ In acknowledgment of his work in helping leaders change behavior, he received his first national recognition in 1993, being ranked as one of the top ten executive educators in the Wall Street Journal.

While serving as a board member of the Peter Drucker Foundation in 1996, Goldsmith co-edited his first book, The Leader of the Future (with Frances Hesselbein and Richard Beckhard). Peter Drucker wrote the foreword for this book. This book has since sold hundreds of thousands of copies and has been translated into 28 languages. It is perhaps the most popular edited book on leadership ever written. The success of this first book led Goldsmith (with Frances Hesselbein and the Drucker Foundation, which became the Leader to Leader Institute, and is now the Frances Hesselbein Leadership Institute) to co-edit six more books, which have been extremely well received in their field.

Goldsmith's work in helping successful leaders achieve positive lasting change in behavior has been featured in a The New Yorker profile, Harvard Business Review interview, Forbes feature story and Business Strategy Review cover story (from the London Business School). He is one of the few executive advisors who has been asked to work with more than 150 major CEOs and their management teams. In 2011 Dr. Goldsmith was named winner of the prestigious 2011 Thinkers50 Leadership Award (the definitive listing of the world’s top thinkers created by Des Dearlove and Stuart Crainer) – as the World’s Most Influential Leadership Thinker, additionally ranking #7 on the overall list of Thinkers50 world’s top 50 business thinkers. In 2005 he was elected as a Fellow in the National Academy of Human Resources – and recognized in Business Week as one of the most influential practitioners in the history of leadership development. In 2004 he was recognized by the American Management Association as one of 50 great thinkers and business leaders who have impacted the field of management over the past 80 years.

Goldsmith is the author or co-editor of 32 books, including What Got You Here Won’t Get You There (a New York Times best-seller, Wall Street Journal #1 Business Book and winner of the Harold Longman Award as Best Business Book of the Year). Harvard Business School has recommended six of his books in their Working Knowledge series. Almost all of Dr. Goldsmith's articles, interviews, columns and videos are available for viewing and sharing online (free of charge) at the Marshall Goldsmith Library. Since 2005, visitors representing 195 countries have viewed, listened to, or downloaded more than 8.5 million articles, columns, interviews, webinars, audios, videos and resource pages from this site.

Several themes run through Goldsmith’s writings:

• The same beliefs that lead to our success – can make it very difficult for us to change behavior – and, as difficult as it is to change our own behavior, it is even more difficult to change others’ perception of our behavior.
• The behavior of leaders needs to be reflective of the stated values of the corporation – and key executives need to ‘go first’ in modeling positive behavioral change.
• Managers who receive feedback and engage in ongoing follow-up with co-workers will almost always achieve positive, change in behavior and be seen as more effective leaders by their key stakeholders. This was shown in a Strategy+Business article that involved over 86,000 respondents. (In 2010 this article, "Leadership Is a Contact Sport," was recognized as one of the greatest articles ever published in Strategy+Business.)
• The key to success in executive coaching is not the coach (who is a facilitator of change) – it is the people being coached and their key stakeholders.
• Leadership development should provide tools that can be used in a positive, simple, focused and fast manner. Complex theories of change, while interesting, will not work in the ‘real world’ with over-extended executives.
• Most executive education has historically been based upon an invalid assumption, “If they understand – they will do.” The basic challenge faced by managers is not understanding the practice of leadership – it is practicing their understanding of leadership.