Travis Bradberry Quotes

“'What is your desired salary?' The unwritten rule when it comes to salary is this: whoever proposes a number first loses. When you interview, you should never feel pressured to answer this question. Simply let your interviewer know that the most important thing to you is how well you fit the position.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Toxic people defy logic. Some are blissfully unaware of the negative impact that they have on those around them, and others seem to derive satisfaction from creating chaos and pushing other people's buttons.”

— Travis Bradberry

I don't know anyone who couldn't use a little boost in their energy and self-control.

— Travis Bradberry

Exercising first thing in the morning ensures that you'll have the time for it, and it improves your self-control and energy levels all day long.

— Travis Bradberry

“Mistakes and pressure are inevitable; the secret to getting past them is to stay calm.”

— Travis Bradberry

Being a good leader requires remembering that you're there for a reason, and the reason certainly isn't to have your way. High-integrity leaders not only welcome questioning and criticism - they insist on it.

— Travis Bradberry

As important as it is to learn how to deal with different kinds of people, truly toxic people will never be worth your time and energy - and they take a lot of each. Toxic people create unnecessary complexity, strife, and, worst of all, stress.

— Travis Bradberry

“Everyone knows that life isn't fair. Saying it's not fair suggests that you think life is supposed to be fair, which makes you look immature and naive.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Humans are creatures of habit. If you quit when things get tough, it gets that much easier to quit the next time. On the other hand, if you force yourself to push through it, the grit begins to grow in you.”

— Travis Bradberry

Grit is that 'extra something' that separates the most successful people from the rest. It's the passion, perseverance, and stamina that we must channel in order to stick with our dreams until they become a reality.

— Travis Bradberry

“Great leadership can be a difficult thing to pin down and understand. You know a great leader when you're working for one, but even they can have a hard time articulating what it is that makes their leadership so effective.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Emotional self-control is the result of hard work, not an inherent skill.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Companies need to have rules - that's a given - but they don't have to be shortsighted and lazy attempts at creating order.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Nobody's perfect. Even the most successful people make serious mistakes.”

— Travis Bradberry

“The ability to manage your emotions and remain calm under pressure has a direct link to your performance.”

— Travis Bradberry

“We need to establish boundaries between our personal and professional lives. When we don't, our work, our health, and our personal lives suffer.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Common sense would suggest that having ability, like being smart, inspires confidence. It does, but only while the going is easy. The deciding factor in life is how you handle setbacks and challenges. People with a growth mindset welcome setbacks with open arms.”

— Travis Bradberry

Even though we don't always realize it, as the day goes on, we have increased difficulty exerting self-control and focusing on our work. As self-control wears out, we feel tired and find tasks to be more difficult, and our mood sours.

— Travis Bradberry

“Gossipers derive pleasure from other people's misfortunes. It might be fun to peer into somebody else's personal or professional faux pas at first, but over time, it gets tiring, makes you feel gross, and hurts other people.”

— Travis Bradberry

“If you can't relax during your interview, then nothing you do to prepare will matter. Being yourself is essential to the selection process, and interviewers will feel it if you're too nervous. Showing fear or anxiety appears weak compared to a relaxed smile and genuine confidence.”

— Travis Bradberry

“If you want to be a leader whom people follow with absolute conviction, you have to be a likable leader. Tyrants and curmudgeons with brilliant vision can command a reluctant following for a time, but it never lasts. They burn people out before they ever get to see what anyone is truly capable of.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Influential people are never satisfied with the status quo. They're the ones who constantly ask, 'What if?' and 'Why not?' They're not afraid to challenge conventional wisdom, and they don't disrupt things for the sake of being disruptive; they do it to make things better.”

— Travis Bradberry

Influential people have a profound impact on everyone they encounter. Yet, they achieve this only because they exert so much influence inside, on themselves.

— Travis Bradberry

“It's difficult to find a genuine weakness that makes you appear competent. For instance, telling your interviewer that your weakness is working so hard that you have trouble prioritizing your family life is a little too cliche and comes across as disingenuous.”

— Travis Bradberry

“It's difficult to know when to set boundaries around your health at work because the decline is so gradual. Allowing stress to build up, losing sleep, and sitting all day without exercising all add up.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Likable leaders truly believe that everyone, regardless of rank or ability, is worth their time and attention. They make everyone feel valuable because they believe that everyone is valuable.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Managers tend to blame their turnover problems on everything under the sun, while ignoring the crux of the matter: people don't leave jobs; they leave managers.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Many companies restrict Internet activity so heavily that it makes it difficult for people to do online research. The most obvious example? Checking the Facebook profile of someone you just interviewed.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Most hiring managers interview a lot of people. So many that they generally have to go back to their notes to remember candidates - the exception being candidates with a strong hook. Sometimes these hooks are how people dress or their personality, but the best hook is a strong story that's work-related.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Most people believe that their listening skills are where they need to be, even though they aren't. A study at Wright State University surveyed more than 8,000 people from different verticals, and almost all rated themselves as listening as well as or better than their co-workers. We know intuitively that many of them are wrong.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Offbeat questions are nearly impossible to prepare for, and they don't achieve the interviewer's objective - to test out-of-the-box thinking and the ability to perform under pressure. That's the bad news. The good news is that companies are moving away from them.”

— Travis Bradberry

“One of the toughest things for leaders to master is kindness. Kindness shares credit and offers enthusiastic praise for others' work. It's a balancing act between being genuinely kind and not looking weak.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Our brains are wired such that it's difficult to take action until we feel at least some level of this emotional state. In fact, performance peaks under the heightened activation that comes with moderate levels of stress. As long as the stress isn't prolonged, it's harmless.”

— Travis Bradberry

“People are salaried for the work they do, not the specific hours they sit at their desks. When you ding salaried employees for showing up five minutes late even though they routinely stay late and put in time on the weekend, you send the message that policies take precedence over performance.”

— Travis Bradberry

People lie in everyday conversation to appear more likeable and competent. While men and women lie equally as often, they tend to lie for different reasons.

— Travis Bradberry

“People often cover their mouths when lying. A hand on the mouth or even a touch of the lips shows you that they are lying because this unconscious body language represents a closing off of communication.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Personality traits form at an early age and are fixed by early adulthood. Many important things about you change over the course of your lifetime, but your personality isn't one of them.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Responding to emails during off-work hours isn't the only area in which you need to set boundaries. You need to make the critical distinction between what belongs to your employer and what belongs to you and you only.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Staying composed, focused, and effective under pressure are all about your mentality. People who successfully manage crises are able to channel their emotions into producing the behavior that they want.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Successful people often exude confidence - it's obvious that they believe in themselves and what they're doing. It isn't their success that makes them confident, however. The confidence was there first.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Teaching emotional intelligence skills to people with life-threatening illnesses has been shown to reduce the rate of recurrence, shrink recovery times, and lower death rates.”

— Travis Bradberry

“Technology-fueled change is happening so fast that even a six-month-old process could be outdated. Saying this is the way it's always been done not only makes you sound lazy and resistant to change, but it could make your boss wonder why you haven't tried to improve things on your own.”

— Travis Bradberry

“'Tell me about yourself.' When interviewers ask this, they don't want to hear about everything that has happened in your life; the interviewer's objective is to see how you respond to this vague yet personal question.”

— Travis Bradberry

“There is no upside to making a disparaging remark about a colleague. If your remark is accurate, everybody already knows it, so there's no need to point it out. If your remark is inaccurate, you're the one who ends up looking like a jerk.”

— Travis Bradberry

“We all hit moments when we feel helpless. The test is how we react to that feeling. We can either learn from it and move forward or let it drag us down.”

— Travis Bradberry

“We hesitate to call liars out in professional environments because we feel guilty for being suspicious. Calling someone a liar for no good reason is a frightening proposition for most.”

— Travis Bradberry

'What if?' statements throw fuel on the fire of stress and worry. Things can go in a million different directions, and the more time you spend worrying about the possibilities, the less time you'll spend focusing on taking action that will calm you down and keep your stress under control.

— Travis Bradberry

“When you take on more than the norm, your boss can't help but think that you're capable of a bigger role. This includes showing that you're willing to take risks by making innovative suggestions.”

— Travis Bradberry

“When you're working hard and doing all you can to achieve your goals, anything that can give you an edge is powerful and will streamline your path to success.”

— Travis Bradberry

Working hard is a great way to impact the world, to learn, to grow, to feel accomplished, and sometimes even to find happiness, but it becomes a problem when you do so at the expense of the people closest to you.

— Travis Bradberry