Top 101 Quotes & Sayings by 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.

While exceptional employees don't seek conflict, they don't run away from it either. They're able to maintain their composure while presenting their positions calmly and logically. They're able to withstand personal attacks in pursuit of the greater goal and never use that tactic themselves.

People with a growth mindset believe that they can improve with effort. They outperform those with a fixed mindset, even when they have a lower IQ, because they embrace challenges, treating them as opportunities to learn something new.

Our days are filled with a constant stream of decisions. Most are mundane, but some are so important that they can haunt you for the rest of your life.

Even in a crowded room, likable leaders make people feel like they're having a one-on-one conversation, as if they're the only person in the room that matters. And, for that moment, they are. Likable leaders communicate on a very personal, emotional level.

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

Negative emotions will challenge your grit every step of the way. While it's impossible not to feel your emotions, it's completely under your power to manage them effectively and to keep yourself in a position of control. When you let your emotions overtake your ability to think clearly, it's easy to lose your resolve.

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

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.

Every leader has the responsibility to hone his or her integrity. Many times, there are integrity traps that have a tendency to catch well-meaning leaders off guard.

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

Chewing gum actually lowers your cortisol levels, the hormone responsible for stress. But chewing gum doesn't just reduce stress, it also makes you more alert and improves your performance in memory-oriented tasks. It does so by increasing the blood flow to your brain and alerting your senses.

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.

The best way to avoid falling prey to the opinions of others is to realize that other people's opinions are just that - opinions. Regardless of how great or terrible they think you are, that's only their opinion. Your true self-worth comes from within.

Being a leader requires being confident enough in your own decisions and those of your team to own them when they fail. The very best leaders take the blame but share the credit.

'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.

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.

In most cases, it's slight and often unintentional gaps in integrity that hold leaders, their employees, and their companies back. Despite their potential, these leaders harm their employees and themselves.

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.

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.

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.

Liars hate silence, so they often try to fill it up by talking more than they need to. They provide far more information than was needed or asked for.

One thing an exceptional employee never says is, 'That's not in my job description.' Exceptional employees work outside the boundaries of job descriptions.

More than half of people who leave their jobs do so because of their relationship with their boss. Smart companies make certain their managers know how to balance being professional with being human. These are the bosses who celebrate an employee's success, empathize with those going through hard times, and challenge people, even when it hurts.

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.

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.

'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.

People who fail to use their emotional intelligence skills are more likely to turn to other, less effective means of managing their mood. They are twice as likely to experience anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and even thoughts of suicide.

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.

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.

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

When it comes to getting promoted, you want to present yourself in a way that feeds into the biases that bosses have about what makes someone promotable. You're already doing the hard work, so why not frame your effort in such a way that it increases your chances of obtaining the position you want?

Effective listening is something that can absolutely be learned and mastered. Even if you find attentive listening difficult and, in certain situations, boring or unpleasant, that doesn't mean you can't do it. You just have to know what to work on.

People like to know you're listening, and something as simple as a clarification question shows not only that you are listening but that you also care about what they're saying. You'll be surprised how much respect and appreciation you gain just by asking good questions.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

Taking time to contemplate what you're grateful for isn't merely the 'right' thing to do. It also improves your mood because it reduces the stress hormone cortisol by 23%.

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.

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.

With a fixed mindset, you believe you are who you are and you cannot change. This creates problems when you're challenged because anything that appears to be more than you can handle is bound to make you feel hopeless and overwhelmed.

Emotional intelligence is your ability to recognize and understand emotions in yourself and others, and your ability to use this awareness to manage your behavior and relationships.

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.

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.

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

The biggest mistake most people make when it comes to listening is they're so focused on what they're going to say next or how what the other person is saying is going to affect them that they fail to hear what's being said.

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.

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.

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.

There is a time in the life of every predicament where it is ripe for resolution. Emotions provide the cue to act when a problem is big enough to see, yet still small enough to solve. By understanding your emotions, you can move adeptly through your current challenges and prevent future ones.

'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.

Get to know the job intimately that you're applying for. Don't just read the job description - study it and picture yourself performing every task required of you. When you interview, framing your responses so that you reveal your significant knowledge about the job gives you a massive advantage.

It's easy to let your family suffer for your work. Many of us do this because we see our jobs as a means of maintaining our families. We have thoughts such as 'I need to make more money so that my kids can go to college debt-free.'

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.

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.

Regardless of the magnitude of the decision, our brains make it hard for us to keep the perspective we need to make good choices.

Leadership is a mindset in action. So don't wait for the title. Leadership isn't something that anyone can give you - you have to earn it and claim it for yourself.

Exceptional employees don't possess God-given personality traits; they rely on simple, everyday EQ skills that anyone can incorporate into their repertoire.