Something to doWhat's next
Choose what to create, keep, drop and accept
A simple exercise to take stock of how you work, and decide what to build, what to protect, what to let go of, and what to make peace with
Why it’s worth your time
Change at work goes better when you decide what to protect and what to stop fighting, not only what to add and drop. Two questions, whether to change something or keep it and whether it's working for you or not, give every part of your working life one of four moves. Picking one item per box keeps it to four small things you can actually do this month.
How to use the wheel of change
You’ll come away with four small moves for this month, one from each box.
We’ll send you a calendar invite.
- Write a few lines in each of the four boxes.
Ask two questions about each part of your working life: is it something to change or to keep, and is it working for you or not? The answers sort it into the four boxes below. A few lines each is plenty. Leave the last box for step three.
Stays in this browser only. Nobody else sees it.
Tip: If a blank box stalls you, start from the job you have. What you love about it usually belongs in preserve, what you dread in eliminate or accept, and what you wish were part of it in create.
- Read it back and move anything in the wrong box.
Something in accept that you've never actually raised with anyone may belong in eliminate. Something in eliminate you've been trying to change for a year, with no movement, may belong in accept. And if something you want to create would crowd out something you want to preserve, decide now which one wins.
- Pick one item from each box for this month.
Four moves, each small enough to start this week. For create, preserve and eliminate, name the first step. For accept, the move is a decision about how you'll show up around it, which is still a choice and still yours.
- Tell one person about one of the four.
Choose the item where someone else's help would make the biggest difference. Often that's your manager, and often it's a preserve item, because they can't protect something they don't know you value. Ask for their advice on making it work, not their permission.
To: your managerI've been taking stock of how I work, and there's one thing I'd like your advice on. I want to create, keep or stop: the one thing, because why it matters to you, and to the team if it does.
Could we spend a few minutes on it in our next 1:1? I'd value your ideas on how to make it work here.
Swap the highlighted parts for your thing. Works on Slack, in email, or said out loud.Tip: Say why it matters to you, and to the team if it does. A reason they can repeat to someone else is easier to support.
- Look again in a month.
Which moves stuck, and which didn't? Keep the page. When you do the full wheel again in six months, put the two side by side.
Good moments for this: twice a yearwhen you start a new role or join a new teamafter a big change you didn't choose
We’ll send you a calendar invite.
Keep going with Truest
Small actions add up. Truest helps you find the next thing worth doing, make the space to do it, and keep a record of your progress. It’s a private place to work on your career, and it’s yours, not your employer’s.
- It actually happensWe’ll put it on your calendar and remind you before it starts.
- A living page in your VaultKeep it as one page you add to, next to your reviews and your files.
- It’s yours to keepEach thing you do is saved to your private record, there when your next review or job search comes around.
Anything else we can help you with this week?
Making it work for you
Every workplace is different. Here’s what to think about before you start, and what might get in the way.
Things to think about
The accept box often fills with company decisions: a reorg, a pay band, a promotion that went to someone else. Those usually reflect what the company needed, not a verdict on you, and filing them under accept on purpose can take some of the sting out.
What might make this harder
Do only the eliminate box this time. Stopping one thing is the move most likely to give energy back, and the rest can wait until you have some.
Questions people ask
What is Marshall Goldsmith's wheel of change?
A model from executive coach Marshall Goldsmith that sorts change into four moves: creating something new, preserving what's good, eliminating what holds you back, and accepting what you can't change. He develops it in his book Triggers, written with Mark Reiter.
How is the wheel of change different from start, stop, continue?
Start, stop, continue is often used by a team looking at shared work, or to ask a colleague for input. The wheel is a review of yourself and how you want to work, and it adds a fourth move, accepting what you can't change, which the other has no place for.
What should go in the accept box?
Things that matter to you but aren't yours to change right now, such as a reorg, a company policy, or a decision already made. Accepting them doesn't mean liking them. It means you stop spending your energy trying to move them.
How often should I do a self-review of how I work?
Twice a year is a good rhythm for a full review, with a quick look a month later to see which changes stuck. A new role, a new manager, or a reorg is a good reason to do one off schedule.
Why this works, and where it comes from
When people decide to change how they work, they often write two lists: what to start and what to stop. Those lists leave out two things. They have no place for what's already good, and no place for what you can't change. So the good parts get traded away by accident, and the unchangeable parts sit on the to-do list for months, quietly soaking up energy that could have gone somewhere it would count.
The four boxes come from Marshall Goldsmith, the executive coach, who calls the model the Wheel of Change. He develops it in Triggers, written with Mark Reiter (2015), and shares it as a short 100 Coaches handout on his website. His four moves are creating, preserving, eliminating and accepting, and the idea underneath is that some things are yours to change and some aren't, while how you respond is always yours. What's here keeps his four, points them at your working life, and asks for one move from each box this month.
The most useful part is often the line between eliminate and accept. It's easy to misfile in both directions. Something goes into accept because changing it would take a conversation we'd rather not have, and something stays in eliminate long after a year of trying has shown it won't budge. From the other side, the people involved often don't know. A manager may assume you like answering at night because you always do. Saying what you'd want is sometimes the first chance they've had to help. And when something truly can't move, accepting it on purpose is different from giving up: you stop paying for a fight you weren't going to win.
This isn't the right tool when one thing is keeping you up at night. A review of your whole working life spreads your attention when it needs to be on one problem, so take that problem on its own first and come back to the wheel when it's settled. Otherwise, twice a year is enough, and the old pages are worth keeping. Read side by side, they show who you've been trying to become, and how much of it you already have.
More in What's next
See allRead this alongside your role page
Tell Truest what you’re dealing with
We read every one, and we write guides for the things that come up most. Leave your email if you’d like to hear when we do.
Written by Truest, based on The Wheel of Change (Marshall Goldsmith (2025)) and Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts, Becoming the Person You Want to Be (Marshall Goldsmith and Mark Reiter (2015)). Last updated October 22, 2026. We sell a career membership; where that’s relevant above, we say so.