How to win friends & influence people

[alohomora]

I summarized the main points of "How to win friends & influence people" by Dale Carnegie. Part III is the most interesting. Do people agree/disagree? Has anyone read the book?

I. Fundamental techniques in handling people:
1. Don't criticize, condemn, or complain
2. Give honest and sincere appreciation
3. Arouse in the other person an eager want

II. Six ways to make people like you:
1. Become genuinely interested in other people
2. Smile
3. Remember that a person's name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language
4. Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves
5. Talk in terms of the other person's interests
6. Make the other person feel important- and do it sincerely.

III. Win people to your way of thinking
1. The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it.
2. Show respect for the other person's opinions. Never say, "You're wrong."
3. If you are wrong, admit it quickly and emphatically.
4. Begin in a friendly way.
5. Get the other person saying "yes, yes" immediately.
6. Let the other person do a great deal of the talking.
7. Let the other person feel that the idea is his or hers.
8. Try honestly to see things from the other person's point of view.
9. Be sympathetic with the other person's ideas and desires.
10. Appeal to the nobler motives
11. Dramatize your ideas
12. Throw down a challenge.

THE END

[Ospi]

Well I pretty much follow those ideas naturally and I have always had good success making new friends and keeping old ones so from personal experience it does help. i think the most important is showing a positive attitude and not complaining to them about things, a) they don't care and b) it's really a conversation killer. So bringing up topics of interest, asking about theirs and also keeping in contact are important.

[pita]

I guess this is explains why I don't have any friends.

[coldmorning]

I read it a while ago. Among the people I've worked with or known in my life and would consider very successful, it always seemed like they follow a lot of the advice. However, I'm pretty bad at following the advice myself because I'm stubborn.

[slylikeafox]

I own this book. I've read it but haven't tried out much of the advice. The name thing is the only thing that really stuck with me. I remember that there was someone, in the book, who was very happy because another person actually bothered to try to pronounce their name correctly instead of just giving them a nickname. Thanks for the summary. Seemed like a great book. I should probably read it again.

Anyone take any of the Dale Carnegie classes?

[bob_sleigh]

a good book in general but not relevant enough to social anxiety - if you want a book to overcome social anxiety buy one that is relevant to it such as Overcoming Social Anxiety or CBT for Dummies

[UKPhobe]

Nice little book, I actually own a first edition copy. Quite good for dishing out tips for better relations with people.

My only complaint is that some of the advice is probably a little out of date for modern times. It was written for the 1930s and times have changed since then, people in society are generally more assertive and less over polite.

Otherwise decent little book, well worth reading. Agree with the above post though, not really very relevant to tackling SA.

[mypasswordneverworks]

Originally Posted by alohomora

1. Become genuinely interested in other people

This is so hard for me! I have the book too.

[sacred]

i should read that book not for the advice but so ill know when somebody ive just met have read it and is trying to use these charisma for dumbass tactics on me. it would be alot more fun to say no thanks ive read that book too keep walking poser than to be charmed by their learned charisma. meh i dont even need to read it i can alway tell when a non charismatic person is trying to be charismatic anyway. they have this fake infomercial like quality to thier personality.

[Neptunus]

I have the book too - have yet to finish reading it. Seems to be pretty sound advice though.

[Sunshine009]

The key ideas are really good, but the stories are too outdated and detracts from the book. That is what I remember although I don't remember exactly what stories they were.

[~Jessie~]

I have this book but haven't finished reading it. I think its good, just not for overcoming SA. I look to it for other areas of my life to work on... when I overcome SA someday lol

[LALoner]

The problem with this kind of advice is different people like different things. Its better to just be yourself and find someone who likes that. But I guess in work situations its different, maybe thats why people buy books like that.

[alohomora]

Originally Posted by LALoner

The problem with this kind of advice is different people like different things. Its better to just be yourself and find someone who likes that. But I guess in work situations its different, maybe thats why people buy books like that.

I was thinking the same thing when I read it...both the part about being yourself and the part about needing to work with people who are different from you.

[JS86]

Originally Posted by alohomora

I. Fundamental techniques in handling people:
3. Arouse in the other person an eager want

Thankyou for the summary, but is there any chance you could re-word this or explain what it means? I am not sure what this sentence is trying to say exactly.

[alohomora]

Originally Posted by JS86

Thankyou for the summary, but is there any chance you could re-word this or explain what it means? I am not sure what this sentence is trying to say exactly.

That's a good question considering that "arouse in the other person an eager want" does not really clearly explain what the author meant.

Basically, the author wrote a chapter on how to get people to want to do something. Preaching is usually ineffective. Basically, you have to find out what the other person wants, not what you want, and see if you can use that to get him/her to do something. It emphasizes that egotistical thinking will not get you anywhere. It sounds like common sense, but people really don't apply it as much as they should.

The author uses this analogy: he likes strawberries and cream. But when he goes fishing he's not going to tempt the fish with strawberries and cream. The fish don't want that. Same thing with people. We often times make the mistake of trying to tempt people with things they don't want...things that interest only ourselves.

I think this is the most important idea I have learned in the book as a whole: the fact that people care less about the things we care about than we realize. This sounds like a bad thing, but you can use it to your advantage when you find this out. People care more about how you REACT to them than you yourself. For instance, if I send someone an e-mail with five paragraphs talking about myself and one sentence mentioning the other person, guess what? They often times only respond to that one sentence. Not always of course, but it's good to notice it happens more frequently than we realize. This has helped reduce my anxiety somewhat because I realized that people are really self-absorbed in their own interests and feeling of importance. It's made me less self-conscious in many social settings.

On the other hand, as LAloner mentioned, whether or not these ideas should be applied depends on what you're looking for. If you are looking for friends who share similar interests, then it is better to express your own interests so that you can weed out people who don't care about them. However, we often times NEED things from people- more than we realize- either from family, coworkers, etc.- and in those cases it is good to be aware of other people's wants. So basically, different behaviors fit different contexts and needs.

[JS86]

Ah, thankyou for explaining that.