Dealing with people is probably the biggest problem you face.' This is the foundation of How to Win Friends & Influence People and it is still true today.
'- How to Win Friends and Influence People in the (Digital) Age, Preface ix
"If you don’t begin with the right foundation, it is easy to send the wrong message, to offend..."- How to Win Friends and Influence People in the (Digital) Age, Preface ix
The same timeless, straightforward principles that keep the original book on the bestseller’s lists are viewed in this book through the lens of today’s mediums. Just a few of the Foundational Principles:
Amazingly the things Carnegie helped us learn almost 80 years ago are, for the most part, not only still true today but actually even more so. Now people have access to us all day and night. Now the new formats/mediums are more informal than ever and we can get a little sloppy causing people to take things differently than what we meant. Now the hyper-frequency with which we interact means way more communications per day, per hour than ever before. If you’re bad at people skills it’s now multiplied!
Look at just the Foundational Principles listed above. What’s the same about each of them? They, like the rest of the principles, are conveyed through communication. So, this book is actually about how to communicate with others in order to win them as friends and influence them.
Carnegie says that the two highest levels of influence are achieved when: 1) People follow you because of what you’ve done for them and 2) Because of who you are. To make these two things happen you have to begin with the right foundation – that every communication (no matter if via new fangled digital or old school in-person/phone/letter) you use is filled with messages that build trust, convey gratitude and add value to the recipients.
"Always leave people a little better and you might be surprised how big it makes you and how far it takes you."- How to Win Friends and Influence People in the (Digital) Age, page 95
Leave others a little better is one of the Foundational Principles and with 27-30 of them to choose from,you may wonder why is this one insight #1. If you implement any of the others you always achieve this one. Many of us subscribe to this principle but aren’t successful at implementing it because of our definition of leaving people a little better. We aim too high. We label leaving them better as “become President”, “get their business in the top 10 of the INC 500”, “have a marriage without controversy”, “have employees who always meet their objectives”. And so success to us is only achieved when we help others achieve these lofty goals. Rarely is this going to happen.
Instead, we need to actively look for small opportunities to leave people a little better. The huge opportunities aren’t up to us. We affect some small ones and, as a result, the recipient is positioned to move his or herself a little closer toward whatever greatness is for them.
"It takes creativity and a bit more time to replicate the effect of a warm smile and a firm handshake, but it can be done."- How to Win Friends and Influence People in the (Digital) Age, page 129
In the original, Carnegie didn’t need to address the importance of the choice of medium to carry the meaning of the interaction, as he had so few mediums to deal with. But today – imagine using Twitter’s 140 characters or less to give constructive feedback to an employee. Yes, the more to the point constructive feedback is the better but it needs to be done in real time so people can immediately ask questions and get the answers they need to come to the same understanding of what happened and what needs to change. The face-to-face or at least telephone or IM mediums, though lending themselves to wordiness, are the way to keep people from getting defensive by jumping to conclusions.
Imagine what would have happened if Franklin D Roosevelt had posted on Facebook, “Yesterday, December 7, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.” Yes, Facebook is an effective way to inform a lot of people about something all at the same moment. It is important that very dire and emotional facts should be heard all at the same time and from one person in order to reduce rumors and the escalation of emotion if taken in a way the speaker didn’t intend. But it’s just those high emotion issues that need the facial expressions, tone of voice and pacing that you can only get in-person or at least by some verbal and visual means.
This is one of those rare How-to books you can’t put down. It is the true definition of a page turner. I wrote about another book recently whose principles were purported to “change your life” once you started implementing them. And it was true. This book will change your life just from reading it – better if you implement the principles, but just reading it gives you a vision of what you’ve been doing to shoot yourself in the foot all these years (“ah, so that’s why that person flew off the handle when I said …!,”, “If only I had read this book before that conversation last week I’d not have lost that client!”). And those kinds of visions are some pretty powerful motivators to improve.
Dale Breckenridge Carnegie (originally Carnagey until 1922 and possibly somewhat later) (November 24, 1888 – November 1, 1955) was an American writer and lecturer and the developer of famous courses in self-improvement, salesmanship, corporate training, public speaking and interpersonal skills. Born in poverty on a farm in Missouri, he was the author of How to Win Friends and Influence People, first published in 1936, a massive bestseller that remains popular today. He also wrote a biography of Abraham Lincoln, titled Lincoln the Unknown, as well as several other books.
