“How to win friends & influence people” by Dale Carnegie

The author 🖋

Dale Carnegie was an American best-selling author, lecturer and speaker who’s now considered as one of the godfathers of copywriting.

Born into poverty on a farm in Missouri in 1988, he still managed to create his own success story by using the principles in his books (and selling tens of millions of copies worldwide).

Key takeaways 🎓

1. Be curious about others

When we make others feel valued and important, they are more likely to be receptive to our ideas.

Questions about their lives, listening closely, remembering names and engaging in longer conversations that revolve around the things they care about is the best way to get people to like us.

Being curious and making someone feel interesting establishes a foundation for a meaningful relationship.

2. Show honest appreciation

Dale advises the use of praise, encouragement and an overall positive approach when dealing with people.

Even when mistakes are made - call attention to them indirectly, let people save face and give them a good reputation to live up to.

The key is to focus on making others feel important and respected - genuine appreciation displayed at the right moment is an extremely powerful tool for getting people to like us.

3. Avoid disagreement at all costs

Carnegie argues that conflict is never productive.

People are more likely to listen if we’re respectful (in fact, they almost never do if we’re not).

So if we disagree with something they say or believe in, rather than pointing it out, we should try to understand the other person's perspective.

Understanding what motivates them allows us to frame our ideas from their point-of-view which gives us a much better chance to gain their cooperation.

Closing thoughts 🧠

Written in 1936, the book provides a set of principles for communication, leadership and influence that have stood the test of time, proving to be effective to this day.

Dale delves deep into the simplicity of human psychology, highlighting the timeless down-to-earth factors that motivate our behavior (and aren’t likely to ever change).

Personally, after hearing so many self-help gurus talk so much about the book but never looking into it, I was pleasantly surprised to see that Dale’s core ideas revolved around treating people the right way…