How to Win Friends and Influence People

Principles

Fundamental Techniques in Handling People

PRINCIPLE 1: Don’t criticize, condemn or complain. 

PRINCIPLE 2: Give honest and sincere appreciation. 

PRINCIPLE 3: Arouse in the other person an eager want.

Six Ways to Make People Like You

PRINCIPLE 1: Become genuinely interested in other people. 

PRINCIPLE 2: Smile. 

PRINCIPLE 3: Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language. 

PRINCIPLE 4: Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves. 

PRINCIPLE 5: Talk in terms of the other person’s interests. 

PRINCIPLE 6: Make the other person feel important—and do it sincerely.

Win People to Your Way of Thinking

PRINCIPLE 1: The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it. 

PRINCIPLE 2: Show respect for the other person’s opinions. Never say, “You’re wrong.” 

PRINCIPLE 3: If you are wrong, admit it quickly and emphatically. PRINCIPLE 4: Begin in a friendly way. 

PRINCIPLE 5: Get the other person saying “yes, yes” immediately. 

PRINCIPLE 6: Let the other person do a great deal of the talking. 

PRINCIPLE 7: Let the other person feel that the idea is his or hers. 

PRINCIPLE 8: Try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view. 

PRINCIPLE 9: Be sympathetic with the other person’s ideas and desires. 

PRINCIPLE 10: Appeal to the nobler motives. 

PRINCIPLE 11: Dramatize your ideas. 

PRINCIPLE 12: Throw down a challenge.

Be a Leader

A leader’s job often includes changing your people’s attitudes and behavior. Some suggestions to accomplish this: 

PRINCIPLE 1: Begin with praise and honest appreciation. 

PRINCIPLE 2: Call attention to people’s mistakes indirectly. 

PRINCIPLE 3: Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person. 

PRINCIPLE 4: Ask questions instead of giving direct orders. PRINCIPLE 5: Let the other person save face. 

PRINCIPLE 6: Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement. Be “hearty in your approbation and lavish in your praise.” 

PRINCIPLE 7: Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to. 

PRINCIPLE 8: Use encouragement. Make the fault seem easy to correct.

PRINCIPLE 9: Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest.

Quotables

“When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing with creatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bristling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity.” (p. 36)

“Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain—and most fools do. But it takes character and self-control to be understanding and forgiving.” (p. 36)

“If you tell me how you get your feeling of importance, I’ll tell you what you are. That determines your character. That is the most significant thing about you.” (p. 44)

“I know, as you know, people who would think they had committed a crime if they let their families or employees go for six days without food; but they will let them go for six days, and six weeks, and sometimes sixty years without giving them the hearty appreciation that they crave almost as much as they crave food.” (p. 50)

“The difference between appreciation and flattery? That is simple. One is sincere and the other insincere. ” (p. 52)

“‘If there is any one secret of success,’ said Henry Ford, ‘it lies in the ability to get the other person’s point of view and see things from that person’s angle as well as from your own.’” (p. 60)

“You must have a good time meeting people if you expect them to have a good time meeting you.” (p. 94)

“Jim Farley discovered early in life that the average person is more interested in his or her own name than in all the other names on earth put together.” (p. 102)

“So if you aspire to be a good conversationalist, be an attentive listener.” (p. 119)

“A man convinced against his will Is of the same opinion still.” (p. 145)

“Three-fourths of the people you will ever meet are hungering and thirsting for sympathy. Give it to them, and they will love you.” (p. 209)

“Resentment caused by a brash order may last a long time—even if the order was given to correct an obviously bad situation.” (p. 255)

“Always make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest.” (p. 278)