How to Win Friends and Influence People

Chapter 1: You Can’t Win an Argument

But we were guests at a festive occasion, my dear Dale. Why prove to a man he is wrong? Is that going to make him like you? Why not let him save his face? He didn’t ask for your opinion. He didn’t want it. Why argue with him? Always avoid the acute angle.”

A man convinced against his will Is of the same opinion still.

If you argue and rankle and contradict, you may achieve a victory sometimes; but it will be an empty victory because you will never get your opponent’s good will.

Buddha said: “Hatred is never ended by hatred but by love,” and a misunderstanding is never ended by an argument but by tact, diplomacy, conciliation and a sympathetic desire to see the other person’s viewpoint.

Distrust your first instinctive impression. Our first natural reaction in a disagreeable situation is to be defensive. Be careful. Keep calm and watch out for your first reaction. It may be you at your worst, not your best.

Listen first. Give your opponents a chance to talk. Let them finish. Do not resist, defend or debate. This only raises barriers. Try to build bridges of understanding. Don’t build higher barriers of misunderstanding.

Look for areas of agreement. When you have heard your opponents out, dwell first on the points and areas on which you agree.

Be honest. Look for areas where you can admit error and say so. Apologize for your mistakes. It will help disarm your opponents and reduce defensiveness.

Promise to think over your opponents’ ideas and study them carefully. And mean it. Your opponents may be right. It is a lot easier at this stage to agree to think about their points than to move rapidly ahead and find yourself in a position where your opponents can say: “We tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t listen.”

Thank your opponents sincerely for their interest. Anyone who takes the time to disagree with you is interested in the same things you are.

Think of them as people who really want to help you, and you may turn your opponents into friends. Postpone action to give both sides time to think through the problem. Suggest that a new meeting be held later that day or the next day, when all the facts may be brought to bear. In preparation for this meeting, ask yourself some hard questions:

1. Could my opponents be right? Partly right?
2. Is there truth or merit in their position or argument?
3. Is my reaction one that will relieve the problem or will it just relieve any frustration? Will my reaction drive my opponents further away or draw them closer to me?
4. Will my reaction elevate the estimation good people have of me?
5. Will I win or lose?
6. What price will I have to pay if I win?
7. If I am quiet about it, will the disagreement blow over?
8. Is this difficult situation an opportunity for me?

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• scrap!
• doggerel: sonnet
• wrangling

Chapter 2: A Sure Way of Making Enemies—and How to Avoid It

When Theodore Roosevelt was in the White House, he confessed that if he could be right 75 percent of the time, he would reach the highest measure of his expectation.

If you can be sure of being right only 55 percent of the time, you can go down to Wall Street and make a million dollars a day. If you can’t be sure of being right even 55 percent of the time, why should you tell other people they are wrong?

You can tell people they are wrong by a look or an intonation or a gesture just as eloquently as you can in words—and if you tell them they are wrong, do you make them want to agree with you?

Never!

For you have struck a direct blow at their intelligence, judgment, pride and self-respect. That will make them want to strike back. But it will never make them want to change their minds.

It is difficult, under even the most benign conditions, to change people’s minds. So why make it harder? Why handicap yourself?

If you are going to prove anything, don’t let anybody know it.

Men must be taught as if you taught them not And things unknown proposed as things forgot.

You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him to find it within himself.

Be wiser than other people if you can; but do not tell them so.

One thing only I know, and that is that I know nothing.

“I may be wrong. I frequently am. Let’s examine the facts.”

You will never get into trouble by admitting that you may be wrong. That will stop all argument and inspire your opponent to be just as fair and open and broad-minded as you are. It will make him want to admit that he, too, may be wrong.

We sometimes find ourselves changing our minds without any resistance or heavy emotion, but if we are told we are wrong, we resent the imputation and harden our hearts. We are incredibly heedless in the formation of our beliefs, but find ourselves filled with an illicit passion for them when anyone proposes to rob us of their companionship. It is obviously not the ideas themselves that are dear to us, but our self-esteem which is threatened. … The little word “my” is the most important one in human affairs, and properly to reckon with it is the beginning of wisdom. It has the same force whether it is “my” dinner, “my” dog, and “my” house, or “my” father, “my” country, and “my” God. We not only resent the imputation that our watch is wrong, or our car shabby, but that our conception of the canals of Mars, of the pronunciation of “Epictetus,” of the medicinal value of salicin, or of the date of Sargon I is subject to revision. We like to continue to believe what we have been accustomed to accept as true, and the resentment aroused when doubt is cast upon any of our assumptions leads us to seek every manner of excuse for clinging to it. The result is that most of our so-called reasoning consists in finding arguments for going on believing as we already do.

Our first reaction to most of the statements (which we hear from other people) is an evaluation or judgment, rather than an understanding of it.

Ben Franklin tells how he conquered the iniquitous habit of argument and transformed himself into one of the most able, suave and diplomatic men in American history.

Ben, you are impossible. Your opinions have a slap in them for everyone who differs with you. They have become so offensive that nobody cares for them. Your friends find they enjoy themselves better when you are not around. You know so much that no man can tell you anything. Indeed, no man is going to try, for the effort would lead only to discomfort and hard work. So you are not likely ever to know any more than you do now, which is very little.

in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present case there appear’d or seem’d to me some difference, etc.

I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily prevail’d with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I happened to be in the right.

I let them develop my system themselves.

nothing good is accomplished and a lot of damage can be done if you tell a person straight out that he or she is wrong.

it began to dawn on me that

I didn’t for one instant insinuate that the inspector was wrong. I emphasized that my only reason for asking was in order that we could give his firm exactly what they wanted in future shipments.

Dr. King replied, “I judge people by their own principles—not by my own.”

Jesus said: “Agree with thine adversary quickly.”

“Be diplomatic,” counseled the King. “It will help you gain your point.”

In other words, don’t argue with your customer or your spouse or your adversary. Don’t tell them they are wrong, don’t get them stirred up. Use a little diplomacy.

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• admiralty
• hush
• ram
• esophagus.
• malign

Chapter 3: If You’re Wrong, Admit It

If we know we are going to be rebuked anyhow, isn’t it far better to beat the other person to it and do it ourselves? Isn’t it much easier to listen to self-criticism than to bear condemnation from alien lips?

gloating over his chance to criticize.

Any fool can try to defend his or her mistakes—and most fools do—but it raises one above the herd and gives one a feeling of nobility and exultation to admit one’s mistakes.

Come to think it over, I don’t entirely agree with it myself. Not everything I wrote yesterday appeals to me today. I am glad to learn what you think on the subject. The next time you are in the neighborhood you must visit us and we’ll get this subject threshed out for all time. So here is a handclasp over the miles, and I am, Yours sincerely,

When we are right, let’s try to win people gently and tactfully to our way of thinking, and when we are wrong—and that will be surprisingly often, if we are honest with ourselves—let’s admit our mistakes quickly and with enthusiasm.

“By fighting you never get enough, but by yielding you get more than you expected.”

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• horseweeds
• red-handed.
• Petulant,
• alibis.
• rakish
• ravine.
• brigade
• sublime.

Chapter 4: A Drop of Honey

“If you come at me with your fists doubled,” said Woodrow Wilson, “I think I can promise you that mine will double as fast as yours; but if you come to me and say, ‘Let us sit down and take counsel together, and, if we differ from each other, understand why it is that we differ, just what the points at issue are,’ we will presently find that we are not so far apart after all, that the points on which we differ are few and the points on which we agree are many, and that if we only have the patience and the candor and the desire to get together, we will get together.”

“This is a red-letter day in my life,”

If a man’s heart is rankling with discord and ill feeling toward you, you can’t win him to your way of thinking with all the logic in Christendom. Scolding parents and domineering bosses and husbands and nagging wives ought to realize that people don’t want to change their minds. They can’t be forced or driven to agree with you or me. But they may possibly be led to, if we are gentle and friendly, ever so gentle and ever so friendly.

“a drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.”

So with men, if you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey that catches his heart; which, say what you will, is the great high road to reason.

I was ‘hearty in my approbation and lavish in my praise.’ I complimented him on the way he ran the building and told him I should like so much to stay for another year but I couldn’t afford it.

The sun can make you take off your coat more quickly than the wind; and kindliness, the friendly approach and appreciation can make people change their minds more readily than all the bluster and storming in the world.

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• picket
• bulldoze: bulldozer

Chapter 5: The Secret of Socrates

Begin by emphasizing—and keep on emphasizing—the things on which you agree.

Get the other person saying “Yes, yes” at the outset. Keep your opponent, if possible, from saying “No.”

So I agreed with him. I told him the information he refused to give was not absolutely necessary.

when he realized that we weren’t asking for this information for our sake but for his sake.

it doesn’t pay to argue,

that it is much more profitable and much more interesting to look at things from the other person’s viewpoint and try to get that person saying ‘yes, yes.’”

He asked questions with which his opponent would have to agree.

“He who treads softly goes far.”

spigot: faucet

Chapter 6: The Safety Valve in Handling Complaints 

So listen patiently and with an open mind. Be sincere about it. Encourage them to express their ideas fully.

Almost every successful person likes to reminisce about his early struggles.

Mr. Cubellis had taken the trouble to find out about the accomplishments of his prospective employer.

He showed an interest in the other person and his problems. He encouraged the other person to do most of the talking—and made a favorable impression.

“If you want enemies, excel your friends; but if you want friends, let your friends excel you.”

• laryngitis.
• valiant
• complacent
• confidante,

stenographer.

Chapter 7: How to Get Cooperation

isn’t it bad judgment to try to ram your opinions down the throats of other people? Isn’t it wiser to make suggestions—and let the other person think out the conclusion?

what they expected from him.

Now I want you to tell me what I have a right to expect from you.”

No one likes to feel that he or she is being sold something or told to do a thing.

We much prefer to feel that we are buying of our own accord or acting on our own ideas. We like to be consulted about our wishes, our wants, our thoughts.

the study of influencing human behavior,

“I want you to do me a little favor, if you will,” he said. “Here are some uncompleted sketches. Won’t you please tell me how we could finish them up in such a way that you could use them?”

I urged him to give me his ideas. This made him feel that he was creating the designs. And he was. I didn’t have to sell him. He bought.”

He knew far more about handling human nature than the others did. He wrote a letter something like this:

Our factory has recently completed a new line of X-ray equipment. The first shipment of these machines has just arrived at our office. They are not perfect. We know that, and we want to improve them. So we should be deeply obligated to you if you could find time to look them over and give us your ideas about how they can be made more serviceable to your profession. Knowing how occupied you are, I shall be glad to send my car for you at any hour you specify.

It made me feel important.

“Self-Reliance” stated: “In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.”

to convert him to an idea was to plant it in his mind casually, but so as to interest him in it—so as to get him thinking about it on his own account.

He didn’t care about credit. He wanted results.

He sent me the names and telephone numbers of several New York people who had stayed at his camp and he invited me to telephone them and discover for myself what he had to offer.

“The reason why rivers and seas receive the homage of a hundred mountain streams is that they keep below them. Thus they are able to reign over all the mountain streams. So the sage, wishing to be above men, putteth himself below them; wishing to be before them, he putteth himself behind them. Thus, though his place be above men, they do not feel his weight; though his place be before them, they do not count it an injury.”

rut

Chapter 8: A Formula That Will Work Wonders for You

“How would I feel, how would I react if I were in his shoes?”

that success in dealing with people depends on a sympathetic grasp of the other person’s viewpoint.”

“Cooperativeness in conversation is achieved when you show that you consider the other person’s ideas and feelings as important as your own.

Starting your conversation by giving the other person the purpose or direction of your conversation, governing what you say by what you would want to hear if you were the listener, and accepting his or her viewpoint will encourage the listener to have an open mind to your ideas.”*

why not pause and close your eyes and try to think the whole thing through from another person’s point of view?

“Why should he or she want to do it?”

less shoe leather. “I would rather walk the sidewalk in front of a person’s office for two hours before an interview,” “than step into that office without a perfectly clear idea of what I was going to say and what that person—from my knowledge of his or her interests and motives—was likely to answer.”

I would rather walk the sidewalk in front of a person’s office for two hours before an interview than step into that office without a perfectly clear idea of what I was going to say and what that person—from my knowledge of his or her interests and motives—was likely to answer.

• conflagration.
• Nonchalantly
• ferret

Chapter 9: What Everybody Wants

“I don’t blame you one iota for feeling as you do. If I were you I would undoubtedly feel just as you do.”

You deserve very little credit for being what you are—and remember, the people who come to you irritated, bigoted, unreasoning, deserve very little discredit for being what they are.

Feel sorry for the poor devils. Pity them. Sympathize with them. Say to yourself: “There, but for the grace of God, go I.”

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

I wanted to be above fools.

To whom have I the honor of speaking?

the enormous chemical value of sympathy in neutralizing the acid of hard feelings.

“I sympathize with you—I know it won’t be easy, but it will pay off in your better musical development.”

“Sympathy the human species universally craves. The child eagerly displays his injury; or even inflicts a cut or bruise in order to reap abundant sympathy. For the same purpose adults … show their bruises, relate their accidents, illness, especially details of surgical operations. ‘Self-pity’ for misfortunes real or imaginary is, in some measure, practically a universal practice.”

• cuss
• alas and alack!
• scorching
• cannibal
• committed an impropriety,
• musicale
• in articulo mortis: at the moment of death
• impresario

Chapter 10: An Appeal That Everybody Likes

The fact is that all people you meet have a high regard for themselves and like to be fine and unselfish in their own estimation.

a person usually has two reasons for doing a thing: one that sounds good and a real one.

The person himself will think of the real reason. You don’t need to emphasize that. But all of us, being idealists at heart, like to think of motives that sound good. So, in order to change people, appeal to the nobler motives.

“I have listened to your story, and I still don’t believe you intend to move. Years in the renting business have taught me something about human nature, and I sized you up in the first place as being a man of your word. In fact, I’m so sure of it that I’m willing to take a gamble. But I still believe you’re a man of your word and will live up to your contract. For after all, we are either men or monkeys—and the choice usually lies with ourselves!’

My mother doesn’t like it.” he appealed to the desire, deep in all of us, to refrain from harming children. “You know how it is, boys. You’ve got children yourselves, some of you. And you know it’s not good for youngsters to get too much publicity.”

Ladies’ Home Journal,

I explained I had called to find out what it was the company had done, or failed to do.

made it clear that, until I had heard the customer’s story, I had no opinion to offer.

“I want you to know I also feel this matter has been badly mishandled. You’ve been inconvenienced and annoyed and irritated by one of our representatives.

I could not help being impressed by your fairness and patience.

the only sound basis on which to proceed is to assume that he or she is sincere, honest, truthful and willing and anxious to pay the charges, once convinced they are correct.

honest, upright and fair.

meteoric

Chapter 11: The Movies Do It. TV Does It. Why Don’t You Do It?

showmanship.

antacid

Chapter 12: When Nothing Else Works, Try This

“The way to get things done,” says Schwab, “is to stimulate competition. I do not mean in a sordid, money-getting way, but in the desire to excel.”

“All men have fears, but the brave put down their fears and go forward, sometimes to death, but always to victory”

The chance for self-expression. The chance to prove his or her worth, to excel, to win.

• gauntlet!
• penitentiary
• flabbergast