Yes, How to Win Friends and Influence People is a timeless classic with some great principles, patterns, and practices.

I think the big deal about The Likeability Factor is the framing of the information, as well as the depth of the exercises and techniques. It’s incredibly prescriptive when it comes to how to eliminate unfriendliness or how to share your realness, as well as several other techniques.

From a metaphor standpoint, I think How To Win Friends is more of a cornucopia, while The Likeability Factor is more of a driver’s guide for results.

I would like to read “The Likeability Factor” to see whether and how it extends Carnegie’s work. Does anyone already happen to have that answer?

-Mike

I love that episode! It’s a great example how likeability is something you can change, for better or for worse.

@ Jannie

Sleep can make a huge difference. We all know the expression, “did you get wake up on the wrong side of the bed?”

What I’ve noticed is eating, sleeping, and working out help keep a better disposition.

@ Alik

I think a lot of likeability comes down to being mindful and doing what you know (vs. knowing what to do.) You already have it in you. I’ll share ways to crank it up, later this week.

In fact, another way to put it is, unlikable really closes more doors.

@ Louisa

It’s a reminder of the saying you catch more flies with honey than vinegar.

@ Vi

I’m finding more and more things really are skills (optimism, happiness, feeling good … etc.). Nature gives us the start, but nurture really goes a long way.

@ Positively Present

I think you’ll like it a lot. It’s rich with stories and data and it’s so down to Earth. The author makes a great case for improving likeability.

@ Karl

I like your story and perspective. I think you make a really great point about liking yourself first and then others follow. It’s sort of like a domino effect and you’re the first domino in the line up.

@ Patricia

Empathy is a blessing and a curse. It’s really feeling the pain, but luckly it’s fully feeling the pleasure too, and empathy is a key to emotional intelligence.

When it comes to relating, whether to engineers or anybody, a little blending goes a long way. In fact, you can use the likeability factors to dail up or dial down the friendliness, relevance, empathy, and realness.

Once I learned the Big Five personality traits (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism), I instantly became more tolerant and accepting of critics, pessimists, and you name it … I think of the saying, people do the best with what they’ve got.

@ Melissa

It’s been like an endless flow of lightbulbs going off since I’ve started the book. Thank you and back at ya!

When I was teaching at the College – Ethics – students made judgments about me by how I looked – I look like someone’s Granny and should be baking cookies and not be smart – and I am tough in the classroom. It usually took 2 semesters before word of mouth made a waiting list for my classes.

Wow fun to think about – I find that most engineers I meet even computer engineers have sometimes a difficult demeanor in person – Do you find that in your work? hard to read?

I should get this book for my IT person, she is very hard to get to know.