Winning With People - Summary

John Maxwell's Winning with people is a very good book. How to win Friends and Influence People is a classic personal development book written by Dale Carnegie. Brain Tracy another personal development expert says regarding this book as 'John has rewritten how to win friends and influence people better than ever.' If you have read the HTWFAIP book then you will understand the depth of that statement and I feel it completely lives up to that statement.

This is my attempt to summarize all the principles in the book and share those parts in the book which I found helpful. The book is divided into five parts each dealing with one aspect of relationsips.

First part is called The Readiness Question which speaks about whether we are ready to go into a relationship. The lens principle described in the first part is previous post.

The Readiness Question

The principles in that are

Lens principle : Who we are determines how we see others

Mirror principle: The first person we must examine is ourselves

Pain principle: Hurting people hurt people and are easily hurt by them.

Suggestions while dealing with people in pain:

Don't add to the hurt. Look beyond the person and situation and help them find help.

Hammer principle: Never use a hammer to swat a fly off someone's head

Elevator principle: we can lift people up or take people down in our relationships

The elevator principle basically means that there are people in our life interaction with whom leaves us smiling and happy . Those are the lifters. Lifters commit themselves to daily encouragement, Lifters initiate positive in negative.

Next is the connection question, where the emphasis is on putting others before ourselves.The principles in that are

The big picture principle: The entire population of the world - with one minor exception is - composed of others

The exchange principle: Instead of putting others in their place, we must put ourselves in their place - empathy

The learning principle: Each person we meet has the potential to teach us something

The Charisma principle: People are interested in the person who is interested in them.

Ways for that are

1. Become genuinely interested in other people

2. Smile

3. Remember their name

4. Good listener

5.Talk in terms of other person's interests

6. Make the other person feel important genuinely.

The Number 10 principle: Believing the best in people usually brings out the best in people. So always believe that people are always 10 out of 10. If you think that way, they will deliver to that level.

The confrontation principle: Caring for people should precede confronting people.

I liked this very much. These will be very helpful when we have to confront people.

1. Confront only if you care about that person

2. Meet together asap.

3. First seek understanding. Not necessarily agreement.

4. Outline the issue

. Describe your perceptions

. Tell this how you makes you feel.

. Explain why this is important to you

5. Encourage a response

6. Agree to an action plan

Identification, agreement to solve it, steps, accountability, deadline, commitment to put the issue in the past after resolution.

To take the relation to the next level, we should increase the level of trust in the relationship.

The Trust Question:

The principles are

The bedrock principle: Trust is the foundation of any relationship

The situation principle: Never let the situation mean more than the relationship

The Bob principle: When Bob has a problem with everyone, Bob is usually the problem

When we have to deal with Bobs in our life, these are some suggestions

1. Respond with a positive comment

2. Show your concern for someone being criticized

3. Encourage steps toward resolution

4. Ask Bob to think before speaking

Is it true?, Is it helpful, is it inspiring, is it necessary and is it kind?

5. Keep Bob away from others

The next principle is about easily being approachable to people...

The approachability principle: Being at ease with ourselves helps others to be at ease with us.

How to put others at ease?

1. Personal warmth - They truly like people.

2. Appreciation of differences in people

3. Consistency of mood.

4. Sensitivity towards people's feelings.

5. Being Human - understanding of their weaknesses and showing our own

6. Forgive and ask for forgiveness

7. Be Authentic

The Foxhole principle: When preparing for a battle, dig a hole big enough for a friend

Next comes to the requirements for sustaining a long term relationship

The Investment Question:

The gardening principle: All relationships need cultivation.

The 101 percent principle: Find the 1 percent we agree on and give it 100 percent of our effort.

The patience principle: The journey with others is slower than the journey alone.

The celebration principle: The true test of relationships is not only how loyal we are when friends fail, but how thrilled we are when they succeed.

These are the advantages.. I can use this principle the most ;)

The joy of accomplishment is diminished when no one celebrates with you.

Many people identify with failure, few with success

People who celebrate with you become lifelong friends

Celebrate with the most closest to you.

The High Road principle: We go to a higher level when we treat others better than they treat us.

Directions for high road :

1. Stay on kindness street as long as possible

2. Turn right on forgiveness avenue

3. Avoid get even alley as it is a dead end

4. Climb to the top of the hill as you will see the high road.

5. Take it and stay on it

Next to make the best of the relationship there is

The Synergy Question:

The principles are

The Boomerang principle: When we help others, we help ourselves.

The Friendship principle: All things being equal, people will work with people they like; all things not being equal they still will.

The Partnership principle: Working together increases the odds of winning together.

The Satisfaction principle: In great relationships the joy of being together is enough.

Winning With People - 1

Currently, I am reading a book called 'Winning With People' written by John C Maxwell about people principles which work every time. There are all together 25 principles in the book. This is my attempt to summarize the laws.

1. The law of Lens: Who we are determines how we see others.

What determines what we are?

And he says that if I am trustworthy, I see others are trustworthy. He says the factors that influence what are are are genetics for the major part and then our experiences, our attitude and our self image and our friends.

So what can we change or improve?

We cannot change genetics and there is a classic question of whether we should work on weaknesses or our strengths. I think the author has given a very good answer to this question.

When it comes to character issues, work on your weaknesses. When it comes to your talents, work on your strengths.

I somehow feel this is correct intuitively. I feel, that I should be more courageous, and not being courageous enough is a big drawback. Hence I cannot avoid improving it if I have lead a better life unconstrained.

I am strong in English language skills. My friend is strong in Mathematics. I sometimes feel if I should improve my maths skills and have tried various ways of improving it - reading vedic maths and shakuntala devi's books etc. but they have never been sticky... but I have been voraciously reading books after book. So I also came to Maxwell's conclusion that I should better work on improving my character but when developing our talents, with little efforts we can become very very good in our strong areas whereas a small improvement in our weaker areas seems to take a lot of effort.

Regarding friends, the difference between what we are now and what we will be five years later will be the people you spend time with and the books you read. So he advises us to choose our attitude well, have good self-esteem, select good friends and read good books.

The Five Rules of Stratospheric Success from the Go-Giver

I have read a book called the Go Giver which is small fable about a man called Joe and how he achieved success. There is a man called Pindar who introduces Joe everyday to a successful person who introduces him to one law of stratospheric success with the catch that he has to implement it in his life before he is taught the next law in the series. It is a really gripping read and whats more, the principles look like they are really useful. This is a summary of the rules.

The Law of Value

Your true worth is determined by

how much more you give in value than you take in payment.

The Law of Compensation

Your income is determined by

how many people you serve and how well you serve them.

The Law of Influence

Your influence is determined by

how abundantly you place other people’s interests first.

The Law of Authenticity

The most valuable gift you have to offer is yourself.

The Law of Receptivity

The key to effective giving is to stay open to receiving.

Each law is so simple and few are obvious but some others like receptivity and influence were eye-openers to me. I am applying all those laws in my life now and hope it is useful to you too.

Practical Tips from the Power Of Now

Ever since Steve Pavlina mentioned about Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, the book has been in my wishlist. It is a spiritual book. It talks about how living in the now can help us be peaceful and do our best and live our best life now. It might seem paradoxical but the principles mentioned in it are quite sound for us to follow.

A few practical tips from that

1. The greater part of human pain is unnecessary. It is self-created as long as the unobserved mind runs your life.

The pain that you create now is always some form of nonacceptance, some form of unconscious resistance to what is. On the level of thought, the resistance is some form of judgment. On the emotional level, it is some form of negativity. The intensity of the pain depends on the degree of resistance to the present moment, and this in turn depends on how strongly you are identified with your mind.

This is very very true, mostly we play the same scenes back and forth again, thinking about it but not able to do anything about it.

2. Unease, anxiety, tension, stress, worry — all forms of fear — are cause by too much future, and not enough presence. Guilt, regret, resentment, grievances, sadness, bitterness, and all forms of nonforgiveness are caused by too much past, and not enough presence.

3.Wherever you are, be there totally. When listening to another person, don't just listen with your mind, listen with your whole body. Feel the energy field of your inner body as you listen.That takes attention away from thinking and creates a still space that enables you to truly listen without the mind interfering. You are giving the other person space - space to be. It is the most precious gift you can give. Most people don't know how to listen because the major part of listening is taken up by thinking. They pay more attention to that than what the other person is saying, and none at all to what really matters: the Being of the other person underneath the words and the mind. Of course you cannot feel someone else's Being except through your own. This is the beginning of the realization of oneness, which is love. At the deepest level of Being, you are one with all that.

He says this way, we can give the other person the space to understand themselves and come out of it.

4.To be free of time is to be free of the psychological need of past for your identity and future for your fulfillment

He says we should always work in the now and that doesn't mean not planning or thinking about the future. If all we want to do is plan, then do that planning in the now. Don't just build castles in the air about how it is going to work out and then leave it. I think this is the biggest take aways from the power of now.

It makes a lot of sense to always be in the present. We can embrace all our opportunities if we are in the present. We can look through and really what the other person is trying to tell if we are really present. I really really recommend this book. It will surely change your way of thinking as it has mine.