How to Win Friends and Influence People (2 page)

this book to be a total failure so far as you are concerned.

For “the great aim of education,” said Herbert Spencer,

“is not knowledge but action.”

And this is an action book.

DALE CARNEGIE

Nine Suggestions

on How to Get
the
Most

Out of This Book

1. If you wish to get the most out of this book, there is

one indispensable requirement, one essential infinitely

more important than any rule or technique. Unless you

have this one fundamental requisite, a thousand rules on

how to study will avail little, And if you do have this

cardinal endowment, then you can achieve wonders

without reading any suggestions for getting the most out

of a book.

What is this magic requirement? Just this: a deep,

driving desire to learn, a vigorous determination to increase

your ability to deal with people.

How can you develop such an urge? By constantly

reminding yourself how important these principles are

to you. Picture to yourself how their mastery will aid you

in leading a richer, fuller, happier and more fulfilling

life. Say to yourself over and over: "My popularity, my

happiness and sense of worth depend to no small extent

upon my skill in dealing with people.”

2. Read each chapter rapidly at first to get a bird's-eye

view of it. You will probably be tempted then to rush on

to the next one. But don’t - unless you are reading

merely for entertainment. But if you are reading because

you want to increase your skill in human relations, then

go back and reread each chapter thoroughly. In the long

run, this will mean saving time and getting results.

3. Stop frequently in your reading to think over what

you are reading. Ask yourself just how and when you can

apply each suggestion.

4. Read with a crayon, pencil, pen, magic marker or

highlighter in your hand. When you come across a suggestion

that you feel you can use, draw a line beside it.

If it is a four-star suggestion, then underscore every sentence

or highlight it, or mark it with “****.” Marking and

underscoring a book makes it more interesting, and far

easier to review rapidly.

5. I knew a woman who had been office manager for

a large insurance concern for fifteen years. Every month,

she read all the insurance contracts her company had

issued that month. Yes, she read many of the same contracts

over month after month, year after year. Why? Because

experience had taught her that that was the only

way she could keep their provisions clearly in mind.

I once spent almost two years writing a book on public

speaking and yet I found I had to keep going back over

it from time to time in order to remember what I had

written in my own book. The rapidity with which we

forget is astonishing.

So, if you want to get a real, lasting benefit out of this

book, don’t imagine that skimming through it once will

suffice. After reading it thoroughly, you ought to spend

a few hours reviewing it every month, Keep it on your

desk in front of you every day. Glance through it often.

Keep constantly impressing yourself with the rich possibilities

for improvement that still lie in the offing. Remember

that the use of these principles can be made

habitual only by a constant and vigorous campaign of

review and application. There is no other way.

6. Bernard Shaw once remarked: “If you teach a man

anything, he will never learn.” Shaw was right. Learning

is an active process. We learn by doing. So, if you desire

to master the principles you are studying in this

book, do something about them. Apply these rules at

every opportunity. If you don’t you will forget them

quickly. Only knowledge that is used sticks in your

mind.

You will probably find it difficult to apply these suggestions

all the time. I know because I wrote the book,

and yet frequently I found it difficult to apply everything

I advocated. For example, when you are displeased, it is

much easier to criticize and condemn than it is to try to

understand the other person’s viewpoint. It is frequently

easier to find fault than to find praise. It is more natural

to talk about what vou want than to talk about what the

other person wants. And so on, So, as you read this book,

remember that you are not merely trying to acquire information.

You are attempting to form new habits. Ah

yes, you are attempting a new way of life. That will require

time and persistence and daily application.

So refer to these pages often. Regard this as a working

handbook on human relations; and whenever you are

confronted with some specific problem - such as handling

a child, winning your spouse to your way of thinking,

or satisfying an irritated customer - hesitate about

doing the natural thing, the impulsive thing. This is usually

wrong. Instead, turn to these pages and review the

paragraphs you have underscored. Then try these new

ways and watch them achieve magic for you.

7. Offer your spouse, your child or some business

associate a dime or a dollar every time he or she catches

you violating a certain principle. Make a lively game out

of mastering these rules.

8. The president of an important Wall Street bank

once described, in a talk before one of my classes, a

highly efficient system he used for self-improvement.

This man had little formal schooling; yet he had become

one of the most important financiers in America, and he

confessed that he owed most of his success to the constant

application of his homemade system. This is what

he does, I’ll put it in his own words as accurately as I

can remember.

“For years I have kept an engagement book showing

all the appointments I had during the day. My family

never made any plans for me on Saturday night, for the

family knew that I devoted a part of each Saturday evening

to the illuminating process of self-examination and

review and appraisal. After dinner I went off by myself,

opened my engagement book, and thought over all the

interviews, discussions and meetings that had taken

place during the week. I asked myself:

‘What mistakes did I make that time?’

‘What did I do that was right-and in what way

could I have improved my performance?’

‘What lessons can I learn from that experience?’

“I often found that this weekly review made me very

unhappy. I was frequently astonished at my own blunders.

Of course, as the years passed, these blunders became

less frequent. Sometimes I was inclined to pat

myself on the back a little after one of these sessions.

This system of self-analysis, self-education, continued

year after year, did more for me than any other one thing

I have ever attempted.

“It helped me improve my ability to make decisions

 - and it aided me enormously in all my contacts with

people. I cannot recommend it too highly.”

Why not use a similar system to check up on your

application of the principles discussed in this book? If

you do, two things will result.

First, you will find yourself engaged in an educational

process that is both intriguing and priceless.

Second, you will find that your ability to meet and

deal with people will grow enormously.

9. You will find at the end of this book several blank

pages on which you should record your triumphs in the

application of these principles. Be specific. Give names,

dates, results. Keeping such a record will inspire you to

greater efforts; and how fascinating these entries will be

when you chance upon them some evening years from

now!

In order to get the most out of this book:

a. Develop a deep, driving desire to master the principles

of human relations,

b. Read each chapter twice before going on to the next

one.

c. As you read, stop frequently to ask yourself how

you can apply each suggestion.

d. Underscore each important idea.

e. Review this book each month.

f . Apply these principles at every opportunity. Use

this volume as a working handbook to help you

solve your daily problems.

g. Make a lively game out of your learning by offering

some friend a dime or a dollar every time he or she

catches you violating one of these principles.

h. Check up each week on the progress you are mak-ing.

Ask yourself what mistakes you have made,

what improvement, what lessons you have learned

for the future.

i. Keep notes in the back of this book showing how

and when you have applied these principles.

PART O N E

Fundamental Techniques in

Handling People

“IF YOU WANT TO GATHER

HONEY, DON’T KICK OVER THE

BEEHIVE”

On May 7, 1931, the most sensational manhunt New

York City had ever known had come to its climax. After

weeks of search, “Two Gun” Crowley - the killer, the

gunman who didn’t smoke or drink - was at bay, trapped

in his sweetheart’s apartment on West End Avenue.

One hundred and fifty policemen and detectives laid

siege to his top-floor hideway. They chopped holes in

the roof; they tried to smoke out Crowley, the “cop

killer,” with teargas. Then they mounted their machine

guns on surrounding buildings, and for more than an

hour one of New York’s fine residential areas reverberated

with the crack of pistol fire and the
rut-tat-tat
of

machine guns. Crowley, crouching behind an over-

stuffed chair, fired incessantly at the police. Ten thousand

excited people watched the battle. Nothing like it

ever been seen before on the sidewalks of New

York.

When Crowley was captured, Police Commissioner

E. P. Mulrooney declared that the two-gun desperado

was one of the most dangerous criminals ever encountered

in the history of New York. “He will kill,” said the

Commissioner, “at the drop of a feather.”

But how did “Two Gun” Crowley regard himself? We

know, because while the police were firing into his

apartment, he wrote a letter addressed “To whom it may

concern, ” And, as he wrote, the blood flowing from his

wounds left a crimson trail on the paper. In this letter

Crowley said: “Under my coat is a weary heart, but a

kind one - one that would do nobody any harm.”

A short time before this, Crowley had been having a

necking party with his girl friend on a country road out

on Long Island. Suddenly a policeman walked up to the

car and said: “Let me see your license.”

Without saying a word, Crowley drew his gun and cut

the policeman down with a shower of lead. As the dying

officer fell, Crowley leaped out of the car, grabbed the

officer’s revolver, and fired another bullet into the prostrate

body. And that was the killer who said: “Under my

coat is a weary heart, but a kind one - one that would do

nobody any harm.’

Crowley was sentenced to the electric chair. When he

arrived at the death house in Sing Sing, did he say, “This

is what I get for killing people”? No, he said: “This is

what I get for defending myself.”

The point of the story is this: “Two Gun” Crowley

didn’t blame himself for anything.

Is that an unusual attitude among criminals? If you

think so, listen to this:

“I have spent the best years of my life giving people

the lighter pleasures, helping them have a good time,

and all I get is abuse, the existence of a hunted man.”

That’s Al Capone speaking. Yes, America’s most notorious

Public Enemy- the most sinister gang leader who

ever shot up Chicago. Capone didn’t condemn himself.

He actually regarded himself as a public benefactor - an

unappreciated and misunderstood public benefactor.

And so did Dutch Schultz before he crumpled up

under gangster bullets in Newark. Dutch Schultz, one of

New York’s most notorious rats, said in a newspaper interview

that he was a public benefactor. And he believed

it.

I have had some interesting correspondence with

Lewis Lawes, who was warden of New York’s infamous

Sing Sing prison for many years, on this subject, and he

declared that “few of the criminals in Sing Sing regard

themselves as bad men. They are just as human as you

and I. So they rationalize, they explain. They can tell

you why they had to crack a safe or be quick on the

trigger finger. Most of them attempt by a form of reasoning,

fallacious or logical, to justify their antisocial acts

even to themselves, consequently stoutly maintaining

that they should never have been imprisoned at all.”

If Al Capone, “Two Gun” Crowley, Dutch Schultz,

and the desperate men and women behind prison walls

don’t blame themselves for anything - what about the

people with whom you and I come in contact?

John Wanamaker, founder of the stores that bear his

name, once confessed: “I learned thirty years ago that it

is foolish to scold. I have enough trouble overcoming my

own limitations without fretting over the fact that God

has not seen fit to distribute evenly the gift of intelligence.”

Wanamaker learned this lesson early, but I personally

had to blunder through this old world for a third of a

century before it even began to dawn upon me that

ninety-nine times out of a hundred, people don’t criticize

themselves for anything, no matter how wrong it

may be.

Criticism is futile because it puts a person on the defensive

and usually makes him strive to justify himself.

Criticism is dangerous, because it wounds a person’s

precious pride, hurts his sense of importance, and

arouses resentment.

B. F. Skinner, the world-famous psychologist, proved

through his experiments that an animal rewarded for

good behavior will learn much more rapidly and retain

what it learns far more effectively than an animal punished

for bad behavior. Later studies have shown that

the same applies to humans. By criticizing, we do not

make lasting changes and often incur resentment.

Hans Selye, another great psychologist, said, “As

much as we thirst for approval, we dread condemnation,”

The resentment that criticism engenders can demoralize

employees, family members and friends, and still

not correct the situation that has been condemned.

George B. Johnston of Enid, Oklahoma, is the safety

coordinator for an engineering company, One of his re-sponsibilities

is to see that employees wear their hard

hats whenever they are on the job in the field. He reported

that whenever he came across workers who were

not wearing hard hats, he would tell them with a lot of

authority of the regulation and that they must comply.

As a result he would get sullen acceptance, and often

after he left, the workers would remove the hats.

He decided to try a different approach. The next time

he found some of the workers not wearing their hard hat,

he asked if the hats were uncomfortable or did not fit

properly. Then he reminded the men in a pleasant tone

of voice that the hat was designed to protect them from

injury and suggested that it always be worn on the job.

The result was increased compliance with the regulation

with no resentment or emotional upset.

You will find examples of the futility of criticism bristling

on a thousand pages of history, Take, for example,

the famous quarrel between Theodore Roosevelt and

President Taft - a quarrel that split the Republican

party, put Woodrow Wilson in the White House, and

wrote bold, luminous lines across the First World War

and altered the flow of history. Let’s review the facts

quickly. When Theodore Roosevelt stepped out of the

White House in 1908, he supported Taft, who was

elected President. Then Theodore Roosevelt went off to

Africa to shoot lions. When he returned, he exploded.

He denounced Taft for his conservatism, tried to secure

the nomination for a third term himself, formed the Bull

Moose party, and all but demolished the G.O.P. In the

election that followed, William Howard Taft and the Republican

party carried only two states - Vermont and

Utah. The most disastrous defeat the party had ever

known.

Theodore Roosevelt blamed Taft, but did President

Taft blame himself? Of course not, With tears in his

eyes, Taft said: “I don’t see how I could have done any

differently from what I have.”

Who was to blame? Roosevelt or Taft? Frankly, I don’t

know, and I don’t care. The point I am trying to make is

that all of Theodore Roosevelt’s criticism didn’t persuade

Taft that he was wrong. It merely made Taft strive

to justify himself and to reiterate with tears in his eyes:

“I don’t see how I could have done any differently from

what I have.”

Or, take the Teapot Dome oil scandal. It kept the

newspapers ringing with indignation in the early 1920s.

It rocked the nation! Within the memory of living men,

nothing like it had ever happened before in American

public life. Here are the bare facts of the scandal: Albert

B. Fall, secretary of the interior in Harding’s cabinet,

was entrusted with the leasing of government oil reserves

at Elk Hill and Teapot Dome - oil reserves that

had been set aside for the future use of the Navy. Did

secretary Fall permit competitive bidding? No sir. He

handed the fat, juicy contract outright to his friend Edward

L. Doheny. And what did Doheny do? He gave

Secretary Fall what he was pleased to call a “loan” of

one hundred thousand dollars. Then, in a high-handed

manner, Secretary Fall ordered United States Marines

into the district to drive off competitors whose adjacent

wells were sapping oil out of the Elk Hill reserves.

These competitors, driven off their ground at the ends of

guns and bayonets, rushed into court - and blew the lid

off the Teapot Dome scandal. A stench arose so vile that

it ruined the Harding Administration, nauseated an entire

nation, threatened to wreck the Republican party,

and put Albert B. Fall behind prison bars.

Fall was condemned viciously - condemned as few

men in public life have ever been. Did he repent?

Never! Years later Herbert Hoover intimated in a public

speech that President Harding’s death had been due to

mental anxiety and worry because a friend had betrayed

him. When Mrs. Fall heard that, she sprang from her

chair, she wept, she shook her fists at fate and screamed:

"What! Harding betrayed by Fall? No! My husband

never betrayed anyone. This whole house full of gold

would not tempt my husband to do wrong. He is the one

who has been betrayed and led to the slaughter and crucified.”

There you are; human nature in action, wrongdoers,

blaming everybody but themselves. We are all like that.

So when you and I are tempted to criticize someone

tomorrow, let’s remember Al Capone, “Two Gun”

Crowley and Albert Fall. Let’s realize that criticisms are

like homing pigeons. They always return home. Let’s

realize that the person we are going to correct and condemn

will probably justify himself or herself, and condemn

us in return; or, like the gentle Taft, will say: “I

don’t see how I could have done any differently from

what I have.”

On the morning of April 15, 1865, Abraham Lincoln

lay dying in a hall bedroom of a cheap lodging house

directly across the street from Ford’s Theater, where

John Wilkes Booth had shot him. Lincoln’s long body

lay stretched diagonally across a sagging bed that was

too short for him. A cheap reproduction of Rosa Bonheur’s

famous painting
The Horse Fair
hung above the

bed, and a dismal gas jet flickered yellow light.

As Lincoln lay dying, Secretary of War Stanton said,

“There lies the most perfect ruler of men that the world

has ever seen.”

What was the secret of Lincoln’s success in dealing

with people? I studied the life of Abraham Lincoln for

ten years and devoted all of three years to writing and

rewriting a book entitled
Lincoln the Unknown.
I believe

I have made as detailed and exhaustive a study of

Lincoln’s personality and home life as it is possible for

any being to make. I made a special study of Lincoln’s

method of dealing with people. Did he indulge in criticism?

Oh, yes. As a young man in the Pigeon Creek

Valley of Indiana, he not only criticized but he wrote

letters and poems ridiculing people and dropped these

letters on the country roads where they were sure to be

found. One of these letters aroused resentments that

burned for a lifetime.

Even after Lincoln had become a practicing lawyer in

Springfield, Illinois, he attacked his opponents openly

in letters published in the newspapers. But he did this

just once too often.

In the autumn of 1842 he ridiculed a vain, pugnacious

politician by the name of James Shields. Lincoln lamned

him through an anonymous letter published in

Springfield
Journal
. The town roared with laughter.

Shields, sensitive and proud, boiled with indignation.

He found out who wrote the letter, leaped on his horse,

started after Lincoln, and challenged him to fight a duel.

Lincoln didn’t want to fight. He was opposed to dueling,

but he couldn’t get out of it and save his honor. He was

given the choice of weapons. Since he had very long

arms, he chose cavalry broadswords and took lessons in

sword fighting from a West Point graduate; and, on the

appointed day, he and Shields met on a sandbar in the

Mississippi River, prepared to fight to the death; but, at

the last minute, their seconds interrupted and stopped