Losing the plot: why you misread Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People
I hate this book title. For years I resisted reading Dale Carnegie’s classic How to Win Friends and Influence People, thinking a more appropriate title would be How to Coerce Friendship and Manipulate People. But I eventually came around — to the title and overall message. Yet something was off. What I read was a self help book, not a playbook for, well, winning friends and influencing people.
I blame the outline. The structure of the text misleads readers to a distorted version of the overarching theme which, in my opinion, is sincerity and having a genuine interest in others. But I think the reader is made to believe that the chapters, and examples therein, are cut and dried rules for getting what you want.
As humans, we want to follow rules. We think it will make us successful or help us get the date or keep us safe. If you do A, then you get B. Simple enough. So on it’s face, the book’s index reads like a to-do list of easy-to-follow rules. If the reader follows these steps, they will get (they won’t) money and power and fame and life they want. That’s how you sell more than 30 millions copies.
We see this again in the chapter examples. Carnegie recounts stories from business titans like Charles Schwab, and how they won success through smiling, remembering someone’s name, or being a good listener. But the way the book is laid out turns useful advice into blunt tools. This is the genesis story of: “I hear what you’re saying but…”
I’m not an editor, although I work with some damn fine ones. And what I’ve learned from their tutelage is the importance of organization and layout — even if you have to cut up and rearrange the rough draft like a 5th grader. It’s this organization that brings the overall message of a piece of writing to the surface.
What lies beneath Carnegie’s book is a timeless message of sincerity and authenticity. I believe THIS is what he intended. He says as much. In the chapter titled “How to Spur People On to Success”, the author tucks away a gem of a sentence that belongs on the first page:
“The Principles taught in this book will work only when they come from the heart. I am not advocating a bag of tricks. I am talking about a new way of life.”
Well, why didn’t you lead with that Dale?
A Hundred Monkeys has three brand attributes: direct communication, fastidious follow up, and empathetic relationships. It’s the last principle that seems to rise like the north star when we talk about who we are and who we want to be. Sure we can get emails out faster and we can cut to the chase during conversation, but empathy is what matters most.
To quote Carnegie quoting Viennese psychologist Alfred Adler: “It is the individual who is not interested in his fellow men who has the greatest difficulties in life and provides the greatest injury to others. It is from among such individuals that all human failures spring.”
