How to Instantly Connect with Anyone
How to Instantly Connect
with Anyone
LEIL LOWNDES
Copyright © 2009 by Leil Lowndes. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a data base or retrieval system, with out the prior written permission of the publisher.
ISBN: 978-0-07-154586-0
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Contents
Introduction: What Determines Social and Professional Success?
PART ONE: SEVEN LITTLE TRICKS TO MAKE A GREAT IMPRESSION BEFORE PEOPLE EVEN MEET YOU
How to Develop Excellent Eye Contact in Ten Easy Steps
How to Use Your Eyes to Make People Crave Your Approval
How to Wear Confidence When Meeting People
How to Make People Appreciate Your Introduction
How to Get Them “Dying to Meet You”
How to Make Everyone Anxious to Hear Your Opinion
PART TWO: ELEVEN LITTLE TRICKS TO TAKE THE “HELL” OUT OF “HELLO” AND PUT THE “GOOD” IN “GOOD-BYE”
How to Have a One-of-a-Kind, Noticeably Outstanding Handshake
How to Exchange Business Cards with Class
How to Be a Successful Networking Conversationalist
How to Give—or Avoid—Social Hugs
How to Detect if Someone’s Hug Is Fake
How to Show You Like Someone With out Being Forward
How to Play It Cool or Play It Hot in Business and Love
How to Say Hello to Prestigious People
How to Meet the People You Want
How to Make a Great Last Impression
PART THREE: TWELVE LITTLE TRICKS TO DEVELOP AN EXTRAORDINARY GIFT OF GAB
How to Get Lively Conversation Going with People You’ve Just Met
How to Start a Friendship with Complete Strangers
How to Never Hesitate Starting or Joining a Conversation
How to Make Your Point When You Keep Getting Interrupted
How to Make Friends with Those Who Don’t Speak Your Native Language
How to Tailor Your Talk to Your Listener(s)
How to Talk to Less Advantaged People
How to Save Someone from “Dying of Embarrassment”
How to Smoothly Change the Subject
How to Know When to Never Change the Subject
How to Not Give the Same Answer Twice
PART FOUR: TEN LITTLE TRICKS TO ACTUALLY ENJOY PARTIES!
How to Make Friends at a Big Party
How to Meet the People You Want in an Unusual Way
How to Never Look Lost and Lonely at a Gathering
How to Ask Great Conversation-Starter Questions
How to Save Face When You’ve Forgotten a Name
How to Hide the Fact That You Haven’t a Clue What They’re Talking About
How to Get away from Nonstop Talkers
How to Deal with VIPs at Social Events
PART FIVE: FIVE LITTLE TRICKS TO HANDLE INVITATIONS: THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE BUMMERS
How to Increase the Chances of Someone Saying “Yes” to Your Invitation
How to Turn Someone Down While Retaining His or Her Affection
How to Handle an Unavoidable Bummer
How to Prevent People Wishing They’d Never Invited You
How to Impress Guests
PART SIX: THIRTEEN LITTLE TRICKS TO BE A COOL COMMUNICATOR
How to Play It Cool When You’re Late
How to Come Out Smelling like a Rose When You’re as Guilty as Heck
How to Come Across as Dependable and Competent
How to Talk Behind People’s Backs so They Love It
How to Make Everyone Comfortable Speaking with You
How to Make People Look Up to You
How to Exude a More Authoritative Air
How to Make Your Signature 21 Percent More Prestigious
How to Laugh Your Way to Being Respected
How to Escape Bores With out Hurting Their Feelings
How to Read People’s Minds
PART SEVEN: TWELVE LITTLE TRICKS TO AVOID THE THIRTEEN MOST COMMON DUMB THINGS YOU SHOULD NEVER SAY OR DO
How to Avoid People Thinking You Have No Status at Your Job
How to Avoid Sounding like Someone Else Rules Your Life
How to Avoid People Saying “Get a Life!”
How to Know When Not to Be Friendly
How to Avoid Sounding Dishonest
How to Avoid Sounding Immature
How to Avoid Big Cats Considering You Commonplace
How to Avoid Common Dumb Phrases People Say All the Time
How to Avoid Alienating Friends When Traveling
How to Avoid a Common Holiday Custom That Makes You Look like a Little Puss to Big Cats
PART EIGHT: ELEVEN LITTLE TRICKS TO GIVE YOUR E-MAIL TODAY’S PERSONALITY AND TOMORROW’S PROFESSIONALISM
How to Prove You Are Special When You Are Out of the Office
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How to Make People Smile When They See Your Message
How to Make Your E-Mail Sound Confident
How to Avoid Sounding Egotistical in Your E-Mail
How to Sound like You Have a Crystal Ball
How to Avoid Making People Think You’re Goofing Off at Work
How to Avoid E-Mail Humiliation—or Worse!
How to Sign Your Messages in the New Millennium
PART NINE: TEN LITTLE TRICKS TO MAKE A BIG IMPRESSION ON YOUR CELL (A.K.A. “PHONE”)
How to Know When to E-Mail, When to Phone
How to Boost Their Self-Esteem with Your Cell Phone
How to Deal with a Caller When You Don’t Know Who the Heck It Is
How to Get Rid of “Talk Your Ear Off” People
How to Please Them by Hanging Up on Them
How to Sound Cool Giving Your Phone Number
How to Impress Them with Your Voice Mail Message
How to Make Your Phone Voice “Music to Their Ears”
How the Phone Can Reveal Who the Boss Is in a Relationship
PART TEN: FIVE LITTLE TRICKS TO DEEPEN THE RELATIONSHIPS YOU ALREADY HAVE
How to Win Their Hearts—a Year Later!
How to Make Them Always Remember Your “Thank You”
How to Give Them Compliments They’ll Never Forget
How to Enhance Your Relationship with Your Partner
How to React When Your Partner Calls You the Wrong Name
A Final Visit to the Laboratory
Bibliography
Introduction
What Determines Social and Professional Success?
For all the hair styling, shoe shining, suit buying, and personality projecting we do, we never really know why some people succeed in life and others don’t. Some highly successful and beloved people are shy. Others are boisterous. Some big winners in life are sophisticated. Others are simple. Many introverts are esteemed, while some extroverts are shunned. And, unless you are auditioning to host the Academy Awards, your personality and looks are not the keys to becoming beloved and successful in life. So what is the key? Will this book help you find out?
Let me tell you what this book will do—and what it will not do—and then you decide. I do not guarantee you will soon be chatting comfortably with a commodities broker about crude oil futures. Nor do I assure deep discourse with a doctor of philosophy on his dissertation. What I do pledge, however, is that you will be able to meet people confidently, converse comfortably, and quickly connect with everyone you encounter.
You have probably already discovered the invisible personal and professional glass ceiling constructed solidly over your head, my head, and everybody else’s head. This book will help you craft a weapon to smash this invidious enemy by mastering communication subtleties you may have never even known existed. And, of course, it will also tell you how to avoid saying and doing those “dumb little things” that make people disconnect from you—thereby losing their potential business, friendship, or love.
You will also learn how to give them an extraordinary gift, the gift of self-esteem. This is something that, sadly, people seldom consider when dealing with others.
How do you do this?
Let’s Go to the Laboratory to Find Out
You and a professor of psychiatry walk into a lab and see two naked men sitting in straight-back chairs, wearing nothing but embarrassed smiles on their faces. The professor mercifully throws each a blanket while explaining your assignment for the day.
“These two gentlemen,” he informs you, “both work in a multinational corporation. One is the CEO. He has a loving family, faithful employees, and adoring friends. He has enough money to enjoy life, care for everyone he loves, and even donate generously to charity.
“The other,” he continues, “cleans floors at the company. He, too, is a good and honest man. However, this fellow has a string of failed relationships and few friends, and he has trouble making ends meet.
“You, my dear student, are to determine which is which.”
You look at the two men quizzically. There doesn’t seem to be much difference between them. They look to be about the same age, of comparable weight, similar complexions, and, if it can be determined by looks, equal intelligence. The professor walks toward the men and lifts the bottoms of the blankets, revealing four bare feet. “Is this a hint?” he asks you.
“Uh, no,” you respond, bewildered by his insinuation that it might be.
He then pulls the blanket up higher to reveal their knees and thighs. Walking back to you, he asks, “Is this a hint?”
Now you are more befuddled. You shake your head no. As the professor returns to the blankets, you close your eyes and fear the worst. Then, you haltingly open them. You and the gentlemen under the blankets breathe a sigh of relief. The professor has merely revealed their heads and upper torsos.
He strokes his goatee, looks at you piercingly, asking the same question with his eyes. You look at one man, then the other, then back at the first. Neither would make the cut for a Cosmo centerfold, but you would classify bot has handsome.
“I’m sorry, I can’t tell who has which job,” you respond.
The professor is not surprised. He continues, “What if I were to tell you that both men were born into families of the same socioeconomic status, grew up in the same neighborhood, played together as children, went to the same schools, and tested similarly on an IQ test?”
Now you are completely flummoxed.
If It’s Not Looks, Intelligence, Education, Money, or Upbringing, What Is It?
Have you ever been similarly confused? You see two people who, from all outward appearances, are similar. Yet one is successful, the other a failure. One lives above that glass ceiling where only winners dwell. The other looks up longingly, asking himself, “Why are they up there, and I’m still struggling down here?”
Some people think the big boys and big girls residing above the glass ceiling are shielding their turf and won’t let anyone else in. That’s not true. They want you to break through. It can be lonely up there. In a sense, they are auditioning you to be one of them.
I have several actor friends who, after not “making the cut” in an audition, don’t realize the directors are even more disappointed. They are desperate to find the right person to cast. Likewise, big winners long to find others to welcome to their club. Like all of us, they want to enjoy the company of companions on their own level. Unfortunately, many people who think the big cats are biased don’t recognize that their own blunders barred them from being accepted.
Back to the Laboratory
The professor repeats his question. “Which of these gentlemen is the CEO and which cleans the floors?”
You shrug, “I give up.”
The professor smiles, turns to his subjects, and says, “Thank you gentlemen, you may go now.” They are as thankful as you that the experiment is over. Grasping their blankets tightly around themselves, they stand.
Subject number one turns to subject number two and says, “Bet you’re glad that’s over, Joe. Good job!” Walking out the door, he looks at you and says, “I know that must have been an uncomfortable experiment for both of you. I hope the next is pleasanter. You must be doing very important research.”
As subject number two starts to leave, he says, “Glad I could help you out.” He pauses for a moment at the door, looking expectant. The professor hands him some money. Subject number two quickly takes it and starts to put it in his pocket . . . until he realizes he doesn’t have one.
The professor closes the door and once again asks you the big question: “So, my dear student, which is the CEO and which is the cleaner?”
With a big smile, you confidently reply, “The first is the CEO.”
“Right!” The professor is ecstatic. “And how did you know?”
You conjecture, “Well, the first fellow was concerned with the other man’s feelings, and ours too. The other guy, come to think of it, said ‘I am glad I
could help you out,’ putting the emphasis on himself. That made it sound like we owed him something.”
“Exactly!” With a eureka expression, the professor clarifies, “You see, the first gentleman put himself in the other person’s mind-set, thus creating an instant connection with him. He predicted Joe’s discomfort and complimented him to alleviate it.
“The second fellow, because he had the ‘you owe me’ attitude, encouraged me to ‘pay him off.’ Thus we have no further debt to him.”
You agree, “Yes, whereas if the first man asked us a small favor, even years from now, we would gladly grant it.
“Uh, but Professor,” you hesitantly ask, “Why were they naked?”
He answers, “The reason I stripped them of their clothes for this experiment was to shrink their comfort level and thus see how each would react in a strange or new situation—as we all must do daily.”
The professor looks at you. “Did you sense how much more confident the CEO was? That was because he predicted how the other fellow felt being put in that painful position. Therefore, his own discomfort took a back seat. Do you remember his first words? ‘Bet you’re glad that’s over, Joe. Good job!’ He sensed that Joe needed a self-esteem booster.
“He was also confident because, over the years, people have given him their respect and warmth. And why is that? Because he treats everyone the way he did the three of us. He predicted our various emotions and responded accordingly.
“The CEO also thought about our emotions. He understood that conducting an experiment with two naked men was probably uncomfortable for us as well. Do you remember what he said?”
You do. “He forecast our emotions and expressed trust in the significance of our research. He then wished us well.”
The Difference Between Winners and Losers in Life
The CEO displayed what I call Emotional Prediction, or EP. He was able to predict how Joe, the professor, and you would feel right after the experiment. With just a few sentences, he connected with everyone and made them feel more comfortable.
Some people instinctively possess this heretofore unnamed quality. Unfortunately, the majority doesn’t. EP is so complex that people can seldom predict their own emotions, let alone those of others.