Talking the Winner's Way 92 Little Tricks for Big Success in Business and Personal Relations... Book

A useful collection of tips for social interactions, mostly for business networking. They emphasize nonverbal communication such as body language and vocal tone. This book definitely increased my awareness of my social behavior, and I’ll keep several of the tips in mind.

If you’ve read How to Win Friends and Influence People (my review) or other books about winning people over, you won’t find much new here. However, there are a few tips that countered common wisdom, such as waiting until after a caller announces their name to sound excited (rather than sounding excited as soon as you answer). Some tips seem disingenuous and manipulative, such as timing your smile, crafting your compliments, and altering your behavior, but most are sound.

I listened to the audiobook, which is energetically read by the author. She comes across as overconfident, but she’s also funny at times. The 3.5-hour recording contains 62 tips instead of the book’s 92.

By the way, besides How to Win Friends, I highly recommend Never Eat Alone (my review).

My favorite tips
• When introduced to someone, pivot 100% towards them.
• When asked what you do, give an explanation along with your job title.
• Listen for the other person to drop clues about their interests, then ask about them.
• Keep turning the “spotlight” of conversation on the other person.
• Parrot the other person’s last few words, in the form of a question, to keep the conversation going.
• Ask “How do you spend most of your time?” not “What do you do?”
• Mimic the motions and manners of the other person.
• Mimic the words and phrases of the other person.
• Use the words “we”, “us”, and “our” to imply camaraderie.
• The killer compliment: privately and sincerely compliment the other person on a specific, attractive quality or trait. Don't do this more than twice a year per person, or you'll dilute its effect.
• On the phone, replace gestures with words.
• On the phone, use a person’s name much more often than when face-to-face.