I came across this in my reading this morning. The source is Lyndon B. Johnson, former president of the U.S., and it was a "formula for success" that he wrote about and strived himself to follow. I find it interesting that pretty much all of his ideas for success involve his relationship to people. I thought forum members here might find this as interesting as i did. I'd be interested in hearing your opinion of it...

Formula for Success

1. Learn to remember names. Inefficiency at this point may indicate that your interest is not sufficiently outgoing.

2. Be a comfortable person so there is no strain in being with you. Be an old-shoe, old-hat kind of individual.

3. Acquire the quality of relaxed easy-going so that things do not ruffle you.

4. Don't be egotistical. Guard against the impression that you know it all.

5. Cultivate the quality of being interesting so people will get something of value from their association with you.

6. Study to get the "scratchy" elements out of your personality, even those of which you may be unconscious.

7. Sincerely attempt to heal, on an honest Christian basis, every misunderstanding you have had or now have. Drain off your grievances.

8. Practice liking people until you learn to do so genuinely.

9. never miss an opportunity to say a word of congratulation upon anyone's achievement, or express sympathy in sorrow or disappointment.

10. Give spiritual strength to people, and they will give genuine affection to you.

---Lyndon B. Johnson

I don't disagree with the value of learning to remember names, but what I've found from my personal attempts to do so is that I can remember names, but really learning someone's name takes place at the expense of my learning who the person IS.

Personally, I found it much better for my budding relationship with someone to be able to say "I remember that you do/like/are X,Y,Z, but I have to admit that I've forgotten your name." And go on to have a conversation based on my previous introduction or conversation with that person than to say "Hi, Jim (or whatever), how are you?" and have no memory of who they are, what they do, etc.

I'd love to be able to do both...

I think that it's true that people skills are more important that knowledge - you can always find someone who can do what you need if you have the people skills. Sadly, I'm better at the doing part than people skills myself... But I try.

Julie

I used to be terrible at remembering people's names! Then one day i thought... i hate not remembering their names because it makes it seem like i don't care about them when i really do! It seemed incongruous with how much i care about people in general. I started making just a little more effort to remember, usually be trying to link their name or just the first letter of their name to something distinctive about them (like you mentioned what they do or like), and now i'm better at remembering. To be honest, I was surprised i could improve!

Yep, I think this is great!
This may sound simple - like people are attracted to like
Like minds are attracted to like
Like thoughts are attracted to like
If you are interested, there is more practical ways to do this every day at: NigelPendrigh. Com/Interview
You have to be what you want to attract and these 10 ideas are a great place to start as you will attract like-minded positive people and you will empower each other