How to Win Friends and Influence People

If Cialdini explains the mechanism of influence, Carnegie explains the practice. I read it after Influence and felt the difference straight away: fewer experiments, more people. It's one of the best books I've read on the subject.

What's striking is how simple the ideas are and how almost nobody applies them. Remembering people's names, talking about what interests the other person, not criticising right off the bat, letting the person feel the idea was theirs. Written like that it seems obvious, but when you try it in a tense meeting, you realise how hard it is.

I find it curious to see ideas that have technical names today showing up there intuitively, backed by stories of real people. And Carnegie has a way of writing that makes you feel you're having a conversation with him.

Some stories sound dated, and in certain passages the book comes close to teaching you to be pleasant in a calculated way. Applied without sincerity, it becomes polite manipulation, and people notice. The book itself warns about this, but I think the warning deserved more weight.

I really like the author and I'm keen to buy his other books. I recommend it to practically anyone, especially technical people who think competence speaks for itself.