The new rules of persuasion for a diverse world-a twenty-first-century update of Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People by a popular professor at Yale School of Management, filled with stories based on cutting-edge behavioral science.
Zoe Chance has been a telemarketer, a door-to-door salesperson, and the brand manager for massive accounts. Years spent trying to get people to buy stuff they didn't really want or need taught her something fundamental about human nature and about how to really influence people over the long term: The transactional approach just doesn't work. So Chance went to Harvard Business School, where she worked with famous behavioral scientist Dan Ariely, author of Predictably Irrational, to understand what did.
Of the hundreds of books written about influence, nearly all focus narrowly on one-time transactions that are often framed in the winner-take-all language of the battleground. But nobody wants to be a target, and few of us want to think of our colleagues, family members, or even customers that way.
When we shift our focus away from short-term transactional influence, we see that to be genuinely influential we need to work together with other people rather than trying to have power over them. Chance shows us how and why we need to listen with the purpose of liking another person rather than trying to be liked; ask the magic question, "What will it take?"; reduce friction for others, making it easier for them to take action after they've said yes; diminish our diminishers ("I'm sorry," "I could be wrong," etc.); say no; and use every negotiation as a way to make things better for everyone involved.
In Influence for Nice People, Chance distills her extensive research into absorbing narratives that will help you make meaningful change in your life, your work, and the wider world. Zoe Chance teaches influence and persuasion at Yale School of Management. Her research has been published in top academic journals like Proceedings of the National Academy of Science and Psychological Science and covered by the Harvard Business Review, The Economist, BBC, Time, Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and The New York Times. Thinkers50 named Zoe one of the world's top up-and-coming management thinkers. Her framework for behavior change is the foundation for Google's food program, helping 70,000 employees make healthier choices every day. Before coming to Yale, she earned a doctorate in marketing at Harvard, worked in sales jobs like door-knocking and telemarketing, and managed a $200 million segment of the Barbie brand at Mattel.
