Forget about asking yourself if you’re likeable
I write a lot about how people have to be likeable to get what they want in life. I get so frustrated, though, because everyone thinks they are likeable. Maybe to their dog, yes, but in my experience most people are not nearly as likeable as they think they are.
I thought of this because I was reading a list of five tips to be likeable:
1. Be positive
2. Control your insecurities
3. Provide value
4. Eliminate all judgments
5. Become a person of conviction
And I thought, this is a great list. I should put it on my blog. Then I thought, forget it. People will read the list and think they have all these qualities and then move on. But don’t do that.
The problem is that the most unlikeable people are the most clueless so they are the least able to become more likeable. Harvard Business Review ran a whole issue on incompetence (via Ben Casnocha) and the conclusion is, among other things, the incompetent don’t know they are incompetent.
So here’s an idea that can apply to likeable and unlikeable people while avoiding the uphill battle of getting the unlikeable to confess: Find the item on the list that is your weak point and force yourself to get better at it. No one is equally good at all five things. Improve on one. Taziana Cascario, professor at Harvard, does research in this area, and she told me that the biggest barrier to being likeable is not caring. So just pick something on the list and improve on it and stop analyzing whether or not people like you.
I am going to improve on number four by being less judgmental. After all, I just wrote a whole post about the misguided-and-unlikeable and how much they annoy me.
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5 Comments »
The item I’d most need to work is eliminating judgments.
On all the Meyers-Briggs tests, I’m always heavily on the Judging side versus the Perceiving side.
On the other hand, I think that my ability to form quick judgments is a strength, not a weakness.
Perhaps the item should be phrased, “Be open to changing your mind, and don’t let judgments prejudice your actions.” Not as clear, though!
Posted by Chris Yeh | September 22, 2006
Good point, Chris. On the Meyers-Briggs test I’m an ENTJ, and I like that. So maybe I should not try so hard to stop judging. But I have a feeling that I’m off the deep end on the J. I wish I could, one day, take the test and wonder, for one moment, if I’m maybe a P. Maybe then I would feel a little more balanced…. and be more likeable, of course :)
Posted by Penelope Trunk | September 25, 2006
(Thought I’d responded to this before but I guess it didn’t take…)
“Control your insecurities” is a good one - I once nervously but perversely confessed to a group of people I was trying to impress how scared I was of public speaking, which they were asking me to do. Felt like an idiot for days afterwards. I don’t know about likeability, but it sure wasn’t professional!
Posted by Emily | September 26, 2006
I came over because of the smart comment you left on businesspundit.
C’mon, this list is awful. Ditch the whole thing. “Make people laugh” or “flatter, flatter, flatter” will beat everything on that list of “chicken soup” strategies.
PS I like it when you are judgmental.
Posted by laurence haughton | September 27, 2006
What strikes me is that numbers four and five are contradictory. I guess I think of convictions entailing an idea of right and wrong, which means judgment about what falls into which categories.
Posted by Eva | January 3, 2008
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