is the title of a book written by Dale Carnegie. He wrote the book over 70 years ago and it has sold over 16,000,000 copies since. Rightly so, because it was the first and I feel is still the best book ever written on communication skills. I’ve been neglecting this blog, and I’ve decided to use it for a different purpose now. I’m going to keep a record of my experiences using this skills in this book to mark my progress as a better communicator. This will be a fresh new start to achieve the dream of improving my relationships with friends and family as well as creating an abundance of new ones.

For this first post, I’m going to list all of the principles taught by the book just to remind me and give anyone reading this an overview of what the book is about. And I’m going to take up a challenge that the author suggests at the beginning:

— For every time anyone catches me violating one of these principles, I’ll give them 25 cents credit towards boba/gelato/yogurt park/goodies. Catch me on a bad day and you might make yourself a few dollars, but not if I can help it =p

I’ve written the Golden Rules of effective communication on one of the text widgets to the right so I and anyone else can always refer to them easily =)

Here is my first experience using the principles in the book.

Five Star Service at a One Star Shop
Paul’s Shoe Repair was not the first shoe repair shop that I had gone to in order to get a replacement heel for the boots I had bought in Japan. The last place I went had replaced my heel, but it had barely lasted the wear and tear of over a month and a half. I didn’t know much about shoes to know that one and a half months is not a very long time, but I did after I went into Paul’s Shoe Repair on Shattuck. I went in and talked to Jim, one of the workers there. I asked about his background in the business (over 40 years and counting) and praised him on the fact that his knowledge and experience could be felt in the way he talked about shoe repair. The service he gave me was stellar. He explained to me all the different materials the boot was made up of, how to care for the boot, and the different options I had for prolonging the life of the boot. Not only that, but when I got the boot back it the job was done flawlessly.

Naturally, when I got a new pair of boots the first place I took it was Paul’s. This time I just went in to get business done without really bothering to say hi to Jim or making much conversation. The lady at the counter took my order with a grumpy face, and avoided any questions I had with evasive answers. I didn’t really feel too good about the transaction afterwards though, so I decided to go back later and talk to Jim. When I looked online to check the shop’s hours I found several reviews about the shop, and all except one gave them one star out of five. The shop had done work that had ruined some shoes and made mistakes like giving boots to the wrong customer.

I went back to Paul’s later on and walked into the shop with a smile on my face and said hi to the lady at the counter, who smiled back. I asked for Jim, made sure to greet him by his name, praised him for the work he had done on my other boots, and told him how I was excited about letting him work on my boots again. I took the time to also talk to the other workers and learn their names. Turns out the lady had made a mistake on my order because she hadn’t cared to be thorough. They gladly apologized and corrected the error, gave the same great service as I had the last time, and Jim went the extra mile to make calls and find out about the material of my boots (I wasn’t sure) so he would be able to teach me how to best maintain them in the future. In a nutshell: a smile, showing appreciation for good work and an interest in others’ work turned a one star service into a five star one!