How to Win Friends & Influence People
Greetings, Buckeyes! My name is Matt Gramza and I am thrilled to be in the final stretch of my academic journey here at OSU. Throughout the past four years, I have been diligently working towards my Bachelor’s degree in Accounting with a goal of completing 150 credits to qualify for the CPA (Certified Public Accountant) certification. While I’ve been fortunate to have many enriching experiences during my time at OSU, my most cherished opportunity has been serving as a Teacher’s Assistant (TA) for Introduction to Accounting courses. This role has been a cornerstone in my pursuit of my goals this semester and beyond.
For almost two decades, my focus has been on academic pursuits, and I have acquired several strategies for being an effective student. As I approach the end of this chapter, I am eager to apply new strategies and goals to help me thrive in my future professional career. Upon graduation in May, I will be embarking on a career at PwC in Columbus. Although transitioning from a student to a professional may present challenges, I am confident that the techniques and tactics I learn through this course project will equip me with the tools needed to confidently take on my first day at PwC. In order to guide my way to developing the fundamental leadership and interpersonal skills necessary for me to grow in my professional career, I have relied heavily on the techniques offered by Dale Carnegie in his book How to Win Friends and Influence People.
There are a few reasons why I opted for this book. Even though it wasn’t part of the recommended reading list for the course, my Dad introduced it to me just days before the semester started. He strongly believed that it contained valuable insights and strategies that could help me succeed and feel at ease when interacting with people, especially in a professional workplace. The material in Carnegie’s book aligned seamlessly with the course project, and I’ve relished putting my own spin on the project throughout the semester to accomplish my objectives.
As my time as a student draws to a close, I’ve seized the opportunity to incorporate strategies that I can use in my future professional endeavors. While technical expertise is undeniably critical in the field of accounting, personal skills are just as valuable to a company. Therefore, the strategies outlined in the book can be instrumental in equipping me with the skills I need to be a well-rounded employee from day one of my job.
Goals For the Semester:
- Goal #1: One of my key objectives this semester was to enhance my capacity to lead and influence people in the workplace. In public accounting, it’s tempting to remain glued to your computer and unquestioningly carry out your manager’s directives. While it’s undoubtedly critical to follow the guidance of your superiors, it’s equally vital to exhibit initiative in your work and serve as a role model capable of assuming additional responsibilities. In order to continue to progress in public accounting, possessing robust and impactful leadership skills is essential to reaching that pinnacle.
- Goal #2: My second objective for this semester was to cultivate the abilities required to optimize interpersonal relationships in the workplace. As I noted earlier, attaining promotions in the public accounting industry necessitates specific qualities. While accounting expertise is undoubtedly indispensable, exceptional interpersonal skills are relatively uncommon in this field. Being able to build meaningful relationships with coworkers and clients is critical to reaching one’s maximized potential at the company. The individuals who can showcase both their technical and personal skills over the long haul are the ones who get promoted. With that being said, I aim to leverage the strategies outlined below to boost my interpersonal skills at work over the course of the semester.
Strategies Implemented From the Book:
- Strategy 1: Become genuinely interested in other people and talk in their interests
- This strategy, aimed at improving my personal skills, has proven invaluable in forging connections with students as a TA. The approach revolves around being intriguing as well as interested while conversing with people. It’s critical to infuse discussions with passion and enthusiasm. Through this method, I’ve actively engaged with students by inquiring about their interests, and I’ve noticed that they are becoming progressively at ease with me as their TA. This closeness with my students has contributed to a more satisfying experience for everyone involved!
- Strategy 2: Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language
- This strategy emphasizes the significance of recalling someone’s name. When you recall an individual’s name, they automatically feel a personal connection and a sense of being valued. I have always struggled with remembering names. To improve this skill, I requested my students to wear name tags in class for a few weeks. This tool proved helpful in quickly learning my students’ names and feeling confident in addressing them when they had questions or responses. However, the only hurdle I faced was that some students chose not to wear name tags despite my request.
- Strategy 3: Ask question instead of giving direct orders. Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement.
- This leadership strategy has proven to be a game changer in my teaching style, as it has allowed me to become a more engaging and personable instructor. Rather than simply giving out instructions, I now take an interactive approach by posing questions to my students and involving them in problem-solving. Before each class, I identify key points in my lesson plan where I can ask questions and encourage participation. When a student answers a question, I make sure to thank and praise them, regardless of whether their response was correct. By doing so, I’ve noticed that students are more likely to contribute in the future and have become more comfortable and confident in the classroom
Tracking my Progress:
- Implementation Tracker
- In order to track and ensure I implemented these strategies into my teaching and turning routine, I have created a spreadsheet as my method of tracking. This spreadsheet ensures that I review and implement my strategies before, during, and after class time. Reviewing the strategies before teaching will keep them fresh in my mind and help me plan out how I want to implement them during class. In order to track and reflect on the strategies taken from Carnegie’s book, I wrote reflections in a digital journal. These reflections allowed me to digest the good and the bad and make recommendations on how I wanted to proceed in the future. This implementation tracker helped me clearly visualize the steps necessary to achieve my goals and ensured that each action was completed on time.
- Reflection Journal
- Like I just mentioned, after incorporating my strategies into my teaching and tutoring routine, I have been writing reflections on my experience with them. Within the reflection, I acknowledge what went well, what went poorly, and how I want to use the strategy in the future. These reflections helped me organize my thoughts and document key takeaways on how the implementation of my strategies went. These journals are quite lengthy, so I have provided the link to my reflection journal as well as an excerpt from my first week of reflections. I recommend checking out the link below to see my progress and experiences while implementing the strategies above in my problem sessions.
Major Takeaways:
- One of the most effective ways to establish a connection with someone is by genuinely showing interest in what they have to say. Rather than focusing on talking about myself, I shifted my attention towards discussing topics that align with the other person’s interests. When engaging with students, I focused on questions relating to their weekend plans or how their week was going. In order to get more individual facetime and conversation with each student, I changed the way in which I took attendance over the course of these three weeks. I had each student come up to me when they walked into class to check themselves in. This allowed me to ask the students questions about themselves and showed that I was genuinely interested in getting to know each and every one of them. While some students certainly were more reserved than others, I noticed an overall increase in engagement throughout the class due to me being more personal and interested in the students. As a result, I have become a better listener, and this has had a positive impact on my relationships with my students.
- Remembering someone’s name is crucial for building connections. In the past, I didn’t pay much attention to memorizing names when meeting someone for the first time. However, this semester, while teaching, I realized that I rarely addressed my students by their names when asking them questions. To help remember my students names, I had them place name tags in front of themselves to help me incorporate their names when calling on them to answer questions. One problem I had with this strategy was that some students refused to put out a name tag, so it was more difficult to get the names of those students down. Nonetheless, by the end of the three weeks, I improved my knowledge of my students names by a significant manner. As soon as I started calling them by name while they walked in and out of class or when answering their questions, I noticed that my students became more engaged and felt a more personal connection with me. This resulted in more active participation in the classroom as students became more comfortable with me when I addressed and remembered their names. Additionally, I also noticed that more students began addressing me by name, showing that my focus on remembering names lead to more students using my name in conversation.
- By encouraging and praising students, I have seen a significant improvement in their level of participation and understanding of the material. Instead of merely giving instructions, I opted for an interactive approach by asking questions and acknowledging students’ contributions with positive reinforcement. In my preparation for class, I wrote out specific questions I wanted to ask throughout class. I made sure to give the students the necessary information to help them feel comfortable and confident when answering questions. I did this in hopes that more and more students would volunteer and participate during class. As a result, I have noticed that students have become more confident in their knowledge of the subject matter and are more willing to engage in discussions. By letting them know that I am proud of their efforts and believe in their ability to succeed, I have not only uplifted their spirits but also enhanced my own satisfaction as a teacher. By setting the tone and praising every bit of improvement and participation, students felt more and more comfortable answering questions and engaging in class. It was awesome to see students who barely talked all year begin to answer questions. This technique of asking questions and praising their engagement is a leadership tactic I will certainly continue to use in the future.
Preparing Me for the Future:
Over the course of the semester, I have enjoyed seeing the positive effects of implementing the strategies outlined in Dale Carnegie’s book How to Win Friends and Influence People. In the future, I am going to use these strategies to continue to grow as a leader and friend. While I probably won’t use the implementation tracker in the future, I really enjoyed writing my weekly reflections and want to continue to incorporate journaling my experiences in the workplace. I feel as though I have become a much more influential and personable leader over the past three weeks while incorporating Carnegie’s strategies into my teaching routine. I’m excited to see how these strategies and techniques I learned over the course of the semester will carry over to my job with PwC this coming fall.
Source:
Carnegie, Dale, 1888-1955. How to Win Friends and Influence People. New York :Simon & Schuster, 2009.