The Life business and Orrin Woodward have made available the basics for community building. Building a community is different than Network Marketing. Building a community goes beyond the goal of ‘signing people up’. It’s not just about making a sale and moving a product. Two dimensions are required to build a community. Leadership and systems are the areas to be mastered. When developing leadership, 'we' actually become the product, as personal development is tied with one's leadership influence.
In their best selling book, ‘Launching a Leadership Revolution’, Orrin Woodward and Chris Brady go on to describe the concept of the ‘Tri – Lateral Leadership Ledger’. It goes without saying that relationships and people skills are critical areas of leadership development. Dale Carnegie’s best selling book ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’, describes relating and being relatable. When I first read the book I was determined to improve in these areas. I would take each chapter and spend a week applying what I had learned in an attempt to be more relatable. These chapters go beyond just technique. Connecting with people starts with being likeable. Carnegie describes six ways to accomplish this.
1. Be genuinely interested in others.
2. Smile
3. Remember their name.
4. Be a good listener. Give exclusive attention.
5. Talk in terms of the other person’s interest.
6. Sincerely make people feel important.
The Team leadership development system recommends the top five books as a foundation to learn and Carnegie’s book is one of them. ‘How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Sales’ by Frank Bettger is another cornerstone of mastering relationships. In his first chapter, he says that enthusiasm made the biggest difference with his success. Who wants to be with someone who doesn't put energy into the relationship? He goes on to say the single most important area to master is to find out what is most important to other people. Go figure. Find a need and fill it. Doesn’t building a relationship come down to helping a friend get what they need? Wouldn’t it be cool if all our friends helped us get what we wanted? Boy, I bet we would like our friends a lot better.
Unfortunately, people skills are not taught in the school system. In fact, many of us would agree that our bad habits were learned in school. The LIFE business, however, is a business that supplements the current school system and teaches what many feel are the most important qualities that a person should master.
It’s a great time to learn from the past and reset our goals for the future. I’d guess that people skills and relationships are on top of the list of areas to improve on. Give the gift of enhancing a persons relationships by letting them know about the LIFE business and The Team system. God Bless, George Guzzardo
