Business is About Relationships: Make People Feel Good Today

In my last post, I talked about how the principle “people work best when they feel good about themselves” should be at the core of how your company is managed. This principle can be extended to everybody you work with.

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My colleague Diye Wariebi, whose Digibridge company provides our technical support, gave a great example. One of his clients owed him money and Diye described how he changed his debt-collecting strategy after borrowing a copy of How to Win Friends and Influence People from our bookshelf.

This classic book, written by Dale Carnegie in the 1930s, encourages you to understand the people you work with and to walk in their shoes. “I had been chasing this debt for weeks,” explains Diye, “and it was getting increasingly antagonistic. I had threatened legal action and he [the client] had responded with, “See you in court.””

Diye says: “After reading the book, I took a different approach. I knew he had been having a difficult time and there had been health problems in his family. So I emailed him in a supportive way and then we talked on the phone. I expressed my concern and my understanding that he had been having a difficult time and asked if there was any way I could help.

“We had a really good talk and I think that meant something to him because I know others had been giving him a really hard time. I didn’t mention the debt at all. But, you know what, within a few days I got a cheque for £1,000 in the post. And, just today, I got a second one paying the debt off in full. Treating him as a friend and trying to understand where he was coming from resulted in my bill getting paid. And hopefully, we will continue to do business together for many years.”

Think about the people you work with – those who work with you and your customers and your suppliers. Where could you make more of a real personal connection that would make life better for you and them?

Related blogs

Henry Stewart- People Work Best When They Feel Good About Themselves– Watch Henry’s talk at the Beyond Budgeting Conference.
Does Your Organisation Enable People To Work At Their Best?– A quick watch with Henry talking about how to get the best from your people.
The Future of Work is Human– Peter Cheese talks to us about the enduring need for a human touch in industry.

Learn the 10 core principles to create a happy and productive workplace in Henry Stewart's book, The Happy Manifesto.

Support your aspiring and current managers to be empowering and confident leaders with Happy

Happy offers leadership programmes at Level 3, Level 5 and Level 7, from new managers/supervisor level all the way up to senior leadership teams and CEOs. These programmes are based on the ideas of trusting your people. They are practical and based on applying what yo’ve learnt. We aim to inspire and ignite change in your organisation, as well as giving you valuable management skills such as business strategy, decision-making, negotiation and project management.

We also offer programmes tailored specifically to people from Global Majority backgrounds. The content is the same, but have been designed to give new and experienced managers the skills they need to navigate organisational culture with a clearer perspective on their own potential, as well as building their confidence and expanding their professional strengths.

Henry Stewart

Henry is founder and Chief Happiness Officer of Happy Ltd, originally set up as Happy Computers in 1987. Inspired by Ricardo Semler’s book Maverick, he has built a company which has won multiple awards for some of the best customer service in the country and being one of the UK’s best places to work.

Henry was listed in the Guru Radar of the Thinkers 50 list of the most influential management thinkers in the world. “He is one of the thinkers who we believe will shape the future of business,” explained list compiler Stuart Crainer.

His first book, Relax, was published in 2009. His second book, the Happy Manifesto, was published in 2013 and was short-listed for Business Book of the Year.

You can find Henry on LinkedIn and follow @happyhenry on Twitter.