July 25, 2006

The Most Important Skill For Success

What is the most important skill you need to succeed in your business or career?

Would it surprise you to learn that it has NOTHING to do with being “intelligent” or “creative” or even, taking a less generous view, being “political” or even “ruthless”?

That it’s actually the same skill you need to “succeed” in your personal relationships?

Because, of course, it IS to do with personal relationships - your ability to build and cultivate personal relationships.

In other words… PEOPLE SKILLs!

Don’t take my word for it.

A study of CEOs conducted by U.S. based Stanford Research Institute and Carnegie Mellon University found that long-term job success depends 75% on people skills and only 25% on technical knowledge.

A study by Harvard University found that 85% of jobs and promotions were due to the candidate’s “attitude” and only 15% due to technical knowledge.

And a study by LeadershipIQ found that most new employees fail due to poor interpersonal skills, not lack of technical skills.

According to the study, “26% of new hires fail because they can’t accept feedback, 23% because they’re unable to understand and manage emotions, 17% because they lack the necessary motivation to excel, 15% because they have the wrong temperament for the job, and only 11% because they lack the necessary technical skills.”

It’s not just YOUR people skills you need to foster either.

If you own your own business and/or manage staff… THEIR lack of people skills could be costing you money and opportunities!

So if you’re wondering what may be holding you or your staff back - or what could propel your career or business forward even further - consider enhancing your people skills.

Now, I’m not talking about “being nice” to people. Just “being nice” or “sweet” won’t get you anywhere. Just ask a cheese cake. They don’t last very long.

Good people skills are about being able to inspire and motivate people to like, trust, believe in, help and follow you… to command their loyalty and friendship… to have them stick with you through thick and thin…

(I don’t know any cheese cakes with those skills, do you?)

That’s why I spent so much time and effort developing the How To Manage People System… because I fervently believe that being able to manage and leverage people is absolutely CRITICAL to success in your career or business.
 
And that’s also why I have something else in the pipeline that will help you use people skills to your advantage.

Hint: everything you’ve read or been told about how to get a good job is most probably wrong. I’m going to reveal what REALLY works…