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In the movies, the business world tends to be portrayed as "dog-eat-dog", "no-holds-bar", brutal competition, so who can forget the ruthless editor-in -chief in "the Devil Wears Prada".
Have you got the little table that I like at that store of Madison?
Get us a reservation for dinner tonight at that place that got a good review last week.
If you know some good news today...
Both of you...
Well there's a new book that says that the road to success is paved with being nice, that's right, nice. The book is called the Power of Nice, how to conquer the business world with kindness. And Linda Kaplan Thaler and Robin Kovol, are the, Koval rather, are the authors. Good morning to both of you. (Good morning) (Good to be here) You know, this is the thing, you both say that nice has gotten a bad rap.
That's right.
Nice is really the toughest 4-letter word you've ever known, Robin and I grew up in the Bronx, so we know a lot of 4-letter words.
Hahaha…
It's really..
Don't (you know) say them here, please
No,
It's got a bad rap, really..
OK why? What do you mean? Justify that.
Well, well,well think about it. Eh, you know in the, in the world we live in, you just show that clip from the Devil Wears Prada, and reality shows that tell us, you know, to eat our young. But that's not the real world, they make headlines but you don't make headway that way.
But, wait a minute, you know, we actually wanted to check into this, and searching how much people think about this, 'cause we actually put on the Internet, er, a, a kind of questionnaire, and 7700 people responded in just a matter of days, into the question that asks: Do you believe the adage, nice guys finish last holds true in today's world, 54% said yes, and 46% said no. Now, I, I would have thought that the difference would've been bigger. But still, people, most people think that nice guys do finish last.
That's because it, nice still has an image problem, you know, you see all the Enron, you see all the bad stuff on the news, but when you look at the really successful people in business and in the world, most of them ,are really er, really got in there, in a abuse, by using positive influence, by really, you know, keeping employee retention. We found some amazing statistics, nice people live longer, nice people, marriages last longer, er nice people would take, nice people get sued less.
They get, they get hired first?
Ok, but let me stop you for a second, because, you know, we actually wanted to ask that question, I'm not to be argumentative here or not nice, but who gets ahead in your workplace, we asked on the Internet and the person who is A. nice B. smart C. aggressive D. none of the above, aggressive wins out, (well) which can be interpreted as not nice.
Well, I'll tell you. It mean, it may appear that way. Sometimes you will see that mean person or that aggressive person get a short-term gain, but it's not a long-term strategy. You know, John Reno wrote the Foreward for the book, who, he is a nice guy, um, and he says this wonderful thing to us, he says you know you can walk into a room and it can be a little cold, err, like it is in this room. (And you can say..) (Air-condition is working on all the time), and, and you can say "shut the darn window" or "is it cold in here"? Both of them will get the window closed, but one creates a negative energy, puts negative vibes out there and it's gonna come back to you. And one puts positive imprints out there.
You two are very successful, and so you know, from what you're speaking, you run an advertising agency, one of you is CEO, the other one is a president and in fact, you do the Alaplet Commercials. And, you know people, you know it's interesting because, you say that people wanna work with you, because they like working with you, because of the way you are. And that's kind of a surprise, 'cause I think, well then, not about you, but just in terms of how people might respond, (Well, quiet, yeah) are we seeing more and more of this, do you think?
Yeah, well, what happens is, a lot in terms of businesses or any interaction, people would never say, well I gave you the job because you were nicer, 'cause it doesn't sound professional, but more times, you know, than you would imagine, we won the piece of business because the client said, you know what, you guys were just nicer. And that was sort of the key to how we started thinking about the book. In fact, we think a lot people, a lot of people out there could even be nicer, if they took, we have nice cute test that we post on our website: thePowerofNice.com. You can really, really see if you are as nice as you think you are.
Err, exactly, so you may be delusional. Exactly, (Well, well) but I like what you are...
There's a good news, there's good news. Because you know, we may start in different places but nice is like a muscle, you know it's a, it's a strategic tool that you can get better at, and the more you exercise it, the easier it becomes, and all of a sudden you are nicer.
Hmm, well I think you've proved that, that in, that is obvi, from your success that it works, but I think a lot of people are afraid of being walked over, you know, if they're too nice, I think that's one reason why people sort of step up the aggression and pull up. You know it's really a defensive mechanism.
Well.
Yeah, you know what, you can, you can attract a lot more business just by, even by a compliment. By the way, you have a lovely dress on today.
Thank you very much.
And you know the truth is in today's world with the Internet, I mean "mean" is very last millennium, because think about it, you know, whether you're doing it because you wanna be nice or you're trying to develop your skill in a nanosecond, something about you can be out there, and you know in the digital world, there is no delete.
So being nice can help you, not being nice can hurt you.
Absolutely. (Absolutely)
Pleasure to talk to both of you, (Thank you) you're both very nice (as are you) and the book is called, and the book is called "the Power of Nice."
1.make headway:make progress, advance
2.adage: n. proverb, maxim, traditional saying 谚语; 古语; 格言; 箴言
3.retention:n. The retention of something is the keeping of it. (FORMAL)
4.vibes:n.[pl] (sl 俚) = vibrations: get good, bad, weird, etc vibes from sth 受某事物影响而产生的好的,奇怪的...情绪.
5.nanosecond:n. one-billionth of one second 十亿分之一秒
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