Blinkist Summary Book

2021-10-21 06:39:56 You're Invited
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me to put yourself in their shoes. How can you offer an invitation that will make a real contribution to their lives?
Strong communities make people feel like they belong.
The word “community” is bandied around all the time. But what does it actually mean? Communities are more than just groups of people. They’re people who feel a special sense of belonging to one another – and to a common cause. 
Researchers David McMillan and Davis Chavis studied all kinds of communities and defined four key pillars. 
The key message here is: Strong communities make people feel like they belong. 
The first pillar of a community is membership . There needs to be a clear demarcation between the people within a community and those who are outside. That could be defined by officially signing up for a club being selected for an academic committee or demonstrating allegiance by wearing a particular uniform – like for a sports team or Girl Scouts. Less tangibly membership is created when people feel Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:56 You're Invited
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conferences and they’re well-curated : the organizers always make sure that attendees are at least as interesting as the people talking on stage. Finally they offer the opportunity for the audience to experience moments of awe . Events designed along these principles will always be very appealing to leaders.
Connecting with community influencers requires a slightly different approach. Red Bull wanted to reach out to artists and club-goers. Most companies would sponsor a trendy music festival or pay a celebrity for endorsement. But Red Bull took another approach: it set up its own music academy. 
Over the last two decades the academy has trained over one thousand musicians and spawned a music festival and radio station. These initiatives provide real skills opportunities and resources for young musicians. Channeling its funds into direct community support has allowed Red Bull to build intense brand loyalty. 
Next time you're thinking about who you’d like to connect with take some ti Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:56 You're Invited
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n connect with anyone if you approach them with empathy and consideration. But you need to understand the unique social pressures that different groups of people face – and then develop tailor-made invitations that contribute to their lives. 
The key message here is: You can connect with anyone if you learn to put yourself in their shoes.
Global influencers like Oprah are so strapped for time that it’s fruitless to reach out to them directly. It’s much better to build relationships with people in their orbit – like friends or personal assistants – and then ask for an introduction from someone they trust. 
Industry leaders are more approachable but they’re also extremely busy. You have to make sure that you offer them an opportunity to participate in an event with real value. 
TED Conferences are so popular with industry leaders because they offer just that. They’re generous in that they provide valuable chances for exposure and learning. They’re novel compared to stodgy traditional Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:55 You're Invited
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rkable things in their fields. But he didn’t know any celebrities and there hadn’t been any industry leaders hanging around his house when he was growing up. So how could he find a way to reach out to them and interest them in attending his events? 
He realized that he’d need to become an expert at putting himself in other people’s shoes and at recognizing the various social pressures they experienced. Even more importantly he’d have to figure out what they valued and how he could contribute to their lives. 
You can connect with anyone if you learn to put yourself in their shoes.
Let’s say you’re designing an event and you’d love for Oprah to be a VIP guest. Or perhaps you want to invite the CEO of a Fortune 500 company you admire. Or a community activist. But none of these people are in your immediate social circles. So how do you go about connecting with them? And even more importantly how can you make sure that they’ll actually want to come to your event?
The truth is you ca Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:55 You're Invited
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irees to connect with an Indian community and culture right there in Florida. That prospect was so compelling that it was worth the extra money.
The key message here is: When creating community shared values are important – but diversity is too. 
Consider your social circle. Do you hang out with people who share your socioeconomic status ethnicity religion tastes and political beliefs? As comfortable as it is to be surrounded by people who are similar to you it can also be limiting. 
Encountering people who are different from you exposes you to new ideas and perspectives. And connecting with a wide range of people is especially important if you want to have broader influence in the world by creating for example a business or social movement. 
The author knew that the movement he wanted to create would need to include a wide range of people like celebrities industry leaders and community activists. He wanted to create events where people were surrounded by others who’d achieved rema Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:51 You're Invited
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ok they chat easily and have the chance to drop their usual social shields. And at the end they enjoy a meal that tastes all the better for the work that went into it. 
When creating community shared values are important – but diversity is too.
In 2008 Iggy Ignatius was a Florida real-estate developer who’d just built a community of retirement homes. It seemed poised for great success. But then America experienced an enormous financial crash. The property market in Florida plummeted and much bigger homes sold for a fraction of the price that Ignatius was charging. He feared the worst but in the end all of his homes sold out – in spite of the fact that they were so much more expensive. 
But why? Ignatius’s development was targeted at Indian retirees who would have loved to move back to India but were bound to America by family ties. Ignatius created a retirement community that offered Indian food yoga and Bollywood movie screenings. In short it offered the promise of allowing ret Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:51 You're Invited
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rawers. Sounds pretty grueling doesn’t it? But it’s also an experience – almost a rite of passage. Putting in the effort to assemble those drawers makes us value them much more than if we bought a finished product off the shelf. 
So if you want to create an event or experience that friends or clients will value don’t invite them to a fancy dinner. Instead create an event where they’ll be required to make an effort. Think for example of volunteering at a soup kitchen together. Or go on a hike. You’ll find that these kinds of situations offer much more opportunity for real bonding – and they’ll create more actual value for your clients.
If you do decide to host a dinner then make sure that guests have an opportunity to contribute. At the author’s famous Influencer Dinners 12 strangers are brought together to share a meal. But there’s a catch: they have to cook it themselves in under an hour. In the rush to complete the meal these strangers become united in their common task. As they co Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:50 You're Invited
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andable but it’s also completely wrong. The truth is that people value the opportunity to give more than they value the opportunity to receive. 
That’s something Benjamin Franklin knew very well. He once wanted to gain the support of a political rival. But instead of trying to flatter him or buy his loyalty he tried another tack: he asked his rival to lend him a rare book from his library. In those pre-Amazon days locating the book and getting it to Franklin took quite some effort. The rival gave him the book – and then became a lifelong supporter. 
The key message here is: People value things they've contributed to more than things they've been given. 
Why did that tactic work? Because people care about things they put effort into. This insight is something that furniture giant IKEA has leveraged into an extraordinary business. Think of the last time you shopped there lugging flat-pack furniture around an enormous warehouse and then going home to spend hours assembling a chest of d Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:50 You're Invited
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e halo effect ” and it’s a powerful shortcut for building trust. 
Another surefire strategy is to place people in a situation where they’re required to be vulnerable with one another. Think of the hazing process at a college sorority or the extreme training that new military recruits undergo during boot camp. When people reveal vulnerability and mutually receive help they create what researcher Jeffrey Polzer calls “vulnerability loops ” which quickly boost trust within a community. 
Of course you probably don’t want to attract new friends or clients through a boot camp or hazing ordeal. So be creative; design your own events that draw on the trust-building power of the halo effect and vulnerability loops. 
People value things they've contributed to more than things they've been given.
We have a tendency to shower people we want to impress with expensive gifts. Surely if they see how generous we are they’ll start to care about us or our business – right? The thinking is underst Open / Comment

2021-10-21 06:39:49 You're Invited
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is is especially the case if we think they have expertise that we lack. Or we trust people who are familiar to us. In fact the longer we’re exposed to something the more likely we are to trust it. A survey of the top 100 trusted companies revealed that only two were founded in the last 20 years.
The key message here is: Building trust quickly is essential to creating community.
Now you typically won’t have 20-plus years to build trust with new friends colleagues or clients. So how do you build trust quickly? One way to do it is to rely on trusted referrals. Cutco Cutlery used this trick to become the leading seller of cutlery in the US over the last 30 years. 
The company doesn’t use advertising or sell in shops. Rather it sells to a network of people door-to-door. When Cutco sellers visit new clients they make sure to emphasize that they’ve been referred by a trusted friend or neighbor. The new client then tends to trust them on the basis that their friends do. This is known as “th Open / Comment