June 11, 2018: Remembering another person’s name is one of the keys to successful leadership.
Do you agree that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language? Kristi Hedges published 5 best tricks to remember names in Forbes Magazine.
- Meet and repeat. Use the person’s name throughout the conversation (but use it sparingly). When you say goodbye, look the person in the face and make an effort to commit their name to memory.
- Spell the name out. Ask someone to spell their name if it’s an unusual one.
- Associate the person’s name with something, e.g. Sarah sells, Bill is from Brazil.
- Make connections between the person you are talking to and someone else you know with the same name, e.g. Carman, like my sister.
- Choose to care. The main reason we forget someone’s name is because we aren’t really focused on learning it in the first place. Making a conscious decision to remember another’s name will help us become better at remembering.
– Janet Leatherwood, CNO