avoid these 7 things which makes one less likeable

Being likable is important, whether you are making pitches or trying to increase your likelihood of being promoted by forging the types of relationships that lead to new opportunities.When you build your awareness of how your actions are received by other people, you pave the way to becoming more likeable. Being likeable is as much about avoiding behaviors that decrease your likeability as it is about magnifying those that increase it. Here are some key behaviors that hold people back when it comes to likeability;

1. Name-dropping. It’s great to know important people, but using every conversation as an opportunity to name-drop is pretentious and pointless. Instead of making you look interesting, it makes people feel as though you are insecure and overly concerned with having them like you. It also cheapens what you have to offer. When you connect everything you know with who you know instead of what you know, conversations lose their color. Simply being friendly and considerate is all you need to win people over. When you speak in a friendly, confident, and concise manner, people are much more attentive and persuadable than if you try to show them that you are important.

2. Humble-bragging. We all know those people who like to brag about themselves behind the mask of self-depreciation. While many people think that self-deprecation masks their bragging, everyone sees right through it. This makes the bragging even more frustrating, because It comes off as an attempt to deceive people.

3. Whipping out your phone. I find this rather annoying. Nothing turns someone off to you like a mid-conversation text message or even getting ‘busy’ with your phone during a conversation. When you commit to a conversation, focus all of your energy on it. You will find that conversations are more enjoyable and effective when you immerse yourself in them.

4. Having a closed mind. Being open minded makes you approachable and interesting to others. No one wants to have a conversation with someone who has already formed an opinion and is unwilling to listen. Having an open mind is crucial in the workplace, where approachability means access to new ideas and help. You need to learn to see the world through other people’s eyes and quit judging other people.

5. Not asking enough questions. The biggest mistake people make in conversation is being so focused on what they are going to say next or how what the other person is saying is going to affect them that they fail to hear what is actually being said. A simple way to avoid this is to ask a lot of questions. People like to know you are listening, and something as simple as a clarification question shows that not only are you listening but that you also care about what they are saying.

6. People make themselves look terrible when they get carried away with gossiping. Wallowing in talk of other people’s misdeeds or misfortunes may end up hurting their feelings if the gossip ever finds its way to them, but gossiping is guaranteed to make you look negative and spiteful every time.

7. Sharing too much on social media. Sharing on social media can be an important mode of expression, but it needs to be done thoughtfully and with some self-control. Letting everyone know your personal business or washing your dirty linen out there will do much more harm than good when it comes to likeability.