How to Up Your L-Factor

So, how do you boost your L-Factor without becoming a Miss Kiss-up? You can start by going to Tim Sanders' Web site to take his on-line self assessment and find out just how likeable you are. The assessment asks you to rate the frequency with which you practice ten components of friendliness, such as, "I build other people's self-confidence and make them feel good about themselves." It also asks you to rate your unlikable aspects. For example, "People ask me why I don't laugh or smile more."

Then, get to work on four elements of your personality, says Sanders, author of the new self-help manual The Likeability Factor. Based on extensive research, upping your L-Factor, or likeability factor, will increase your professional and personal success, including the ability to get the jobs and raises you want and have longer and better relationships. Here are the four elements of your personality to work on, which Sanders spells out in Executive Update Online:

• Friendliness: the ability to express a liking for another person and communicate welcome. Never allow yourself to communicate unfriendliness as a first step because people are likely to reciprocate.
• Relevance: the importance you hold for other people and your ability to connect to others' interests, wants or needs. Connecting with others' interests makes people feel validated and produces positive attitudes. Improving your relevance just a little can go a long way in building your likeability factor.
• Empathy: the capacity to walk a mile in your colleague's shoes, to see things from another person's point of view and even experience his or her feelings. This is the toughest element to improve, but can dramatically boost your L-Factor.
• Realness: being true to yourself and others, consistent between your beliefs and your actions. People recognize a fake when they see one. So don't lie and don't engage in hypocritical behavior.