Quote Origin: One of the Best Ways To Persuade Others Is With Your Ears — By Listening To Them

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Dean Rusk? Jacob Morton Braude? Reader’s Digest? Apocryphal?

Illustration of a listening ear from Pixabay

Question for Quote Investigator: If you wish to influence or persuade a person you must attempt to determine their viewpoint. You must be attentive to their needs and desires. Here are two versions of a pertinent saying:

(1) One of the best ways to persuade others is with your ears — by listening to them.
(2) The best way to persuade someone is with your ears—by listening to them.

U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk has received credit for this saying. Would you please help me to find a citation?

Reply from Quote Investigator: The earliest match found by QI appeared in “Reader’s Digest” magazine in May 1961 within a section titled “Quotable Quotes”. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:1

One of the best ways to persuade others is with your ears — by listening to them. —Dean Rusk

This evidence was substantive, but “Reader’s Digest” received information about quotations from readers; hence, the accuracy was not guaranteed.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

In June 1961 the quotation appeared in newspapers such as “The Lima Citizen” of Ohio. QI conjectures that the item was reprinted from “Reader’s Digest”:2

Greetings from us and from Secretary of State Dean Rusk: “One of the best ways to persuade others is with your ears—by listening to them.”

In 1962 the quotation appeared in the collection “Lifetime Speaker’s Encyclopedia” compiled by Jacob Morton Braude:3

One of the best ways to persuade others is with your ears—by listening to them. —DEAN RUSK

In 1964 the quotation appeared in “Contemporary Quotations” compiled by James B. Simpson. The accompanying citation pointed to “Reader’s Digest” in 1961, but the month was inaccurate:4

One of the best ways to persuade others is with your ears—by listening to them.
Dean Rusk, Reader’s Digest, July, 1961

In 1993 the following item appeared in “The Macmillan Dictionary of Political Quotations”:5

One of the best ways to persuade others is with your ears — by listening to them.
Dean Rusk. Quoted in Dee Danner Barwick, Great Words of Our Time, 1970.

In 1998 a slightly rephrased instance appeared in “Power Tools: 33 Management Inventions You Can Use Today” by Sam Deep and Lyle Sussman:6

This tool is based on the advice of the former secretary of state Dean Rusk: “The best way to persuade someone is with your ears—by listening to them.” In other words, listening is a vital leadership action that gains respect, knowledge, and influence for you.

In 2006 the quotation appeared in “Treasury of Wit & Wisdom” from the Reader’s Digest Association:7

One of the best ways to persuade others is with your ears—by listening to them.— Dean Rusk

In 2018 an instance appeared in “The Excellence Dividend: Meeting the Tech Tide with Work That Wows and Jobs That Last” by Tom Peters:8

The best way to persuade someone is with your ears, by listening to them.  
—Former U.S. secretary of state Dean Rusk

In conclusion, QI believes it is reasonable to credit Dean Rusk based on the 1961 “Reader’s Digest” citation. QI found no other substantive alternative attributions.

Image Notes: Illustration of a listening ear from geralt at Pixabay. The image has been retouched, cropped, and resized.

Acknowledgement: Great thanks to Shantha R. Mohan whose tweet led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration. Also, thanks to the other x-twitter thread participants Jonathan Dunnett and Tom Peters.

  1. 1961 May, Reader’s Digest, Volume 78, Number 469, Quotable Quotes, Quote Page 130, The Reader’s Digest Association, Pleasantville, New York. (Verified on paper) ↩︎
  2. 1961 June 1, The Lima Citizen, Where There’s Life by Hope, Quote Page 13, Column 1, Lima, Ohio. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  3. 1962 Copyright, Lifetime Speaker’s Encyclopedia, Compiled by Jacob Morton Braude, Topic: Persuasiveness, Quote Number 4686, Quote Page 592, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
  4. 1964, Contemporary Quotations, Compiled by James B. Simpson, Topic: Advice, Quote Page 256, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
  5. 1993, The Macmillan Dictionary of Political Quotations, Edited by Lewis D. Eigen and Jonathan P. Siegel, Chapter 67: Negotiation and Compromise, Quote Page 447, Macmillan Publishing Company, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
  6. 1998, Power Tools: 33 Management Inventions You Can Use Today by Sam Deep and Lyle Sussman, Chapter 3: Tools For Leadership, Section: Lead With Your Ears, Quote Page 54, Perseus Books, Reading, Massachusetts. (Verified with scans; Internet Archive) ↩︎
  7. 2006, Treasury of Wit & Wisdom: 4,000 of the Funniest, Cleverest, Most Insightful Things Ever Said, Compiled by Jeff Bredenberg, Topic: Power, Quote Page 251, The Reader’s Digest Association, Pleasantville, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
  8. 2018, The Excellence Dividend: Meeting the Tech Tide with Work That Wows and Jobs That Last by Tom Peters (Thomas J. Peters), Chapter 13: Listening, The Bedrock of Leadership Excellence, Quote Page 349, Vintage Books: A Division of Penguin Random House, New York. (Verified with scans; Internet Archive) ↩︎
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