Robert Cialdini, a psychology professor at the Arizona State University and author of Influence: Science and Practice has some fantastic ideas around improving the way we influence others.
He calls them the six universal principles of influence:
- Reciprocation: People give back to you the kind of treatment that they have received from you.
- Scarcity: People will try to seize the opportunities that you offer them that are rare or dwindling in availability.
- Authority: People will be most persuaded by you when they see you as having knowledge and credibility on the topic.
- Commitment: People will feel a need to comply with your requests if it is consistent with what they have publicly committed themselves to in your presence.
- Liking: People prefer to say yes to your request to the degree that they know and like you.
- Consensus: People will be likely to say yes to your request if you give them evidence that people like them have been saying yes to it (used to great success with Amazon’s recommendation engine).
He shares three types of influence “practitioners”:
– Bunglers: These people screw up their chances to influence positively either because they don’t understand the principles or how to engage them properly.
– Smugglers: Unfortunately, these people know the principles all too well but use them for evil, meaning a win-lose situation. These people get short term wins but lose over the long term because people will avoid them or not trust them in the future, thus narrowing their potential influence.
– Sleuths: These people use the principles properly and, like a good detective, uncover details about the person and the situation for maximum benefit to all.
Influence is a part of everyone’s daily lives and can be the difference between success and failure. How do you think you employ these principles in your leadership?
I hope this has been helpful and of course the Adaptive Talent team would welcome the opportunity to help you and your team improve your results and adaptability via our culture and organizational development consulting, communications and coaching / mentoring training, total rewards consulting, assessments, leadership coaching and development programs and retained search to help you land high impact talent.