The Foundation of Influence

As a fledgling manager I found myself working in a predominantly male environment, in fact I was the only female manager! I felt intimidated in discussions, where so much was done through posturing and force, and I suspect that many decisions were made outside of the meetings anyway. Finding a voice, and one that carried influence, grew out of my developing self-confidence in who I was. Being self-assured gave me a platform to influence that was internal and not reliant on any external affirmation or approval of others.

An internal source of strength, approval and confidence cannot be easily knocked – and no-one can take it away from you unless you choose to hand it over. You build it and maintain it yourself, and it does need to grow as you stretch to meet new challenges. So to influence is to be genuinely confident- dare I say - fearless!

Posted by Maureen Atkins on 08-Sep-2010 17:30:31 BST

The Components of Power

If you want to become more influential, understanding what power is can be extremely helpful. It is not complicated - it is simple. The concept is regularly spoken of but rarely understood at a practical level. Jeffrey Pfeffer usually defines it as a capability to create influence. This definition combines skills, tactics and assets (see below). Most people focus on skills and tactics when they seek influence and fail to recognise the potency of the assets - many of which need to exist as the foundation of skills and tactics.

These distinctions are easily illustrated. Imagine you have a big bag of money (a particularly powerful asset in the current economic climate). You may be pretty good at drawing attention to your asset, perhaps you have a qualification in money shaking – a powerful skill indeed. Now when you come and wave it under my nose, that is a powerful tactic – provided of course that I am interested and cannot more easily acquire it from someone else!

Thinking about power in this way yields a number of interesting and useful ideas.

1. You can achieve influence without using your skills or tactics - provided that people know you have the asset and want a slice!
2. The potency of different types of asset can vary depending on supply and demand. Imagine the difference between a "fist full of dollars" and a crate full of Argentinean Pesos.
3. Many people fantasise and make assumptions about your assets, particularly if they are of the more obscure or intangible variety, like relationships.
4. People without valuable assets have to use lots of skills and tactics to gain influence (the office politician perhaps).
5. Assets can be divided between different people, and of course, they can combine the power of their assets too!
6. You can also lose your assets; spend them; invest them or suddenly have their value drop like a stone.

The distinctions are not pure, nor are they always easy to categorise. For instance, some assets only have influence when they are used, such as the voice. This is without doubt a physical asset, honed into a skill but is rarely influential unless you exercise it (in fact it’s a good example of a skill reliant on an asset)t. The classification is less important than the practical implications of thinking about power in this way. Although I’ve been using this concept with my clients for years, it always delights me to see how much more you can develop using this approach.

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 18-Aug-2010 17:40:46 BST

Harnessing the Power of Informal Groups

We normally view organisations as being split into formal groups such as marketing, operations, sales etc. To this formal structure we can add cross-functional project teams created for specific purposes. This represents the way formal power assets are divided within the organisation.

However, underlying this is an informal structure – groups of people with something in common. They could share common sporting interests, educational background, or even the fact they all smoke. These informal groups can have a massive impact on the decision making processes, yet this is an often neglected part of influence. If you can harness the power of informal groups you can make significant strides in developing your success.

To spot an informal group, you need to look for people who have things in common. They only become a group when they recognise this commonality in each other. If they do, and they start to get together, they will begin to form an identity. At this point they start to function as a group, provided they keep communicating. As such, they have power (i.e. the aggregation of all their individual assets). At this stage their influence is only potential, what they need is a common issue to mobilise them into action, and to overcome the other influences which could be pulling on each individual. For instance, those with an MBA may get together on a regular basis, however they could be mobilised into action to influence HR to make an MBA as a requirement for promotion to senior management.

If the group has a strong sense of identity, and that identity is being threatened or an opportunity arises to bring benefit to the group as a whole, they will kick into action. Your challenge now is to notice the informal groups around you, understand how you connect with them and how you can influence them more effectively.

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 11-Aug-2010 16:21:52 BST

Power, Politics and Influence Workshop NYC

On 3rd November in New York, I'll be joined by Dr. Gary Ranker (a Global Senior Executive Coach) as we run a workshop for The Conference Board. This workshop will provide practical and advanced learning for executives on power, influence and politics. One of the key take aways will be a political campaign plan, developed during the workshop.

This intense day will be full of practical ideas, tools and techniques you can apply immediately as you seek greater influence in your organization. If you'd like to join us, please click here for more information, or get in touch.

You may also be interested to know, that the previous day, Marc Effron will be running a workshop on his One Page Talent Management approach - combining both days will give a real boost to your approach to talent management!

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 03-Aug-2010 22:58:01 BST

Focus Your Personal Brand

Corporations spend massive sums positioning their brand in the mind of their customers and the public. How much do you spend?

Many people advocating the development of your Personal Brand will suggest you need to develop a catchy personal statement or tag line. Nothing wrong with that, except some can find it very difficult without marketing or wordsmithing skills.

Instead, a quick and easy way to gain practical progress is...

1. Find 3 words you'd like others to have in their mind when they think of you
2. Make them as exciting to you as you can - edit with a thesaurus
3. Check you can live up to these words
4. Every day, think of one thing you can do to increase the likelihood these words will be in their minds

Recent coaching examples include: Relentless, Engaging and Expert; Challenging, Approachable nad Fun. Note how the combination of these words work to moderate negative impressions.

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 28-Jul-2010 10:55:05 BST

New Executive Service

Our business is helping senior people to become more influential. And this is a pressing need for many executives - one client recently told us that over 60% of their general managers have "influence" in their top 3 development needs. They need to be able to understand the politics and navigate the power to succeed in tough conditions - but they don't have the time to learn new approaches.

That is why we've adapted our approach to supply fast, focused and intensive learning and application on influence. If you need to be more influential, don't have time for executive coaching and want to move it fast - take a look at the Executive Service and give us a call. This can range from a single one-off session to help/consult on a specific challenge, or we can build a program based on your development needs (typically at weekly intervals over the phone/skype).

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 21-Jul-2010 19:58:21 BST

Colin's Influence Book Club

One great way of learning about power and influence is to open a book. However with such a proliferation of books out there on this critical subject which one should you open? Some are good, some not so good!

So if you learn well from books, and want to learn more about power and influence, follow this post as I review the good, the bad and the useless. Only by following this actual posting will you get regular updates about books.

You can add your own thoughts about these books, or even add reviews of your own. And if you are stuck for a book to help you, why not ask for recommendations here!

NB YOU MUST SPECIFICALLY FOLLOW THIS POST TO RECEIVE REGULAR UPDATES FROM THE INFLUENCE BOOK CLUB!

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 18-Jul-2010 07:53:28 BST

Tact and Diplomacy

My article "Developing Tact and Diplomacy" (www.siccg.com/articles/developtact.php) has attracted considerable interest over the last couple of years, particularly with those who need to demonstrate greater sensitivity when influencing. They are often bemused by the way others seem to take everything so personally! They are tough but fair. The need to adjust their behaviour is obvious, as too is the positive impact the change can have on relationships.

Less obvious is the need for naturally sensitive people to lower their tact and diplomacy to achieve greater influence. When these people need to influence tough customers they run the risk of being perceived as lacking directness, “walking on egg shells” and generally wasting time getting to the point. Thi s mental reaction (noise) creates and unhelpful distraction. In reality, their desire to be tactful and not upset people is often having the reverse effect. By reducing the level of diplomacy in their behaviour, they gain more respect and this hopefully clears the way for more effective influence.

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 14-Jul-2010 11:59:13 BST

Investing in your Network

"I know I need to network, but I never seem to find the time" is a concern that many people share with me in the mentoring work I do. They have been sold on the benefits, and have even made sure that they have the skills to do it effectively. Yet somehow, life seems to push it to the bottom of the list of things to do.

Often the reason is that they don't see an immediate payoff. Time is money and networking takes time - sometimes quite a lot of time. And it is true that most networking yields a payback in the medium to long term, and only occasionally in the very short term. Here are three thoughts for you to boost your networking effort...

1. Regard networking as a shrewd investment. How much of your success today is linked to networking you have done in the past?

2. What is your long term career/life goal? Focus networking towards that for increased motivation. For example before I'd written a book, I realised I needed to get other authors in my network and I was really motivated to strive for that.

3. Organise around medium term goals. Think about what you want to achieve next year. To help achieve that, what type of people do you need to add to your network?

Ok, a fourth point - try to make it a habit to do a little networking each day - if only sending an email to someone you've not been in touch with for a while.

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 07-Jul-2010 10:04:27 BST

Women want influence

Research into politics in the workplace has shown time and again that women are far more interested in politics than their male counterparts. Not only is the academic literature clearly demonstrating this, seminars and conferences that I have presented to over the years have had a significantly higher number of female attendees . Indeed, many have been women's networking groups all keen to hear about politics in the workplace.

However it is wrong to conclude that this is a gender bias. In fact my research has revealed that this extra interest is stimulated by membership of a minority group. Those in the minority have to focus much more on their influencing skills and tactics to be able to get a fair hearing. A man in a female dominated world is going to have to work hard to gain influence as the group dynamic conspires (naturally) against him. Find out more about this research at www.siccg.com/articles/ps-men.php

Put another way, if you are an outsider, you will have to be able to use the most effective influencing skills to prevail. Have you experienced this? It would be great if you could spare a moment to share your thoughts here!

Posted by Colin Gautrey on 29-Jun-2010 23:03:49 BST