Get Your Own Way – 7 Steps to increase your Persuasiveness

12th September 2011

Caroline

Persuasion & Influence

Archives

In business as in life we like to get our own way. We want people to buy into our ideas, our product or our service.  Success makes you feel good, breeding more success.   Here are some pointers to help you achieve persuasive success more consistently.

  • Be clear on your outcome
    Before going into any negotiation, important meeting or conversation get clear on the result / outcome you want to achieve.  The clearer you are on exactly what you want from the interaction, the greater your chance of success. Clarity is power.  Some go into meetings with a rough idea of what they want to achieve, however, those that are crystal clear win the day.
  • Seeing is believing
    When you run through the interaction in your minds eye beforehand, imagining things going the way you want, and achieving the desired result, you are programming your brain for success. Run ‘What if’ scenarios in your mind. Think through the potential responses of the other person and how you could deal with each one.  See yourself successfully handling whatever is thrown at you.  The greater the detail and frequency of your visualisation, the more effective this success programming will be.
  • Preparation, Preparation, Preparation
    Although we know the maxim fail to prepare, prepare to fail, knowing and doing are quite different things particularly in the busyness of today’s business.  Take time to think about what the other party is interested in – the What’s in it for me concept. What are they looking for?  What problems do they have that you can help solve?  What is important to them, who is the key decision maker and what is likely to grab their attention and get a yes?  What are they absolutely not going to agree to?

  • Strategy
    Given your research and preparation, what is your game plan going to be for the discussions? What is your starting point, what are you prepared to concede?  Think about how you can find common ground to agree on and build from there. How can you give them what they are looking for and still achieve your outcomes? 

  • State
    ’State’ is your emotional state of mind such as happy, confident, focused or frustrated. Your performance is directly linked to your state.  If you are not in a good state performance suffers.  However, if you are in a peak state such as very confident and persuasive, your performance will be fantastic.  Get your state right first.Being able to stay calm and focused is crucial.  During your preparation, when you visualise your success, see yourself remaining calm, focused and persuasive.  

  • Ask yourself a better question
    When persuading someone or in a negotiation there can often be a point where both parties have moved as far as they are prepared to and negotiations stall.  At this point  you need to stay absolutely focused on your outcome.  Instead of saying to yourself “Where do we go from here?” ask yourself “what ARE the ways in which we CAN resolve this and I can still achieve my outcome?”. When you ask your brain a question with absolute certainty that it will come up with an answer, and you are in a calm enough state for the idea to pop into your awareness, you will suddenly start coming up with alternative and creative ways of ‘unsticking’ the discussions.   You may even surprise yourself at how ingenious you are!This approach will help you be flexible in your approach whilst staying fixed on your outcome.
  • Stick to your outcome
    I know from experience and that of my clients that when you keep focused on your outcome and use the strategies above (amongst others) you are significantly more likely to get your own way.

 

6 Responses to Get Your Own Way – 7 Steps to increase your Persuasiveness

  • Cat says:

    Soon after all, what an excellent web site and educational posts, I’ll upload inbound hyperlink – bookmark this website internet site? Regards, Reader.

  • Brynell says:

    Great article, thank you again for wiritng.

  • Leave a Reply

    Your email address will not be published.

    Want to know more, fill in your details & we will call you back:

    • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

    Work with us

    Gavin Logo Faded Large

    Strate-G Logo

    The Work Life Balance Myth

    • The Work Life Balance Myth

    • Have the Real Conversation

    • Profits Follow Purpose

    • Good Things Happen to Good People

    • Stack the Reasons Why You Must Change

    Blog

    Keep up to date with Gavin's blog ...

    More From Gavin's Blog