Influence: The Critical Elements
Posted: Monday, March 01, 2010
by Colin Gautrey
The Gautrey Group
If you want to be successful, you've got to be great at influencing others. Some believe that being good at your job is enough to deserve recognition and success. Sure, that helps but if you want to be really successful, you've got to be good at influencing too.
Having specialized in this area for many years, my research and experience has identified seven key areas which lie at the heart of influencing skill. It has also led to the recognition that accurate assessment on how you measure up is necessary so that you can focus your personal development where it will have the greatest impact.
1. Self Awareness: The better you know yourself, the more likely you are to be able to influence other people. This self awareness helps you to understand what you are capable of, what your limitations are and what you need to do to leverage the greatest influence.
2. Understanding Others: The ability to know what drives people; how they think; how they react, is critical. This establishes a firm foundation upon which you can determine the most appropriate approach to influence.
3. Understanding Groups: The workplace is a social organization and comprises of many different groups, both formal and informal. Understanding them, how they work, how they get results can provide you with many opportunities to gain influence more quickly and thoroughly.
4. Influencing Individuals: This is the most talked about area of influence and cannot be avoided. You need to be able to influence people on a one-to-one basis first and foremost. From this base you can then develop more sophisticated approaches to influence.
5. Networking: Networking is often seen as the differentiator between the good and the great influencers. To be able to work the room and build a wide array of good personal contacts develops an extremely useful resource which you can call on when you need to, for support, information and advice.
6. Influencing Groups: Influencing groups of people is far more efficient that focusing just on individuals. With your understanding of how the different groups around you function, you can develop strategies to maximize your influence and speed up the results you get.
7. Building Trust: Research has demonstrated that in the absence of trust, successful influence is unlikely. Therefore the person skilled in influencing others will be able to act in a manner which builds trust with the people they are working with.
Beneath each of these elements lies a multitude of different skills to master, all of which can help you to become more influential - forty two to be precise. Working out where to focus your personal development to become more effective requires that you know how good you are at each of these. It also helps if you can get valuable feedback from those who work around you - those who see you in action on a regular basis at work. By focusing on the individual skills which lie at the heart of successful influence you can greatly increase your upward potential because you'll be developing the skills which will make the difference for you.
If you would like to see how you score on these elements, you can try the Influencing Skill Assessment and get a basic report free from Strategic Influence.
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