Nothing ever comes to us merely by wishing for it. It is the same when it comes to influence. You can’t just wish for it or even just outright ask people to change or do something. It doesn’t work even when we associate noncompliance with negative consequences.
Simply put, we have to approach influence as though there is something that we are giving to others. This is different from saying something or just asking and hoping that it happens, because in the context of human relationships, it is give and you shall receive, not ask and you shall receive.
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Awareness
The first thing we are usually lacking in any relationship is “awareness.” In particular, when it comes to the person we want to influence, we lack awareness in two areas: the person’s needs and the subtleties of the context in which we find ourselves.
We cannot influence others if we are not aware what is important to them. Do you know with razor-sharp clarity what’s important to your prospects, your buyers, your customers, your constituents, your spouse, or your kids? Do you know what they really desire, what they want? What is their passion? What are their needs? What drives them?
If you knew more about them, if you had more awareness of them and their needs, then you would have more influence over them. The problem is that we know what we want, but we don’t know what they want. This is where our attempts at influence fail.
It is also the same thing when you think you know your spouse or your partner. Do you think you know them really well? Overall, my general awareness of what my spouse wants and what she needs is good, but that doesn’t mean I always know precisely what is going on with her. Perhaps she comes home and I want to try to influence her in regards to a particular situation, but during the course of the day she had a major conflict with someone in her life. This might be a major conflict with her partner at work or a major conflict with a customer or another family member.
The existence of this conflict will change my level of influence. The thing is that when we want to influence someone, we always try to get it without actually taking the time to step back and take a look at what the other person needs, not just in general, but in the moment. Sometimes we just need to wait before trying to exert our influence.
You need to understand where others are in their lives. You need to have not only an awareness of who they are, what they need, what drives them, and what their passions are, but also what happened to them that day. What has gone on for them? What is their reality today? What was going on with them during the past week?
I remember one time I was trying to get somebody to work on a project with us. He had some specific expertise that we really needed. He kept saying he would help out, but he wasn’t delivering and we were getting frustrated with him. We talked about it and we decided to be more explicit and tell him the situation. He said he understood, but his behavior didn’t change.
We asked him what was happening with him that was preventing him from being a much higher performer on this project. He revealed to us that he was being stretched too thin. Aside from his regular workload, he had also been given an assignment from our supervisor, asking him to plan out a specific project the company was to take on later in the year. He didn’t want to let anyone down, but in the process he was dropping the ball with all his work.
We knew that he was a really good employee, one who was valuable and had worked for the company for a few years. We worked out an arrangement with him that everyone agreed to. A couple of us would help him get his other projects completed and he would, in turn, have the time to work with us to get our project off the ground.
He was stressed about the situation in which he found himself and we were trying to exert influence over him without knowing his situation. Once we were aware of what was going on, we could work with him to take his needs into account. It ended up being a win- win for all of us, but a situation like this often ends up with one side thinking bad things about the other, rather than taking a proactive approach to figure out what the problem is.
You need to realize that most of the time you are unaware of something going on in other people’s lives, about what competing interests they might have. You are unaware of something that might be happening in their lives right now that is so relevant it is taking them away from the ability to deliver their best work.
Here’s the thing. Great influencers are hyperaware. They are hyperaware to who and what another person or group is and what the other person or group desperately wants or needs. They are super hyperaware about the context in which that person or group is operating at the moment. This awareness is critical when trying to influence someone, if you don’t know where they are or what they need, you can’t move them to action.
ask yourself these questions:
What is it that I need to know about their wants, needs, desires?
What context do they find themselves in right now?
Are they struggling or do they have any conflicts?
How is their mood, their emotional state?
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Presence
The next reason someone does not have influence is due to lack of “presence.” If there was only one gift you could give to the entire world it would be presence. With presence comes everything. We fool ourselves when we think that we don’t need to be present with people.
Your family, your friends, your team, the people who are watching you, they know when you are not present. They can tell if you are distracted or if you’re overwhelmed when you are talking to them. They can tell when you are not paying attention to them.
You might be talking to them, you might be physically in the room, sitting right next to them, but you are thinking about a thousand different things and they know it. They know it and it is our belief that we can fool people into thinking we are attentive or loving or caring that gets in the way of our influence. But not being present with the person with whom you are speaking is disastrous. This is the cause of almost every single failure to influence I have ever seen in any situation, even in negotiation. If you give yourself any kick-start in influencing people, then learn to be right with them, right in the moment, right in the present with them.
When you walk into your child’s bedroom to talk about homework, you’d better show up and be really present with him or her. You have to be present with your loved ones. If before you walk in, you know you are really distracted, then you need to take a moment. If your mind is on the house or on work or on anything other than your child and his or her homework, then you might as well not even bother. You have to be right there, fully present with your child, right now in the moment. Getting really serious about your presence in these times can be difficult.
It is the energy you are emitting with the people that you interact with, the ones you are trying to lead or serve or convince to buy from you, that matters. Your energy must be bold and buoyant. You need to be energetic in a positive way. Real presence comes from the spirit. We are all blessed with the spirit to be walking and alive. We are here with something special within us. It is such a gift, and when we tap into that gift and that energy with a buoyant spirit and it comes alive, all of a sudden you liven up the energy of your environment.
That’s your job. Your job is to lift up the energy of your family, spouse, kids, the people at work, the people you lead, everyone!
If you want to have more influence, then lift up people around you with a higher, bolder, more buoyant, positive energy. It’s about how you sound and feel and move around the room when you talk with people. When they sense the energy coming from you, you have more influence than anyone else—every single time! Everyone else is distracted and worried. They are mired in their concerns. They are in their head. And you are out there, present with the people. This is the game changer!