Transformational leadership: Persuading people to say yes

Let's  talk about how to present your ideas in such a way that people will want to say yes to them.

There are eight strategies for having someone say yes to your requests. Some of the strategies are more mindset related and others are more skill set related. But in each case the strategies are a positive step forward to hearing someone say yes to your ideas.

The 8 strategies are:

1. Put Others First
2. Be Open to Being Persuaded
3. Exude Confidence
4. Be in The Moment
5. Use the If/Then Strategy
6. The Magic of Three Yeses Strategy
7. The Powerful Language Strategy 
8. The Show-Me-the-Money Strategy

More on Mindsets

The Chimp Paradox - a better understanding of your mind.
https://betterwellnessguide.com/the-chimp-paradox/

Dream Dare Dazzle

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Again everyone. And last week we were talking about a
active listening before endeavoring to influence either individuals or a
group of people, and we suggested that we use our
ears first before opening our mouths. This week, I'd like

(00:32):
to talk about how to present your ideas in an
engaging way that people want to say yesterday, here our
eight strategies for influencing someone having people say yes to
your requests. Some of the strategies are more mindset related

(00:57):
and others are more skill set related, but in each case,
the strategies are a positive step forward to hearing someone
say yes to your ideas. The key thing behind that
is being an alignment with your core values. It's all

(01:17):
about influencing someone else, not about controlling, not about using
smart n LP techniques. Albeit is the link I gave
you last week. Some beautiful strategies within NLP. Providing it
comes from I would say an honorable or respectful heart.

(01:41):
NLP has some bad press over the years, but I
found it particularly useful, particularly in behavioral safety leadership, helping people,
helping people look at world through slightly different perspective, and

(02:01):
enabling people. So let's go into it all better. Still,
I'll summarize the strategy is first, and then we'll look
at them in a bit more depth. Persuasion strategy one
put others first. Two open yourself to being persuaded. Three,

(02:28):
exude confidence, four, be in the moment. Five use the
if then strategy. Six the magic of three yeses strategy,

(02:51):
seven the powerful language strategy, and eight show me them
money Hey strategy. Persuasion strategy number one putting others first.
This may seem a wee bit repetitive or unnecessary. The

(03:15):
first mindset strategy reminds us to be of service. Why
do you need your minding to be of service? Because
there's continuing pressure at all levels of an organization to
deliver business results, sometimes at any cost. The mantra of

(03:44):
do more, do it better, do it faster, do it
cheaper It can depending on how it's deployed, place results
ahead of relationships, profits ahead of people, and doing ahead
of being. To be of service to another, you must
start by caring deeply about what's important to the person

(04:08):
you want to persuade. This requires knowing they have business objectives.
It must be accomplished, but getting a sale may preclude
you from getting a second or the fourth. Much more
profitable sell. The only way to secure the fourth sell

(04:31):
is to make sure the first and all subsequent sales
are clearly linked to being of service service to the
other person, the other people, the other communities, and making
his or horder their lives easier or better. What specifically
are the priorities and what if any promises have they

(04:55):
made that you can help them achieve? Everything thing you accomplish.
We'll start there. Persuasion two. Be open to being persuaded.
Interesting one. Persuading someone to say yes to your request

(05:16):
res for you being persuaded also well, recently I've had
that in the UK when the current Prime Minister care
Stammer has been endeavoring to get new proposals through parliament
a disability benefits system. He was facing a revolt by

(05:40):
many of his own MPs. He knew he needed the
support of the majority of his MPs to get his
agenda through parliament. They knew, or he knew, an openness
to being persuaded was essential to making political progress. So

(06:06):
the backbenchers the revolters, were also open to being persuaded,
and by doing so, provided each other something they could
live with but probably not laugh. What's important to remember
with the persuasion principle, is it persuading another person to

(06:28):
your way of seeing a situation? Never black and white,
right or wrong depending of the proposition, but along more
the lines of good, better and best. The same holds true,

(06:50):
say with securing a yes to your ideas, say of
a four hundred and fifty thousand pounds added headcount. If
the only option is for someone to provide you with
a four hundred and fifty thousand pounds worth of additional

(07:12):
highcount or else, you are likely to be going away
disappointed and see us my way of the highway? Type
of leader? What is required in order to hear yes
from a colleague or bus when you're questioning additional resources?
It's a clear willingness to be reset of the new

(07:36):
and possibly more resourceful ways of thinking about the allocation
of resources. Is it a resourcefulness that's capable of being
persuaded to see your perspective a bit differently rather than
an on else mindset that cultivates a collaborated of the

(08:00):
mutually beneficial mindset. Are you, as your organization also open
to being persuaded? Persuasion strategies three exude confidence from many
leaders exuding conference is not a problem. The problem is

(08:26):
that their confidence comes from their title or where their office,
the corner office, or whether the names appear and organizational chat,
as opposed to the power of their ideas. When this happens,
their confidence is seen as arrogance. Arrogance which is an

(08:49):
exaggerarated belief in one's abilities are important. It's not attractive,
repels the adoption of ideas. Confidence, on the other hand,
is rooted and certainly believe in a position, person, or outcome.
Confidence about your ideas when coupled with a collaboration, the

(09:12):
mutually beneficial mindset are essential for transformational leaders. If you
believe in something firmly, are willing to be persuaded, are
enthused for persuading others, You've built a foundation for the
next step persuasion strategy for being the moment. Really, too

(09:40):
often we're disassociated from the present moment. We regularly think
about our past experiences in persuading others and whether or
not we were successful or were we projecting the future on,
thinking about our requests for additional resources and what we'll

(10:02):
do if we've rejected. When you're thinking is in the
past or future we're not listening. We're not listening to
a person to discuss there his or her priorities and
hopes for the future. We're interpreting him or her based
on a past or a future. Both preclude us from

(10:27):
hearing subtle clues and their voice their tonality. The word
choices also creates an anxiety and apprehension. Coaches regularly say
to the athletes, get your head and again whenever an
athlete makes a simple mistake. For transformational leaders, the clarying

(10:51):
call is get your mindset in the moment five use
if then strategy. When you're presenting an idea, you'll hear concerns, objections,
or questions. This is what you want. Concerns, objections, and

(11:11):
questions show engagement. However, you get a flat refusal to
any form of support. Shut us off the conversation. When
you hear an objection, For example, like my priorities are
to reduce my budget by seven point five percent while
also decreasing the weight time for futures futures on hold,

(11:35):
regarding say the new credit card promotion. I know I
can do this because the one time expenses for the
closed office. For a closed office will be in dundee
will be completed with the fourth quarter. It's okay there,

(11:58):
but I do need to reduce the way time. So
it's looking at options different strategies. The objective is using
the if then strategically is simply to continue the conversation
to see if the collaboration and mutual benefit can be used.
A week example, PAULA, I have an idea about how

(12:22):
you can help how I can help you decrease the
customers on old time issue you've got at the moment.
If it were possible for my team, who have worked
on a great solution for something similar for us, would

(12:42):
it be possible I could share a best practice and
help you reach your targets that you want. Would you
then be willing to help me with the head count
issue I'm working on. So it's a win win. It's
the organizational brain, it's collaboration and it's a beautiful place

(13:05):
to be and it's not a sounding board. Ideas bounce
off each other and we end up getting a far
better solution to our challenge, to our problem. Persuasion strategy
six the magic of three yeses. If you want someone
to say yes to providing you for example, the additional resources.

(13:31):
An important step is to provide them with three attractives
options for saying yes. If you have high levels of
trust and respect and a track record of great results,
presenting one option has at most a twenty five percent

(13:51):
success chance of success. Presenting only one option leads people
curious of other abilities, and I know, becomes the easiest
way to halt the process. When you provide two options,
it presents a binary choice, which usually falls into this

(14:14):
process of right and wrong, good and bad. This halts
the process, reduces the odds of someone saying yes to
your ideas. It's the same as flipping are calling a
fifty to fifty chance of success. Conversely, when you provide
three options, all that are capable of meeting the other

(14:35):
persons needs once objective, your success rate in one of
your options been accepted because up to ninety percent, it's
about engagement, it's about it's about empowering people, giving them options,
giving them an opportunity for control. And with control or

(15:00):
that sense that you're you're being listened to, that's a powerful,
very powerful place to be in strategies in the powerful
language strategy. Without language, we can't make, can't make the
request that a Brista makes her favorite coffee. We can't

(15:24):
make known our feelings for a partner, a spouse, child,
and we can't tell the doctor where it hurts language.
I suppose we could point to it for the doctor.
Language is a powerful tool for good or ill, But
in the world of email, Twitter, social media, it's reduced

(15:48):
or developed. In a brune a one hundred and forty
character world of the fewest pustle worlds culture, we now
accept no worries as a respond to a positive gesture,
as opposed to you're welcome. I watched a couple of
leaders in a team meeting discuss a very difficult and

(16:11):
complex issue on three occasions. The first leader used the
language the idea wren't work. That's unnecessarily complex and cumbersome.
The second leader used language such as we can build that, dear,

(16:35):
and your ideas really helped for me to think more
clearly about this and how we can move forward fast.
Thank you. The first leader's language was rooted in what's
not working. The second leader was rooted in what can work. Next.
First leader was communicating a judgment that had been extended

(17:00):
was unacceptable, unworkable. The second were speaking about the opposite
to think of your words used as seeds planted in
the fertile soil of someone's experience of you, and the

(17:21):
response she received. Your ideas and requests are the harvest
of the words you planted. The two leaders in the
previous example used different language had a different level of
receptivity to their ideas that I would suggest as directly

(17:42):
proportional to the language used. As a transformational leader, may
I suggest you should try to choose positive, uplifting, optimistic,
and grateful words that the catalysts for positive of persuasion

(18:04):
and finalizing persuasion strategy show me the money strategy. The
strategy could invite memories of Tom Cruise yelling show me
the money into the phone and the movie Jerry Maguire.

(18:25):
Tom Cruise's characters are down and out sports agent desperate
to hold on to a client and is persuaded to
talk like his football star client. Money is not the
answer to every persuasion dilemma you have, but recognize that
many leaders and organizations are higher focused on driving business

(18:49):
results and do see most of the decisions as financial ones.
If your request doesn't enable someone to see a clear
return investment, for saying yes to your idea of fall

(19:09):
likeli fall and death years. A colleague of mine had
a chief in information officer who was very astute to
recognize that is one hundred and eighty eighty pounds investment

(19:29):
in an organization wide printer and copier had a little
to do with a printer system. Printers were now either
what was important nor the purchase of it. What was
being purchased was an accelerator of organizational priorities, had a
tenfold return and investment. Using several of the previous strategies listed,

(19:58):
he clearly articulated the falling one. The costing ours related
to worker effectiveness, ease of operation, troubleshooting and maintenance of
the current system. That was a creaking that seemed. Two,

(20:20):
the costs and future to operate the new system far lower.
Three the amount of miscommunity miscommunication and document rework they
had to do with the same system. There was lots
of errors for the time wasted and mission critical departments

(20:44):
due to inefficiency and efficiencies, and how recovering twenty percent
of the time waste was a catalyst for doing more
organizational priorities. How the current system was impacting the senior

(21:07):
executives individual departments and what increases they would individually re
seede With the new system in place, there was a
lost control and they worked out the value of that
relatively small investment about three and a half million pounds,

(21:31):
but then cut the number of in half to show
his concern for being receptive on the potential upside one
and a half million upside after investment of one hundred
and eighty thousand pounds had a net gain oh dar

(21:53):
May of one point three million pounds. This was a
sinful return and each pound spent. This presentation showed key
decision makers that the chief Information Officer was a strategic
business part to the rest of the organization, a business

(22:15):
party who's committed to delivering high value results. See how
it works its way through the system. So over the
last couple of podcasts, we've learned about the three part
persuasion process and all more detailed actions to make in

(22:39):
each step. But that steps are how we do them,
how they're applied in the real world. Next week the
podcast is how we'll take these strategies and add to them,
complimenting them with one of the most underu used misunderstood

(23:02):
principle in the book. In the Book of Peak Performance.
That is the praising principle until next week. Have lords
and lords of zest and energy making a massive difference
to your world by now