Copyright 2005 Daniel N Brown
Every day we're confronted with situations where we need toinfluence, lead and persuade people. From persuading yourchildren to clean their room, to convincing your boss to giveyou a raise. It's all about influence.
Our ability to deal successfully with people determines thequality of our business life, our family life, and our sociallife. Ultimately, our success in life and in any endeavor willbe solely determined by how well we influence other people. Ourideas will never see the light of day if we can't persuadeothers why it's such a great idea.
Excellent influencing skills require a healthy combination ofinterpersonal, communication, presentation, and assertivenesstechniques. But, there is no right way, nor is there only oneway to influence others. Everything is a factor when influencingpeople.
Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends and Influence People" givesan incredible insight into human behavior. If you've never readthis classic book I highly recommend it. There are also plentyof other great books out there on people skills and humannature. It would do us all good to gain more understanding onthis vital topic.
We must, absolutely, have a proper understanding of people andtheir nature if we are ever to win others to our way ofthinking. When you gain a proper understanding, then, and onlythen, can you become a successful person of influence.
Influencing is about being able to move things forward, withoutpushing, forcing or telling others what to do. It's the abilityto work everything at your disposal, both verbal and non-verbalcommunication, to create the impact you want, rather thanletting things just happen.
To best influence people you must have an understanding ofyourself and the effect or impact you have on others. It' sabout knowing how others perceive you. It can sometimes belooked at as the ability to finesse another person. They becomepersuaded, often unconsciously, into seeing and understandingyour view .
If you can make people understand your view then they will befar more willing to at least meet you halfway. Even more so ifyou make them feel acknowledged, understood and appreciated.They may even end up doing or agreeing to something theywouldn't have previously done because they feel good aboutmaking the choice.
Now, here's a big secret to influencing people; make the otherperson feel important and the more they will respond to you.It's human nature for people to want to be recognized and tofeel like "somebody." It's been said about recognition, "Babiescry for it and grown men die for it."
People will always respond in a negative way to you if you treatthen like a nobody, or talk down to them. I see this all thetime, particularly in families. Parents can't seem to understandwhy their kids disrespect them. Often times, the parents aretalking down to their kids, belittling them, making them feellike their ideas are stupid, and making them feel unimportant.
People could gain a lot of ground by first listening to otherswithout judgment and criticism, hearing what is important tothem, and hearing what will move them. When you know what willmove them, you will then know how to move them because you willbe able to tell them what they want to hear. You can simply showthem how they can get what they want by doing what you want.
Again, our successes in life will be greatly determined by howwell we influence other people. So, we need to learn all we canabout human nature and obtain great people skills so we may winothers to our way of thinking. When you gain a properunderstanding of human nature and hone your people skills, thenwill you become a mighty successful person of influence.
