The Top 10 Things to Think About when Designing an Influence Strategy that is EFFORTLESSLY ATTRACT-ABLE!

The Top 10 Things to Think About when Designing an Influence Strategy that is EFFORTLESSLY ATTRACT-ABLE!

Category: Corporate, Organizational Issues, Competition (AC41)

Originally Submitted on 9/14/97.

In enterprise, it becomes essential that we develop the capability to influence. While there are many more dynamics involved than those listed in this top ten, these ten are essential when considering an influence "strategy" that helps the organization to become attract-able.

1. Do the work!

I think that effortless attraction is an oxymoron. Influence and the subsequent attractive capability of a person or enterprise arises out of well-designed, hard work. The responsibility for making oneself or an organization attract-able is not effortless. The degree of difficulty is increased as we seek to make our systems "transparent" to observers. The systems and processes that underlie what seem on the surface to be effortless are truly hard work if they are to become transparent to observation. Don't let anyone kid you, if someone or something is attractive, a lot of homework and experience is in place!

2. Stay available in the present!

We can't serve if we are not here. As Wayne Dyer once said, we come from being NOWHERE to NOW HERE. We can't afford to be in the past or in the future. In order to be attentive, which is what most people need to feel important, listened to or valued, we must remain solidly in the present, centered now and prepared to move outward but from a center of now.

3. Let go needing a specific outcome!

This comes from Buddhism and is a very good axiom to remember. First if we are stuck on the outcome, we are not present. Second, if the outcome is firmly affixed in our minds, we preclude those emerging opportunities that will arise. Thirdly, the outcome is a place where WE want to go and not necessarily where the other participant or participants want or need to go. Lastly, being stuck on the outcome decreases our motivation to continue and innovate if we fail to reach it. In the meantime we devalue the generative process which we are apart of in the journey.

4. Understand that people have different needs!

It seems logical, but how many people or organizations can truly assimilate this counter-intuitive premise? Everybody is like us, right? WRONG! We all need different things and much of the time we are unable to articulate those needs because we speak different languages and I don't mean French and German!

5. Cognitive map anyone?

Through the process of living and being we develop very different maps of reality. These "cognitive maps" help us to make sense out of the world based on where we are at in our lives and what we have experienced. You can't have rapport with someone if you fail to fit within their cognitive map. How do you know where their cognitive map leads--try listening in their language. Believe me, this is not easy to do. Suspensions of one's own mental models to listen for the distinctions in another's really takes some practice and often some special gifts but it can be developed. Invoke Covey's habit that summarizes the golden rule, seek first to understand, then be understood.

6. Remain authentic!

First I must state that I believe that we have no ordained right to brandish our own authenticity. However, by remaining authentic, we keep from being disingenuous as the situation changes. Do you know some people, you can't tell what color they are--just like a chameleon because they change "color" according to the situation. They seem to always be contrived? In my view, this is evidence of the Newtonian school where marketing people are taught to develop synthetic rapport in order to gain trust and influence. I don't agree. By being authentic, you will FAIL to attract some people but you will never fail to influence them. And there is always tomorrow!

7. Stay open to possibilities!

This is a key point. If we stay in the present, we can move with the flow. We learned in football to stay in the balanced position, always present, never leaning one way or the other, otherwise an opposing force can defeat your position. While this is a graphic example of competition, influence is not competition. Influence and especially attraction is being where you need to be when you need to be there with what is authentic. You can only do this if you're not leaning into the future or the outcome. As possibilities unfold, you are ready to adjust and incorporate the opportunities presented and move towards new order. There is a difference between being situational and remaining open to possibilities. As an authentic person or organization, we know what we are and are clear about our capabilities. In view of possibilities, we don't extend ourselves so far past these points that we become disingenuous and "suddenly" capable of anything--that is not being open to possibilities; that is not having a center.

8. Do win-win or walk away!

This is where the going gets tough. Many people popularized this philosophy but Stephen Covey probably gets the most credit as it is one of his seven habits. Regardless, the concept is tried and true and eons old. People respect you when you won't settle for win-lose, or lose-win. When you know enough about yourself to walk away because win-win is essential, you become extraordinarily attract-able. For the person or organization that practices win-win from an authentic center, tomorrow is not only a possibility it is a guarantee of success.

9. Be aware--of the known and unknown!

David Bohm coined the terms "implicate and explicate" order. In recognition of the known-explicate, and what is occurring in the implicate order--the unknown. Just because we don't know about it, doesn't mean it is not occurring. In this realm we are all at the beginning, yet we can recognize that there are other forces at our disposal within the universe that are unrecognizable but none-the- less, present. There are times when we seek to influence (and as a result attract), that we put too much credence in what we know. We constantly seek to do and learn more without realizing there is much available to us through the unknown. If we can't always figure it out, it doesn't mean that we are doomed. In fact, what may be happening is a signal that we need to pull back to center and allow the unknown to emerge and create the possibilities that seem to be lacking.

10. Cause and effect are not always related!

For the linear mind, this is a leap of faith without question. As complexity happens, we begin to realize that there are many types of systems and much interplay among possibilities. It has been fairly recent since we have begun to grasp non-linear system dynamics, where cause and effect can be so dislocated that we fail to see how one affects the other. This failure occurs partly due to the implicate order and partly due to the myopic lens we wear as humans and organizations of humans. If we try to fit everything into a cause and effect bundle, we become limited in our ability to both influence and consequently become attract-able. Clearly we need to embrace this non-linear understanding and allow for the non-sequential order of things to guide us in understanding the effects of these dynamics in our lives.

About the Submitter

This piece was originally submitted by Mike R. Jay, Happeneur, Executive Coach, writer, consultant, learner, who can be reached at quarterback @msn.com, or visited on the web. The original source is: None specifically, but many are synthesized and repackaged and noted in the list.

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