Influence is not Charisma

"You don’t need to be charismatic to influence others."?

What do you think you need to have or be to have influence? A question I frequently post to my workshop participants. Without fail, I will have numerous people sharing that charisma is one of the many factors to having influence.

I proceed to ask what is their definition of charisma then? Often, if I have 20 participants, I will have 20 different definitions of the word, and this can only point to one fact, that charisma is not an answer to building one’s influence. What cannot be defined cannot be duplicated to create the same result.

Fortunately, psychologists and behavioural scientists had invested more than 60 years into the world of influence, discovering and understanding what makes humans tick, and how these findings can help us to become better influencers. We can’t create charisma since it is rather a fluffy word, but we can accelerate our likability as defined through science.

The Fundamental Truth

Influence requires a conscious effort. Nothing comes by chance. If you knew of people who can quickly call upon help and garner attention and support for a challenge they are having, those networks do not come overnight, certainly not through using authority. Authority alone is certainly not influence.?

Influence is about building it now when you don’t need it so that when you need it, you have it. If you need influence, but don’t have it, you will likely not need it again for the moment when you needed it the most will slip by you

There are three basic yet powerful behaviour strategies that I am going to share that you can do to increase your likability and influence over time.

Strategy 1: Doing Others A Favor

Doing a favour for someone is giving the person an implied ‘obligation’. It is a universal rule that when you received favour from someone, you reciprocate. But what is lesser known is a psychological truth that when you return a favour, you increase your likability.

Over time, when the favour is made and received in a continuous two-way cycle, the relationship gets strengthened, and you have built a strong network of not just colleagues, but friends and partners.

Strategy 2: Holding People To A Standard.??

When people fall short of a certain benchmark or standard, we could potentially use the standard as a positive way to align people to the original standard they set for themselves.?

For example, if your co-worker or friend fall short of a certain level of behaviour (i.e. not delivering high-quality work on time). What you could do is point out the positive reputation he has built up previously when he was at his best, but falling short of that standard today.?

What you are doing is applying the principle of commitment and consistency. Because of the high standard, he had set for himself previously (i.e. a commitment), this time, he had to be consistent with that standard. Before you know it, he is back on track and thank you for that quick reminder of his capability.

Strategy 3: Providing Exclusive Information.

Exclusive information is deemed to be highly persuasive and influential because it is not available to anyone on the street. It is available only to the selected few. In your course of work, look out for possible real information, but because of the nature of your job, it is deemed “special information”. That is, if a person can receive it from you, they will be able to achieve two things.

The first thing is to help them to avoid totally an adverse outcome. The second thing is to assist them to increase the possibility of a successful outcome because they are doing it differently, now that they know this critical information. In fact, you are also doing them a favour, which directly increases one another likability.?

At the end of the day, be kind to everybody because everyone and anyone can potentially be your ally and support when you need it the most.?

Article by:

Joseph Wong is an award-winning Leadership Transformation Coach and Influence without Authority Expert and Author.