In this lesson we will be looking at how to increase your influence through building trust and rapport. From my own experience, this is fundamental. In lesson 2 we looked at how people may be resistant to being influenced because of perceived differences between you. The example that comes immediately to my mind was an issue I managed at a startup developing biometric technology for humanitarian projects in the Global South. I had only recently joined and was in charge of developing their flagship product: a fingerprint scanner used to record the identity of a person and later verify it was them so they could receive a course of treatment. Unfortunately a previous version of the scanner had developed intermittent battery life issues, which meant that units were failing in use. This was causing some bad feeling between my team and the Ops team, who were in the field managing the complaints from health-workers that the equipment was unreliable. As the new PM I recognised the characteristics of the issue - the intermittent nature meant it was hard to track down the cause, as well as being unpredictable as to which units would fail. I spent lots of time on calls with my colleagues on the ground to collate the data and understand the problem better. From this I learnt three things about the role of trust and rapport in influencing people:
Let's start by picking up on lesson 2’s theme on overcoming resistance.
We will return to Jenny's attempts to influence Neil shortly, but first I want to share that if you want to influence other people, you have to be prepared to put in the reps. Influencing as a skill is part of relationship building as a skill. Relationships take time to build, and need constant nurturing to maintain if not grow. We may romanticise the vision of being someone calling the shots, and everybody falling over themselves to follow us with no argument. But that's not reality. In fact, it takes time to build influence - you need to spend time getting to know people before you can start influencing others. We need to build trust. So look at this as a long game, one that you will need to constantly invest in, like tending to a garden.
Jenny runs into Neil who's coming back from the gym after lunch. She feels nervous but politely asks him how he is. 'Oh I'm great, thanks. I've just tried hot yoga - have you done it before?' Jenny smiles and nods as it's something she has done a few times before. 'Yeah actually, it's hard work but you feel great afterwards.' Neil laughs. They swap hot yoga stories for a few minutes before Neil catches the time and excuses himself to get ready for the afternoon. Jenny continues on to her meeting, surprised that she's had such a pleasant exchange with him. She's questioning if he's really the awful person she and her work friends think he is: he can't be that bad if he's willing to try hot yoga.
What this example shows is that Jenny and Neil share something in common: they both like hot yoga. This now gives them a topic of conversation that they can build their relationship around. The next time Jenny sees Neil she could ask him how his classes are going or give him suggestions on new ones to try. By focusing on what they have in common rather than their differences, they create a new shared social identity: Product people who like hot yoga. The more points of similarity they share, the more open they become to being influenced.
Social Identification Theory (SIT) was developed in the 1970s and 1980s by Tajfel and Turner. The core idea of SIT is that we categorise ourselves and others into social groups based on nationality, gender, profession and so on. These categorisations come with an emotional and value-based significance that contribute to our self esteem. The core processes are:
It's possible that you can belong to two groups that are in opposition. Jenny is now a member of a group of product managers that don't like Neil, and a group of Product people who like hot yoga in which Neil is a member. This will create incongruence in Jenny's mind, and she will have to resolve it either by leaving one of the groups, doing some mental gymnastics to compartmentalise or justify her opposing views, or adopting a more neutral social identification in the groups.
When similarities are established between folk, trust follows. Let's take a deep dive into the process of building trust.
It seems counterintuitive but the most solid way to build trust (and therefore influence) is to listen. We spend far too much time talking, and even when we're supposedly listening it's mainly because we're waiting for our chance to speak again! For many of us, there's an inner commentary running 24/7 that takes over our ability to be truly present and hold space for other people. Unfortunately we probably can all remember at least one example of someone who was a terrible listener, and how that made us feel.
Stephen Covey in 'The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People' talks about empathic listening. 'Seek first to understand' is his mantra, contrary to our usual modus operandi of seeking to be understood first. Covey suggests that first we need to get inside the other person's frame of reference and see the world how they see it. This requires listening with ears, eyes and heart. Over time, listening empathically and appreciating the similarities between folk leads to the creation of rapport - a deep, harmonious relationship based on understanding each other.
Let's return to Jenny and Neil to see how they're getting on in their relationship.