What is our presenter vision for 2022? If it has any element of success involved (and it would be a pretty rare resolution that didn’t have that), then being persuasive is going to be integral to the success of realising that vision. If you are trying to climb the corporate ladder, then getting your thoughts sorted and have others listen and agree is persuasion power. If you are the boss and you want the team to get behind your new ideas, direction, project, fresh business initiative etc., then you need them to follow you and that means having persuasive presence. If you are a peer and you seek the cooperation of your colleagues from other divisions, then you need to persuade them to elevate your needs up their priority list. If you want your clients to buy and buy right now, then your persuasion skills have to be excellent.
Great. How do we become more persuasive in business? Being a force of nature won’t work. No matter how much belief, passion and enthusiasm we have mustered, the person we are talking to won’t care much, unless they see something concrete in it for them. We should plan our interactions, so that we get the best result. That makes a lot of sense, however, we can’t always have that opportunity. We may be in the midst of a discussion and we suddenly need to weigh in with our idea. We have no time for careful, detailed planning and scoping of how the conversation should run, because the situation it so fluid. What do we do?
Habit is a powerful tool in business. It means we can engage in high level activities without needing any preparation time. Therefore we need to build habits, so that we are in flow, reacting spontaneously without thought. The habits we choose can be destructive though and defeat us in our quest for persuasion. Interrupting others when they are speaking would have to be at the top of the “stop doing” list. This is always a problem, because it says to the other person that what they are saying has no value and we are more important than them. Finishing their sentences for them would probably rank as number two in the deadly habits list. It says we are more articulate and clever than they are. We have anticipated where they are going with the conversation and we can get there more effectively than them, because we are smarter than they are.
Instead, we need to make CEP our new persuasion habit. I know everyone needs another acronym like a hole in the head, but they are a handy short form to help us remember the content, so please bear with me on CEP. The “C” stands for “context”. We start not with our proposal or suggestion, but with the background. This is a very strategic choice that guarantees we can reduce rejection and resistance for our idea. When we leap into our plan or idea, we will face two levels of resistance. The quick thinkers will be telling us why that idea won’t work or that it has been tried before and failed, etc. The deeper thinkers will be doing the same thing, but they won’t necessarily voice their opposition at that moment, because the bolshie, assertive few are dominating the airwaves.
Starting with the context is genius because there is nothing to disagree with. The listeners are just hearing the background which has led you to draw certain conclusions based on the details and facts of the case. The quick thinkers will be racing ahead of you and leaping to conclusions about what should be done. The deeper thinkers will be doing the same thing, just at a much more substantive level.
The “E” stands for the “execution” that you are recommending to the group. Our recommended actions won’t be whimsy, accidental or fantasy. Based on the facts of the case there are some logical things which should happen as a result. The listeners in many cases will have arrived at the same conclusion as we have or are well on the way toward it. They will be more likely to agree with our idea, because they feel they have discovered it for themselves independently, based on the facts they have heard.
The final “P” is for “payoff”. The idea of recency says that people tend to remember best what they heard the most recent, so we save the best for last. They have raced ahead of us to what the execution piece should be. The next thing they hear is the payoff from taking that recommended action, which makes it even easier for them to agree with our idea.
The key is to make this process our standard operating behaviour. Instead of jumping in and blurting out our idea, naked and undefended, we go straight to the context first. By making this our habitual way of introducing ideas and suggestions, we create a new habit, one which substantially eliminates opposition to what we are saying. If you make this one decision to adopt the CEP habit for 2022, then your persuasion power will get a tremendous boost.
