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Finance Books

Principled Persuasion:
Influence with Integrity,
Sell with Standards
by Dr. Marlene Caroselli

Excerpt

Deliberate or Dishonest

If you've ever watched a courtroom drama or served on a jury yourself, you know that lawyers make special efforts to relate to the jury. They may speak in a certain way, cite particular references, dress in a deliberate fashion, carry a certain kind of briefcase. Would you regard their efforts as dishonest manipulation or deliberate influence? You must judge for yourself, of course. But if such actions were immoral, then salespeople, leaders, ministers, managers, teachers, attorneys, and a host of others--including those who spruce up their home before selling it--would be guilty of unethical influence.

Effective influencers are multi-lingual: they use the language of objects and a variety of other languages to lead others to think or act in a certain way. As long as the purpose behind their use of those languages is an ethical purpose, designed to benefit someone or something beyond the influencer, then the influencers are acting with integrity. To effectively employ body language and paralanguage and silence and neurolinguistics and proxemics (the use of space) is to understand that different folks need different strokes. Your ability to use a wide range of tools is a tribute to your understanding of human dynamics.

Leading by Influence not Authority

Influencing with integrity, not surprisingly, means exerting positive leadership, effecting positive change. In fact, author Kenneth Blanchard observes the key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority. If you wish to lead others, you can no longer depend exclusively on the power of your position. Your authority, such as it is, carries less weight today than it did in times past. Because the Quality movement emphasizes empowered behavior and because flattened organizations spell leadership opportunities for everyone, you are probably eager to learn how to lead by influence--no matter what degree of authority you have in the organization or in the other structures in which you participate.

Realize the initial reaction to many of your leadership proposals will be a healthy skepticism. Most people are slow to change. They have adopted an "if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it" attitude. Thus, to be effective, you must withstand and overcome the reluctance that is the usual response to a leader's initial suggestion. You and your ideas must be strong enough to withstand a range of negative reactions--from apathy at one end to complete refusal at the other. Influencing with integrity may mean overcoming objections, or igniting passions, or changing minds. It may be convincing through information, or persuading through personality, or swaying through strategic alliances. No matter what means or combination of means you use, the purpose behind your efforts must be an ethical one--to effect positive change for both yourself and others.

Ripples on an Ethical Surface

If your efforts are less than admirable, others will sooner or later learn of the unethical stance you have taken. Not only do you stand to harm your reputation but you may harm your career as well. Every action you take has consequences--positive or negative, sooner or later. Sometimes you will not learn of the ripple effect you have created until long after you have spoken or acted. Whenever you set out to influence, you will be tossing words onto smooth surfaces of paper, computer screens, or minds. There is no telling how far your influence may extend, no foreseeing how wide audience may become.

If only for this reason, integrity should guide all your influence actions. And the more tools you have at your disposal, the more effective your influence can be. Those who are limited to the metaphoric hammer view every influence-situation as a nail. The more effective influencers, though, have acquired several different integrity-tools and several different influence techniques.

The former CEO of Ford Motor Company, Don Petersen, once observed that results depend on relationships. You may be able to maintain relationships for a while by operating in an integrity-vacuum. Sooner or later, though, some of the people who cannot be fooled all of the time will see through the threadbare mantle of non-principled behavior, worn by those with few scruples in order to cloak ulterior motives. And when that happens, the consequences are usually dire. If you are interested in results, you need good relationships. And to sustain those relationships, you need to influence with integrity, to take a standards-driven approach.

Peter Drucker reminds us that leaders know how to ask questions--the right questions. As a leader of others, you will willingly explore the many questions associated with influence--many to be found in this book, others that will occur to you as you execute your leadership plans. Among the concepts to be probed as you build mutually influential relationships is awareness: do you know when you are acting with integrity? What leads you to your conviction that your actions are proper? On what bases do others view your actions? How can you expand your influence without lessening the ethical component of it? Ideally, by the time you have completed Principled Persuasion and have given serious thought to the questions and activities, you will have developed your own definition of "integrity," your own philosophy for integrating integrity in your influence endeavors, and your own practical approach for operating from an ethical stance whenever you seek to influence others.

Dr. Marlene Caroselli, author of 39 business books (visit Amazon.com), is an international keynote speaker and corporate trainer for Fortune 100 companies, government agencies, educational institutions, and professional organizations. She contributes frequently to a number of well-known publications and presents seminars on management topics. Her first book, "The Language of Leadership," was chosen a main selection by Newbridge's Executive Development Book Club. Her most recent book, "Principled Persuasion" was just named a Director's Choice by Doubleday Book Club.