Latest / Unspoken Career Truths / The Power of Influence: Building Credibility, Trust, and Impact

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The Power of Influence: Building Credibility, Trust, and Impact · Unspoken Career Truths

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  Welcome to unspoken career truths.
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  I'm Cara Wood. And I'm Lauren Levac Gilbert.
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  And we're here to be the Co workers you can trust.
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  In just 10 minutes, we'll cover the strategies you need, the
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  mistakes to avoid, and the insider secrets no one tells you
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  so you can show up with confidence at work.
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  Hello everyone and today's episode we are going to talk
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  about influence. So influence I feel like has
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  many different connotations, but I wanted to actually define it
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  like dictionary define it. It means the capacity to have an
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  effect on the character development or behavior of
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  someone or something or the effect itself.
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  That is the definition of influence.
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  Got it, Cara. Yes.
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  And I'm trying to think if there's any surprises in that.
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  But that makes sense, right? Yeah.
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  And I also am glad it's more than just behavior because I
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  think a lot of times when I think influence, I think that I
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  can influence. Behavior, the perfect segue into
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  exactly what I was going to say, which is that influence is a
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  really powerful word and it's a powerful skill.
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  And but sometimes it can get kind of misconstrued with
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  manipulation, which is very, very different.
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  But sometimes when I talk about influence, I know other people
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  kind of get like, oh, like that feels like fake or it feels
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  facilitated or it feels like manipulation.
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  But there's very different intent in both of those things.
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  That is interesting because yeah, I did.
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  My mind went to Puppet Master. My mind went to like, you can
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  sway someone and then they aren't making their own choices.
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  So influence is about it, like enrolling people, like in a
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  shared goal, a shared vision, and manipulation is about
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  tricking people into advancing your own agenda.
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  So the intent is very different. And the way that I like think
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  about it in my brain is that influence builds trust and then
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  manipulation breaks it. Nice.
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  And So what are some examples, I mean like examples of things
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  that you're supposed to do to be that person that builds trust
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  instead of instead of eroding it.
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  Well, I think the thing about influence and those things that
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  that help you get there is that you need to understand also the
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  place it has in in business and work in your career.
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  And I think the big piece of that is it doesn't matter what
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  your title is necessarily. You can have more influence at
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  different levels if you're more skilled at it.
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  So example to your point, like building credibility just as
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  yourself as your brand within your organization, when you say
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  something, you follow up and you actually get it done and you
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  achieve it. And people know that and people
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  see that. And then that builds trust,
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  which can then also build influence.
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  Got it. Do you have any examples, Carl
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  on your side about? Like other ways that people have
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  built influence and trust. I mean, I think that it also
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  comes down to understanding because if we are talking,
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  you're building trust, you're building free will.
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  It's like understanding and giving people the reason to do
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  something, so incentivizing them.
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  And you talked about brands can build trust just like people
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  can. And I think if I think of
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  someone who's manipulating you, they might have like a favor
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  swap versus when you're behind a leader that is actually
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  credible, it's because they've inspired you with their vision.
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  A. 100% And that when you think of organizations and like
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  influence in the workplace, the topic that always comes to my
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  mind is let's say you have like a new idea.
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  Or if I use like an example from my past, like I had created this
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  kind of like new strategy and I wanted everybody to get on board
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  and I wanted their perspective. And I really wanted to have like
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  a joint conversation. And it was going to be a big
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  meeting. So there were probably going to
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  be like 15 different people in the meeting.
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  So what I did beforehand was I had alignment with each of those
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  individuals. And I said like, hey, this is
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  how I'm thinking about it. This is my perspective.
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  This is where I see you fitting in.
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  And so then going into the meeting, nobody felt like they
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  were being attacked. Nobody felt like they were
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  blindsided. And we had a really
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  collaborative conversation because I helped to influence
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  the alignment conversation that happened around, hey, this
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  strategy works for us. We see how it makes sense to us.
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  We think that we can implement it, and here's why.
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  But that took a lot of. A lot of background work you're
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  reminding me of. There's someone I used to work
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  with who did that so well because not only did she just
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  straight up say to you like, get this alignment, she actually
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  asked you your, her, your input. And so she'd get input from
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  every stakeholder before the meeting where all the
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  stakeholders came together. And again, it was only made
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  sense in these like really extreme like cases where you're
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  like, hey, I know this is important.
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  And maybe sometimes when you have someone in the room who
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  you're who you're concerned isn't going to buy in, if you
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  invite them to the table early and see what their concerns are
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  ahead of time, you can sometimes, you know, address
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  them with your argument once you've heard them.
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  So that's really fascinating. Yeah.
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  And it at the end of the day, we've talked about this on some
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  of our other podcasts like Everybody's Human, Everybody
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  wants to feel like they're bringing value.
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  They want to be a part of the conversation.
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  They want to feel like they can influence the strategy and be
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  asked the questions and and have input.
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  And I think the thing about influence is it is very, very
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  heavily relationship based, right?
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  You have to talk to people, you have to understand what
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  motivates them. You have to understand how
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  they're feeling at a certain time and make sure that it's
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  clear that what you're working on or what you need their input
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  on is like helping advance both them and the broader
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  organization. And that's, that's a lot of
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  chatting and relationship building and discussions and
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  just kind of back and forth. And you have to be really kind
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  of comfortable with that to have influence.
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  It's funny because when you started this, I was thinking to
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  myself, well, how are the ways that I've influenced?
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  And I think I go about influencing in another way
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  that's effective, which is it's the action piece of it.
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  It's like the showing up and the like overtime building
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  credibility and what's challenging when you're in that,
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  when you take that tact is that again, these all all these
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  things take time building influence.
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  I think actually it just like takes a lot of time when you're
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  coming into a new situation, you have no reputation, then you
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  have to just kind of again, consistently show sort of over
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  perform. But those that's the way that I
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  historically in my career have built influences.
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  Then people look to you as the person who's either going to get
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  things done or who's going to know kind of how to get things
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  done, which is a is a nice position to be in, but it takes,
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  it takes a while and it takes you producing results.
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  Yeah. And I think that incorporates 2
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  things. I think 1 is the small wins,
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  right? So like set your up for, set
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  yourself up for success, follow up, do the task, say what
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  you're, do what you're saying, right?
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  And then I think the other piece is also like just being very
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  clear about how you can provide value in a situation.
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  And I, I remember I was talking to a very senior leader once and
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  I was like, you know, I was young at the time.
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  And I said, what is the like one piece of advice?
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  Like if you had to give one piece of advice that you think
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  will be the most valuable throughout my entire career.
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  And you know what he said he was like follow up.
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  Yeah, you said. That you're going to do it, you
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  follow up and you complete it and you do it.
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  The follow through is so important and can oftentimes get
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  so lost in so many to do's or busyness or meetings.
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  Or he was like follow up and you will be credible and you will
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  build trust and you will build influence.
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  And I'm amazed at how often people hesitate before following
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  up. Or they'll follow up with me,
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  but then they'll express later that they were concerned or
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  nervous about following up. And so I think there's two sides
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  to it. Like you said, that could be
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  just that you've got this giant To Do List and it's like, no,
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  prioritize the follow up. But it's also like also don't
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  hesitate to follow up because people actually really want to
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  hear from you. And like you said at the start,
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  they want to feel included in decision.
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  So if you're working through something together, hearing what
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  you're thinking and like over communicating can be really
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  powerful way and to influence you're you're in their in their
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  face. It's but in an in a nice
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  supportive way. And a lot of the times sometimes
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  I think the, the pause to like stop and not follow up or like
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  be concerned about that is because maybe they have nothing
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  to say. But something I do quite often
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  is I'll respond and just be like, I don't have an answer.
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  I'm working on it. You'll hear from me in 2 weeks,
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  like just an answer so it doesn't go into the abyss.
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  Or even like with some of the senior leaders that I work with,
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  they really like to know kind of updates.
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  So even if I don't have an update, I say no update meeting
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  this time. Just be clear, no, I'm on it.
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  And obviously everybody's different and you have to kind
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  of understand everybody's style, but just not letting things kind
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  of flow into the abyss. Yeah, no, it makes sense.
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  And then last thing I think that's really important about
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  influence is storytelling. And I think that came through a
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  bit in my example of aligning with people beforehand and then
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  bringing it up to the broader meeting.
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  Storytelling is a super interesting, super important
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  talent to learn. It will be a topic that we will
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  eventually cover, but thinking about how you can use
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  storytelling to explain the value of what you're working on,
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  get people on board with you, help them advocate for you
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  outside of what you're doing too.
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  It's just a really important skill for influence that is
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  something to continue to hone throughout your entire career.
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  Yeah. And one of my favorite things
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  about storytelling is actually, if you think of your best
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  storytellers, there are people who plant images in your mind so
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  that you actually end up Co creating the meaning of the
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  story. And so when you're thinking
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  about those stories that you want to tell, make space for the
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  person to connect the dots, make the meaning.
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  People who I think of as great storytellers, they, they start
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  to paint a picture that you relate to yourself and you start
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  to imagine yourself in that story.
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  And that's where, again, you can really influence and sort of
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  brain worm in and have people easily remember because it's
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  about them or it was something that they could start to
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  imagine. And for our audience, Car is an
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  incredible storyteller and I rely on her so much to help me
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  with that. So I just wanted to give you big
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  kudos for that, Cara. Thank you.
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  OK, so just to close out, remember, influence isn't about
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  waiting until you have the big title or you're working on this
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  really important strategic initiative.
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  It can happen in day-to-day practices.
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  Just think about storytelling, think about where people are
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  coming from from an empathy standpoint.
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  Try to listen more than you're talking and really think about
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  those small wins that you can have throughout your career to
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  help you get there. Amazing.
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  That's a wrap. Thanks for joining us on
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  Unspoken Career Truths. Don't forget to follow us on
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