How to Increase Your Influence

Alignment

This is one of the great buzzwords of our time. When used consciously, it's also the key to building solid relationships as well as the foundation for being influential. When you are able to show how someone else's needs can be met through your idea or process, you both stand a chance of walking away satisfied. 

The question: How do you do it?

Five Styles to Help You Influence

1. Demonstrate. Give a successful example of your idea. 

How? Highlight related examples of the same idea already taking place in your organization or in another business. 

2. Cost-Focus. Show how problems and costs can be minimized. 

How?  Run through the numbers to reveal, factually, the cost benefits of your approach. Do this on paper and hand the other person(s) a copy to hold in their grubby little paws. This makes it real. Don't just say it; print out the math.

3. Values-based consistency. Show that your solution is consistent with, and strongly supports, the other person's values. 

How? Do your homework and find out the non negotiables in the business lives of those listening. Then, clearly point out the values-alignment that your solution brings.

4. Time Awareness. Demonstrate how the plan will unfold over a specific period of time.

How? My favorite--because it is low risk and high payoff--is to do a trial project implemented in stages with "client" review at designated points. It is very powerful because the other person is actively involved, shares likes and dislikes at each step, and is part of the successes and problem-solving. Ownership emerges rather quickly.

5. Testimonials. Show that your idea already has the support of other respected people. 

How? Ask others who have used the idea to give you a blurb or, internally, to come to the meeting. Nothing succeeds like someone else showing how successful you have been with them. You hardly have to say a word except "thank you" to those who have helped.

Some Other Thoughts

• Listen to what sound like objections and acknowledge them. You'll gain respect. You'll lose respect if you don't treat feedback to your ideas as being legitimate. 

• Stay focused on your theme and not everything you know about the idea or proposal. Too many details will distract your listeners. However, if they ask for details, be prepared to respond. It means they are interested. 

• Consistent with #4 above: People are more likely to accept a smaller proposal if they've just rejected a larger one. Keep the pilot program in your back pocket as a reasonable alternative to implementing the entire idea. It will seem sensible to the individual or group.

I found this great Blog posted by Steve Roesler! Thanks for the info!

15 Success Principles

The 15 Success Principles You’ll Never Want To Forget

By Joel on March 12, 2013

You can’t assure success, but you can increase the chances of it happening. After all, opportunity favors the prepared. With the following 15 success principles, you can dramatically increase the chances of success in your life.

1 – Prepare

The first success principle is preparation. It’s the foundation of success. With preparation you create your own opportunities. Once you have all the different elements lined up, it only takes a small opening to realize your goal. At the same time, taking advantage of big opportunities without enough preparation means risking your success, as you’re building without a well-laid foundation.

2 – Do something you love

You have to work very hard whatever it is you choose to do. Your work or your project will dominate much of your time and your life. Therefore, find something that you enjoy doing and do that.

3 – Get started

You have to start somewhere. Today is as good a day as any to start. Get into action today and start moving in the direction you want. Putting it off can only lead to failure, whereas if you start and see an early setback, at least you conquered that setback early on.

4 – Move in the right direction

Keep everything moving in the direction you want. It doesn’t matter if things go slowly initially. As long as the overall direction is favorable, you’ll get where you want to go eventually.

5 – Use the power of dreams and your imagination

What you dream and visualize today will become true tomorrow. You just have to work on turning it into reality. Just as your dreams can only influence your life if you let them, the cities you build in your imagination can only become real if you build them.

6 – Think big

If you set your aim a bit too high you might fall short. If you set your aim too low you might achieve your goal… and miss out on the other opportunities. By thinking bigger, the only limit is what is possible. You’re no longer limited by what you think is possible.

7 – Focus on growth

Seemingly impossible challenges are just cleverly disguised opportunities for growth. If you take those challenges and, in solving them, improve yourself, you’ll find yourself continually moving in the right direction.

8 – Maintain your determination

With enough determination, you can succeed through almost any odds. Enough determination means you’ll find a way no matter the situation.

9 – Set a clear vision

Think through where you’ll want to go. Develop a clear sense of what your final goal is, and keep this with you. By knowing the destination you want to reach, you can continually look at your current path and decide if it’s a route that will help you get where you want to go.

10 – Set goals along the way

A final goal isn’t enough. You need intermediate goals that set the path. These goals should be specific, measurable, realistic, attainable, and timely. These intermediate goals define the steps that you need to take to get to the final one.

11 - Work out plans of action for your work

For each goal, it helps to have plans to reach them. Your plan describes how you can reach each step from where you are, or where you will be. Keep in mind that the future is never certain. Things rarely work out exactly how you plan. Therefore, see these plans as showing one or more possible routes, not necessarily the route you’ll end up taking.
Still, knowing the plan means you can avoid long detours that might compromise your chances of reaching a goal on time — or at all.

12 - Commit to taking action

Once you start going, keep going. Never, never, never give up. If you find an obstacle in your way, chip away at it or go around it. The only way to really fail is to give up. If you keep going you’ll succeed. If you hit the limits of what’s possible, you can regroup and find another way.

13 - Use affirmations

Affirmations are just short, positive, and above all direct phrases in present tense. Things like “I’m getting more and more successful.” The idea is that they reinforce a positive world view. With affirmations, you are defining your own reality. By transmitting a positive world view to your mind, it adopts this view. As your mind adopts this view, it helps shape the world around you to fit it, which means it helps make the world around you one that reflects a reality of you getting more successful every day.

14 - Get rid of negative influences

Avoid harmful influences around you that might shake you from your goal. Keep people and ideas around you that support your success and your belief in yourself.

15 - Be grateful and appreciate what you have

The final success principle is to appreciate what you have already. Realize that — by sheer virtue of the fact that you can be reasonably certain you’ll live from one day to the next — you already have enough. Enjoy it! Appreciate what you’ve achieved so far, and see that what you want, where you’re going, is not what you need or what you must do. Rather, these are things and actions that will make your situation even better.

Article By James Meyer | Addicted2Success.com

Business Books That You MUST Read

How many of these have you guys read? Any others that should be on the list?

Business Books that Will Change Your Life by Dave Kerpen

Great leaders learn every day, and reading great books is the one of the best ways to learn. I've been fortunate enough to read some excellent books over the last fifteen years - books that have inspired me to change the way I see the world, my business, and the opportunities in front of me. In the order in which I've read them, here is a list of nine books which have changed my life. May they change yours as well:

1) What Color is Your Parachute? A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career Seekers by Richard Bolles
I read this book when I was 21 years old and didn't know what to do with the rest of my life. It helped me go from a Crunch n Munch vendor at the ballpark to a top salesperson at Radio Disney. Ffifteen years later, I have given at least 40 copies away to interns, staff and friends who are searching for their career purpose. It's difficult work - because not only will you read the book, but you'll have to do a lot of exercises and soul searching throughout - but whether you're 21 or 61, you'll emerge with a clearer vision of what you want to do next and where you'll want to work.

2) Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers Into Friends & Friends Into Customers by Seth Godin
No author has influenced me more as a marketer, business person and writer than Seth Godin. I could have easily included 9 books just by Godin - Purple Cow, Tribes, Linchpin, Poke the Box & his latest, Icarus Deception are all amongst my favorites. But Permission Marketing described social media marketing before it existed. Seth understood push-vs-pull marketing long before others, and this book, published in 1999, is still a must read for anyone in marketing today.

3) The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell
This classic, one of three by Gladwell (Blink & Outliers are the others), demonstrates how successful products are launched, how ideas spread and how a trend can take off. It's influenced me a great deal, as a word of mouth and social media marketer. And it's an essential read, whether you're in marketing or sales, or just want to become better at getting your ideas to spread.

4) Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap - and Others Don't by Jim Collins
Collins is scientist of great companies - and this is his best work - chock full of case studies and simple yet profound principles like Level 5 Leadership. Even though I read this book when my company was only a handful of employees, it inspired me to want to build something great, and enduring. Whether you work at a large company that has the potential itself to become great and enduring, or you have a vision of a company you'd like to one day build, this is a must-read.

5) Mastering the Rockefeller Habits: What You Must Do to Increase The Value of Your Growing Firm by Verne Harnish
It's hard to believe I even had a business before I read this book by the founder of my favorite business group, Entrepreneurs Organization. Verne's 1-page strategic plan is now used by both companies I've founded, and thousands of other companies. And our management teams use much of the methodology from this book. What's great is that it's both inspirational and quite practical - an excellent read for any entrepreneur or manager at a small business.

6) The E-Myth: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work, and What to Do About It by Michael Gerber
This is a must read for any small business owner - especially "technical" owners such as lawyers, accountants, florists, restaurateurs, consultants and dentists. Gerber inspires the small business owner to get out of his/her own way, and to build systems and processes that scale and allow the business owner to work "on" the business and not "in" the business.

7) Built to Sell: Creating a Business That Can Thrive Without You by John Warrilow
Make no mistake - if you are an owner or leader at a business - this is a great, super valuable read, even if you or your owners have no intention or ever selling the business. The idea isn't to create a business in order to sell it - it's to create a business that has sustaining value beyond you and without you. Warrilow's book is a short, easy story - with powerful, unforgettable lessons - so much so, that after my business partner and I read it, we gave copies to the entire Likeable team to read.

8) Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
No matter what you do, this easy read will change the way you think about your work. It is so simply written, with small words and big pictures - and yet contains profound wisdom about how to be more productive and successful without being a workaholic or sacrificing anything. I read it in an hour on a plane, and have since shared it with two dozen colleagues, and referred back to it myself at least a dozen times.

13 Things Overachievers Do!

13 Things Overachievers Do

 1. They laugh — at themselves. And with others.

2. “They steal stuff.”

I have to come clean right here. This post is completely inspired by Penelope Trunk and her blog post: 15 Things Overachievers Do. Her post is way better, filled with links, and you need to read it, in full, to start 2013 off properly.  Link at the end of this post, too, since I hope you’ll read to the end and then go visit her site and post. I find most of her career posts a huge breath of fresh air in a world of stale content. She has a great sense of humor, too.

Continuing the #2 item, overachievers know they have plenty of ideas, says Penelope, so they don’t care if people take their ideas. And they bend the rules to make their own lives better. They know that ideas are a dime-a-dozen, really, and that execution is what matters.

So, when she says they steal stuff, she is talking about how people build, iterate, incubate on ideas. It is #15 on her list. Like me, for instance, I borrowed a number of Penelope’s ideas, but rounded them out with my own thoughts and attempts at humor.

3. They are notorious list makers. Sometimes they make lists after they complete the task so they can enjoy that feeling of greater productivity. I’m not sure if list makers are more successful in life, but I believe they have more fun putting sticky notes on everything.

4. Their desk is usually clean and everything is organized. They love IKEA because they can buy lots of organizing bins and boxes.

5. They don’t mind when a door shuts. They know that a window might be open. Or they go buy a DeWalt Sawzall and make a door. Seriously, Penelope points out that go-getters know that life is about tough choices sometimes and you have to be willing to give up one thing in order to get something else. 

6. They are not shy about their weaknesses because they are uber-confident in their strengths. Every strength comes with a weakness and if you can share that awareness, that wisdom, with potential employers, or your employees if it is your company, then people will see you as a real person.

7. They get tons of mentoring or coaching. They seek out mentors. Overachievers know that top athletes have coaches for a reason. To get to the top of your game, you need help. You don’t get there alone. They are willing to pay for someone to push them.

8. They don’t write books. The book industry is dead, Penelope reminds us. She points out a post by my Forbes colleague Suw Charman-Anderson: Amazon Is Ripe For Disruption. People who have something to share are putting those thoughts down in blogs. Or, in my mind, in ebooks. Of course, I’m a bit biased as I’m finally finishing a simple book I’m publishing on the Kindle platform about building websites. I’m hoping that books are not yet dead.

9. They don’t let themselves get fat  soft. Soft in any sense of the word. They work out regularly, fanatically, and they take care of their bodies and minds. 12/30/2012 update: My conscience bothered me. My goal in any of my writing is to uplift and encourage people. So I edited this section. My intent was not to target people who are overweight, myself included, but more appropriate is type-A personalities don’t let themselves get soft, in any way, if they can avoid it. You can be skinny and soft, by the way.

10. They like to start things. They like saying they are the “founder” of a project or company or initiative. I’ve seen many overachievers lay claim to being the founder of a hashtag. You know those Twitter tags, such as, #SmallBusiness or #Journalism or #Marketing. Their ego and confidence allows them to take ownership of things that can’t possibly be owned. Many of them love to finish things, too.

11. They ask about you so they can get a turn to talk about themselves. As Bette Midler said as one of her characters after talking about herself for a long time, “Enough about me; What do you think about me?” Ha. They do thrive on being able to tell of their exploits — that’s half the reason (or more) for why they do them. Time is not money; Time is Life. When you listen to an overachiever, you have a choice: You can either hate them or be inspired to your own greatness by listening to all they have achieved.

12. (Speaking about Goals) They are rabid about lists because they are crazy about achieving their goals. Uh, hello, that’s why the word “over” is in front of achiever. They have a bucket list for life, for each year, and perhaps each week. Many of their goals include a fair amount of adventure-seeking and the stuff that takes them out of their comfort zone. Because that’s where stuff gets done — outside the comfort zone.

13. They have an “I Love Me” wall in their home or office. That’s what we used to call it when I was in the US Air Force. Every officer or NCO that had an office would have all of their awards and commendations displayed for all to see. Awards are like a list in 3D — you can hang that item on the wall instead of checking it off a list.

But this award mania isn’t bad — it is one of the ways overachievers keep score for themselves. They are out to change the world. And, in reality, the best and brightest overachievers are not competing with you, but only themselves. They are happy for you to succeed and often want to help you achieve, too. Just as long as you spend a bit of time listening to how they helped you get there…

You can find the original article from Forbes.com HERE

Four Networking Mistakes!

The upcoming conference has got me thinking about networking! I'm going to be sure not to make any of these mistakes. Hope some on you find this helpful as well!

 

Whether you’re looking for a job or not, you’ve probably been encouraged to “network, network, network!” more times than you can count. Are all those conferences and events you’re attending leading to new connections or opportunities? No? You’re not the only one. Many networking newbies have tendencies that actually inhibit building real relationships with their new contacts. The good news: it’s not that hard to fix. Here’s what you might not even realize you’re doing wrong—and what to do about it.

Mistake #1: Talking about Yourself—All the Time You’re talented! Eager! Ambitious! You have lots of ideas to share! And you want to make sure that every person you meet at the event knows who you are and what you do! We get it. And yes, sharing your story with new contacts is important. But sharing your life story is overkill: Nothing can set a person off more than an aspiring professional who takes no interest in anything beside her own ambitions.

The Fix: Take Some Interest. Stop highlighting your latest accomplishment and start listening instead. Find people with industries or careers of interest to you, and ask them questions: How did they get their start? What do they love about their jobs, and what do they wish they could change? By taking an interest in your contact, you will make her feel valued—and hopefully interested in continuing the relationship. And you’ll likely gain some new insights, too.

Mistake #2: Expecting a Job You’re looking for a new job, so you hit the circuit of industry events every week, asking every person you meet to help you find your new gig—after all, it’s not what you know, it’s who. Well, yes. But give people some credit: If you pursue networking opportunities purely for the job prospects, your contacts will figure you out. You will leave them feeling used, and they will be less likely to recommend you for an opportunity.

The Fix: Provide Some Value. If you’re looking for a job, don’t ask for it—work for it. Do some research into what your contact does both in and out of work and find ways that you can contribute your time or support. Perhaps you could volunteer your expertise in social media for the big convention she’s heading up, or offer your accounting knowledge for her non-profit. Provide some opportunity for contacts to see you in a working light, and you’ll be that much closer to a good referral.

Mistake #3: Not Saying Thanks You attended a large event last week and grabbed coffee with one of your new professional contacts afterward. And then—the week got busy, and you didn’t get around to saying thank you. She’ll understand, right? Maybe. But if you don’t show gratitude, even in the smallest (or largest) event, you risk leaving a negative impression—probably not the desired outcome of your meeting.

The Fix: Just Do It. Whether you pack notecards in your purse for post-meeting scribbles, set yourself a reminder on Gmail to send off a quick note, or just insert a quick “thanks for taking time to meet with me!” at the final handshake, you must say thank you. Not only will you solidify your reputation as a courteous individual, but you won’t be leaving your contacts with a bad taste in their mouths. Always say thank you, and your good impression will last until your next meeting.

Mistake #4: Forgetting to Follow Up You meet someone over a networking happy hour and tell her you’ll send her your portfolio. But as the night goes on, she has a few drinks and meets a few dozen more people. You’re sure she’s forgotten all about you, so you decide it’s not even worth emailing her the next day. Bad idea. Meeting someone is just the first step in networking. In order to forge a lasting relationship (and make sure people don’t forget you), you need to follow up, every single time.

The Fix: Stay Accountable. If you told a networking contact that you would do something, do it. Even if you’re not sure she remembers you, you can bet that she will be grateful that you took the time out of your day to send her what you had discussed. If you’re worried about forgetting, keep a pen near your business card holder to quickly scribble out what follow-up actions you have for that contact, and review your cards after the event.

Above all, keep in mind that networking isn’t about short-term gain, but about learning, growing, and forming connections. Adopt good social habits, and you’ll see your skills and comfort improve, your opportunities increase, and your relationships grow—for the long haul.