PERSUASION SKILLS

It is a basic skill many employees, organizations, business markets try to excel in. Without this one can’t dream success or gather talent pool. It is common in the MNC’s that when a manager prepares a business presentation along with the arguments, references, success stories and resources available he fails to persuade the clients with his proposal!!

People try to impress others with their ‘content’ ignoring ‘how the presentation is delivered.’ Therefore ineffective presentation leads to failure in persuasion.

According to Harvard business review’s persuasion skills can be improved by:-

1. Identify who the decision maker is in the group one is trying to persuade.

2. Identifying the decision making style of that person: and

3. Tailoring the arguments/presentation to the decision making style of the leader in the group.

Employees or people can be classified into 5 decision-making types:

1. Skeptics

2. Charismatic

3. Followers

4. Controllers

5. Thinkers

Skeptics:

Expressions that describe him: feel, grasp, agreeable, trust, power, demand, action, suspect, disrupt.

a. They are suspicious and have strong personalities. Their character traits include: demanding, disagreeable, rebellious and disruptive at times. They believe in take charge. They are fast decision makers.

b. They demand time, energy from their colleagues and act on feelings.

c. They ask all kind of questions during a presentation. At this time the presenter must maintain his composure.

Ways to persuade a skeptic: -

I. These people look for the credibility in the persuader. Therefore the persuader must gain the credibility before the presentation.

II. A skeptic trust people with the similar background, be it an education, hobby, job etc. hence the persuader must try to find something in common and worth highlight it to gain the trust of a skeptic. The persuader can also draw attention by getting the endorsement that skeptic believe in.

III. A persuader must never challenge the skeptic; instead he should be dealt delicately.

It may seem a daunting task to persuade a skeptic but in reality it is not so. In fact he is the one who want to race ahead with revolutionary ideas. The only fact is that the skeptics accept the ideas only if they come from their trusted source.

Charismatic: -

Expressions that describe him: clear, easy, focus, proven, action, bright, show, watch and look.

They are talkative, captivating, dominant, enthusiastic and persistent. Being fascinated by new ideas, they are able to absorb large chunks of information with ease. They are emotional yet rational.

a. Can’t take risk and not easy to get their approval. Before making any decision they look for facts that hold their emotions. It seems they rely on their past experiences to balance their enthusiasm and reality.

b. They take methodical decisions based on balanced information & look for proposals that increase the competitiveness of the firm.

c. These are never independent decision makers. They take suggestion from high profile executives before taking decision.

d. The high enthusiasm of charismatic makes one feel that they are fast decision makers, but in reality they take their own time & expect others to wait for them.

Ways to persuade a charismatic:

I. A persuader should discuss the risks involved in adopting an idea rather than describing the idea to grab charismatic attention. That is a persuader should provide an honest and upfront analysis of risks, highlight the measures to be taken to minimize those risks.

II. When persuading a charismatic one should not hide the draw backs, instead they should gain the confidence by being realistic.

III. Charismatic’s have short attention status & can’t hear long presentations. Therefore the central information must be presented in the first session.

IV. The persuader must work on presentations that make room for the bottom line or basics; else their ideas won’t take shape with charismatic person.

Followers: -

Expressions that describe him: innovate, similar to, previous, what works, bright, swift, just like before, expedite, expertise & old way.

a. They mostly rely on the past experiences. For e.g. while making a decision they look for a solution that was taken by a trusted person on a similar situation in the past.

b. They are responsible decision makers which resulted from the fear of making a wrong choice.

c. They may raise many issues and challenge the persuader, but they are ready to learn from others mistakes.

d. They consider themselves as innovative and forward thinkers & try to convince others.

Ways to persuade:

I. They are easy to persuade. Using anecdote of successful people and their decision making style as of those similar to the followers would boost their confidence. As followers believe in proven methods & successful track records, persuader must use testimonials & references.

II. Persuader must not present any out-of-the-box ideas nor expect from the followers.

Controllers: -

Expressions that describe them: facts, details, grab, handle, just do it, logic, keep them honest and make them pay, power & physical.

a. They are detail oriented, unemotional, analytical, objective and sensible. Interested in logic of arguments & pure facts. They hate uncertainty & ambiguity.

b. Controllers see everything from their perspective & think they know the best in every area.

c. They make snap judgments & are unilateral in decision making. Even though they discuss their ideas with others we hardly see them implementing.

d. They demand accurate information, but not always take rational decisions.

How to persuade:

I. Generally to cover the fear and insecurity, these people pay great attention towards minute details of the processes & methods. Hence the persuader must able to answer questions that ask for minute details.

II. Controllers are self absorbed; as a result persuaders must be prepared for long silences during presentations.

III. Persuaders should never challenge the controllers, as they never surrender while arguing on what they believe.

IV. When persuading a controller the persuader must put forward an argument that is structured, linear and credible.

V. Persuader should never try to sell his ideas; instead he should leave it to the discretion of controllers. In nutshell, persuader must provide all the details to the controller & leave him to make a decision.

Thinkers: -

Expressions that describe them: expert, competition, academic, intelligent, makes sense, numbers, plan, quality, proof and think.

a. They are difficult to understand, tough to persuade, academic, cerebral.

b. They are very careful when they talk. Like arguments which are quantitative & supported by data.

c. They take pride in out-maneuvering & out-thinking the competition.

d. Depend lot on comparative data; hence it is a bit tough to convince them.

e. Thinkers try to gain a holistic perspective of a given situation & averse to risk taking.

How to persuade:

I. Presenter should communicate the drawbacks of the idea at the starting of the meeting because thinkers are more effective in taking decision when they know beforehand the risks involved.

II. Their thought process is not always methodical & if they break from their usual way of decision making if they feel to save time & money.

III. Similar to controllers, thinkers should be given enough time & space to come to a conclusion.

IV. Thinkers rarely forget any bad experience. Hence, the proposal made must appear to be the best available option.

V. Thinkers often take contradictory views in meetings. Persuader must remember that thinkers do not like to express what they are thinking (this is to hide their penchant). They do not voice their opinions till they take final decision.