How To Gain Influence, Part 1

The question arose about “Influence”, one of the “High Performance Six.” I like Brendon Burchard’s stuff in general, but it’s most important to me because a specific circle of my associations agrees with it, likes him. This gives me a verbal/emotional short hand in speaking with them.

But the question seemed to be: “how does one develop influence”? Boy howdy, THERE’S a good question. If you don’t have influence you cannot get cooperation from others, build teams, find love, sell or market. It will leave you on the outside looking in even if you have great skill. “Its not FAIR. They didn’t have skill — they just had FRIENDS.”

No one told you not to pay attention to the fact that life works like that. The child part of you might wish that skill alone, fabulousness alone, should get you acclaim. That “if you build it, they will come.” Yes, if they KNOW the value of what you are doing, and see it as something THEY need NOW. Otherwise…not so much.

There are certainly books like “How to Win Friends And Influence People” and if I felt a lack in that arena, that’s one of the places I’d go. Literally every day I see people complaining about lack of influence. They can’t get their kids to do A, their spouses to do B, their exes to do C, their customers to do D, THEMSELVES to do E. About 90% of the complaints I see have to do with getting others to do something…or getting THEMSELVES to do something new, or more regularly.