Tag Archives: influence

The Power of Robert Cialdini’s Six Weapons of Influence

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cartoon of boy leading influencingMastering Project Management with Influence

Project management is a bit like juggling flaming torches—you’re constantly balancing resources, timelines, and expectations, often without having direct control over these things. But fear not! The secret to thriving in this challenging landscape lies in honing your influencing and negotiating skills. Enter Robert Cialdini’s Six Weapons of Influence, a toolkit that’s been a game-changer since 1984. Here’s how you can use these principles to steer your projects toward success.

1. Reciprocation: The Power of Give and Take

Reciprocation is the art of give and take. When someone gives something to you, it often creates a need to give something back.

Ever notice how charities send you a free pen, and then ask for a donation? That’s reciprocation in action. It creates a sense of obligation. In project management, this could come in the form of helping out another team with your resources. When you do this, they’re much more likely to return the favor when you need it.

Pro tip from Cialdini: when someone thanks you, you can reinforce reciprocation by saying, “I’m sure you’d do the same for me.” It subtly sets the stage for future exchanges.

2. Commitment and Consistency: The Power of Small Steps

People are more likely to follow through on a request if it aligns with their past actions, or their self-image. In project management, when you often don’t have direct control, here’s a strategy you can use.

Get people team involved early – if you’re trying to improve a system, start by asking for their input on improvements through a survey. When it comes time to ask for volunteers to help with those changes, they’ll be more inclined to step up because they’ve already committed to the idea, and they want to stay consistent with that initial involvement.

3. Social Proof: The Influence of the Crowd

Social proof means we’re influenced by what others are doing. Have you ever noticed you’re more likely to buy something if you see hundreds of five star reviews? But if there’s only one or two, we hesitate.

If your project involves rolling out a new system and the team is hesitant to use it, try introducing it across the organization gradually. Then showcase successful implementations and have people from the first team share positive feedback to the new teams. When others see their peers benefiting from the change, they’ll be more likely to embrace it themselves.

4. Liking: The Friend Factor

We’re more inclined to say yes to those we like. In project management, this translates to building rapport with key stakeholders. If you’re trying to gain support for a new feature, get to know the influential people involved. Compliment their past achievements, align with their goals, and be genuinely friendly. A little likability can go a long way in winning their support.

5. Authority: The Power of Expertise

Authority means people are more likely to listen to someone with credentials or experience. If you’re pushing for a new framework or tool, flaunt your qualifications. Share your relevant experience, industry standards, and any endorsements from higher-ups. Demonstrating your expertise will make your case more compelling.

6. Scarcity: The Urgency Effect

Scarcity creates a sense of urgency and increases perceived value. If you want your team to adopt a new tool, highlight any limited-time offers or exclusive benefits. Emphasize that the opportunity won’t last forever. By making something seem scarce, you can motivate quicker decisions and actions.

By mastering these six weapons of influence – reciprocation, commitment and consistency, social proof, liking, authority, and scarcity – you can navigate the complexities of project management with greater ease. So, get ready to put these strategies into action and watch your projects thrive!

Keep pushing forward, and remember, with these tools at your disposal, you’re not just managing projects; you’re mastering them.

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10 – The Project Manager’s Sphere of Influence

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Project Managers Sphere of InfluenceThe Project Manager’s Sphere of Influence

When you are working as a project manager, you don’t necessarily own a team of your own inside the business. Instead, you’re usually coming in and using business resources to help you deliver something, and they may not report to you on a daily basis.

Because of that it’s very interesting to look at the project manager’s sphere of influence, because it really does vary and it is different to a normal manager’s sphere of influence. For example, the normal manager will have direct influence over their team – they can pretty much hire or fire, they can tell their people exactly what to do with real consequences. Sure, a project manager can in some ways do that as well, but it’s much more prominent as a functional manager will have direct control over those people.

A project manager will need to have influence over the project team, and the managers and the resource managers for those people. But it extends out even further. They need to work with and ensure influence and responsibility for the project sponsors – who we’re delivering that business value to. There are also governing bodies around the project such as the steering committee of the project. There’s project management organizations or PMOs – all of these within an organization will need to be worked with, and you’ll need to provide information make sure that they’re working with you not against you, and ensure there’s little friction so that you can help get those things delivered nice and smoothly.

And that’s all part of being in the project manager role.

Beyond that we’ve got stakeholders of the project, for example suppliers who are supplying either resources or tools or things or information into the project. The end customer and the end users as well – all of these people will ultimately be influenced by the work that we do and so are subject to the project manager’s influence over the project.

A project manager needs to lead the project team and meet the project objectives, and meet or manage their stakeholder’s expectations. If things need to change over time a project manager will need to use their skills to ensure that stakeholders support the project instead of going against the project (which definitely can happen if things go sideways) and even to support the project decisions even when they don’t agree with them sometimes.

That can be a very challenging situation but it will be something that you do need to work through. It was noted in the PMBOK guide that the top 2% of project managers demonstrate superior relationship and communication skills, while displaying a positive attitude.

Even when things get tough, they still are able to display a positive attitude and work through those issues in a positive way. This is so they can keep those good stakeholder relationships as well, and work through those things in the future. It’s very, very important.

A project manager must also have influence over the organisation, working with other project managers in the organization. Maybe you’ve got 10 projects going on at the same time and maybe there are different resources required – this project needs some of your resources and now you have to ensure that you’re using your power and influence and your skills to make sure that your stuff still gets done at the same time as helping out other projects around the organization.

It can be a tough situation, but it is something that you will need to be aware of. Other projects may impact yours due to demands on the same resources, funding (maybe they need money and it’s coming out of the same bucket of money), impacts of the change to the business. Sometimes the business can only handle so much change going into it, such as training and communication and process changes that need to be done, and they have their business as usual work that they need to do as well, so sometimes they just run out of capacity to take it all on.

As project management capability is increased it’s also important throughout the organization that everyone is operating from the same playbook, the same strategic steps, the same tactical steps (such as processes that you go through to complete a project), so that everyone is is on the same page and knows what you’re talking about. It’s a much nicer shortcut to working with others when everyone is working from the same process steps.

But that is not all.

The project manager needs to work with the industry as well. We need to stay informed about current industry trends, no matter what industry you’re in all of these things are constantly changing and it’s up to us to be aware of what’s happening in our industry because they might impact our project. Something could come out of the blue and completely change the landscape, and we need to be aware of that.

We might have product technology development, new market niches. You might have broader economic forces, for example maybe the stock market is starting to fall, or maybe money is flowing out of this particular industry. We’ve got new tools, new skills or disciplines (for example Agile coming into IT around 15 years ago and now into project management, and also into operations management).

We’ve got new competitors, new threats and of course new laws and regulations. We seen our fair share of of regulation changes over the last few years in almost every industry.

But that is still not all.

A project manager needs to influence and be aware of their own professional discipline as well. That means continuing our professional development, continuing to learn, continuing our education and sharing that knowledge, the things that we’ve learned with others within our organization to help everyone sing from the same hymn book, to work from the same process steps. Beyond the organization is helping other organizations improve their way of work and their methods for delivering projects as well. It might include standards for delivering change around the world, whether it’s in your industry or other industries. This is a wonderful thing because now we’re not just helping ourselves, but we’re going out there and helping others where we can as well – we’re developing our project management knowledge, our knowledge in our related profession and we share that at local, global and national levels.

Lastly the project manager’s sphere of influence will occur across disciplines. And that’s part of the real value of project management because project management is a skill set that will sit across almost any industry, because any industry will require to put change into an organization or to go from point A to point B at some point, and to do that you need a project. To do that change you need to manage a project from start to finish. In using a project management process that works across disciplines we can help coach, improve and inspire others in that method to help them get the business value that they need.

– David McLachlan