A little while back I wrote and published the CXO Guide to Influence. This was born out of a report last year by Deloitte which found that the largest gap in CIO/CTO skills was their capability to influence internal stakeholders.
Since influencing stakeholders is a subject I’m quite passionate about, I wrote the CXO Guide and a companion checklist for those who are interested in learning how to make sure they are doing all they can to influence appropriately.
The checklist runs to 17 items, in a fairly logical order. Since we are here to help you to become more successful in large organisations, I thought it would be useful to share this with you here.
If you find yourself struggling to find answers to the items below, treat it as a call to action and get busy. This is the only way to eradicate guesswork and stop influencing in the dark.
Your Goal
- What exactly do you want them to do, say, think or feel? Specificity cuts to the chase and helps you to move faster.
- What evidence will you notice when you have succeeded? This is especially important for thinking and feeling goals so that there is no doubt in your mind you have influenced.
Their Agenda
- What is their professional agenda? This should cover their whole role, and all of their roles. You need to be able to describe the professional context in which they are making decisions. Vital here is identifying their top priorities, concerns and worries.
- How confident are you that if you describe their professional agenda to them, they will think you’ve been very intimate with their line-manager?
- What is their personal agenda? This may overlap with their professional agenda, but it may not. This includes career aspirations, financial goals, recognition needs, personal preservation or even the thirst for revenge. Personal agendas are even more influential than profession ones when it comes to the decisions they take.
- How confident are you that if you describe their personal agenda to them, they will wonder how you could possibly know all that?
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Conflicting Agendas
- If you are successful at influencing your stakeholder, who will lose out? This could be in direct and obvious ways (such as losing budget allocation or resources) or indirect ways like air-time, visibility, profile, reward potential or any manner of other negative consequences.
- Similarly, who else would win if you succeed in your influence? Again, look for the indirect ways and identify potential opportunities to collaborate.
- If your stakeholder says yes, how will that decision assist their agenda?
- How will it hinder their agenda? This is starting to get to the crux of the matter.
- Alternatively, how will saying no to you help move forward their agenda? Oft times, especially in large and complex organisations, you may need to influence against their own agenda for the greater good. For example, local profit margin vs. global standards or efficiencies.
- Finally, how will it saying no make things even worse for them? This may be the opposite of question 9, but it may stimulate more helpful thoughts.
Their Decision Process
- What formal process will they use to make their decision? This may not be appropriate in all cases, but make sure you don’t ignore the presence of undocumented approaches which have been instituted in their domain.
- What informal processes will they adopt? This will happen in every situation and could relate to the people they will involve in advising them. Perhaps they will take heed to gauge the mood of their teams, or others for that matter.
- Knowing what they know, how would you respond to your influence attempt? Of course you would say yes like a shot, but what do you think they would do?
Your Strategy and Plan
- Knowing what you know, how will you attempt to influence them? Most people jump straight here and give scant attention to the first 15 questions. Don’t keep making that mistake.
- How are you going to handle any risks that your influence attempt will go awry? This could involve mitigating or contingent actions. Make sure you have the main risks mapped out and planned for, especially if a second attempt might not be possible for months.
Of course, the depth you choose to go to on each of these questions is a matter for you to decide. You will also need to allocate time to this exploration which may be in short supply. All I can do is but point the way, and encourage you to do as much of this as you can.
The Gautrey Influence Blog
Ever felt overlooked, unheard, or stuck in office politics? You’re not alone. The Gautrey Influence Blog breaks down the real-world strategies behind leadership, influence, and power—giving you the tools to be heard, respected, and successful. Join 35,000+ professionals getting ahead the smart way—subscribe now..
💡 Benchmark your Influence: Take the Master of Influence Assessment (Free for Subscribers!)
👉 [Subscribe & Take the Assessment]