Search Results for: trust

Making a BIG Impact in Your Organisation

October 27, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

If you want to make it big in your organisation, especially if it is a really busy place, you've got your work cut out. The competition is intense. Hundreds, if not thousands, of ambitious and talented people all jockeying for position. Trying to get their voice heard. Clamouring for attention so they can push forward their ideas and land their results. Talent hoping to get spotted. Many give up, using the excuse that they don't do politics. Or, that their sense of integrity prohibits self-promotion. Instead, they settle in to their professional discipline. They develop ever greater technical or subject matter expertise. After all, this is what they really enjoy. Yet, behind the myriad and convincing excuses lurks, a doubt, and a wish. Read More

How to Learn the Politics

October 23, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

Do you understand the politics around your role? Can you respond confidently when someone makes a move against your interests? No? Well, you're not alone. I'm starting to think that the most significant factor contributing to failing to deliver in a large organisation, is the inability to understand and manage the politics. Lack of leadership skills doesn't come close. A couple of days ago I was talking to Kate. She is an ambitious and talented senior project manager. Hard working and with a reputation for making things happen and getting things done that reaches far across the senior management community in her bank. Despite this track-record, she keeps getting surprises. Project get knocked off course because of the political manoeuvring by powerful people. No amount of technical capability can help her to prepare for these moves. Yet she hasn't got a clue how things are working. Not only is this causing her grief now, she is also beginning to realise it could be career limiting. At a high level, my FOUR key suggestions to overcome this problem were:: Read More

Dismantling Power Bases: Proceed with Caution

September 9, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

No, this is not a second coming of Niccolò Machiavelli. It is just that sometimes it is prudent to take action to remove powerful opposition – for all the right reasons. When this is on the agenda with coaching clients, what we are doing is evolving a clear strategy and plan of action to substantially shift power towards them. This means that others will lose a significant amount of power when my client succeeds. Which means, the stakes are high. If you think this is something you should do, bear in mind the main pros and cons. Read More

How to Gather More Political Intelligence

September 8, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

In Mastering the Politics, I talk a great deal about the need to develop greater political insight or intelligence. This is absolutely vital if you are to avoid "shooting in the dark" with your attempts to influence others. Of course, there is always an element of guesswork involved in any act to influence, and in a way, that is part of the fun of it. Yet at the same time, guesswork is leaving you exposed. So, it makes sense to develop the habit of increasing your knowledge on Read More

Character Power Explained

September 3, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

Extract from Influential Leadership: A Leader's Guide to Getting Things Done

The underlying traits, values and beliefs which shape your behaviour.

It is difficult to estimate how influential strength of character is, but it is big. It compliments credibility well and if you have generous amounts of both, you're well on your way to becoming very powerful and influential. In effect, this is concerned with your internal world and how it Read More

Credibility Power Explained

September 3, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

Extract from Influential Leadership: A Leader's Guide to Getting Things Done

The power derived from your professional standing and expertise.

Credibility is the reliance awarded to someone based on trust and perceived expertise on the topic being considered. When making decisions, most people get input from others and they have to decide how much reliance to place on that input. Information from highly credible sources are more likely to be accepted at Read More

Stakeholders: Natural Born Liars

August 4, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

No, I don't believe this to be the case, but you have to admit, sometimes it seems that way doesn't it? In any complex political environment (or rather, in any large organisation), you need to get to the bottom of what your stakeholders are thinking. Unless you can get the truth from them, you'll be shooting in the dark with your work, plans and proposals. You can't even solve problems unless they tell you the full story behind their reservations or resistance. Knowing this, when you've hit an issue or a problem, you rightly make the approach and ask the questions. Sometimes Read More

A Graduate Lesson in Influence

June 15, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

My work gets me talking to all sorts of people, facing all manner of challenges. One of my recent mini-consultations got me talking to Jessica, a graduate in her first job. Personally, I believe that many people twice her age need to pay heed to the simple ideas I shared with her. Do you?

Dear Jessica,

It was great chatting to you the other day. Rarely do I have the opportunity to talk with someone so new into the workplace. Nor, if I may say so, one so forward thinking to be Read More

Mapping Your Stakeholders

June 9, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

Having a list of stakeholders is a good start; but to get a sense of the priorities, you need to understand their position relative to your Influencing Goal and to each other. That way you can begin to see the bigger picture and develop a clear strategy to accelerate towards your goal. Using the Stakeholder Influence Map (below), the general idea is that you plot the name of each (impactful) stakeholder based on where you think they are in terms of Read More

What’s Missing from Your Relationships at Work?

May 12, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

During a closing coaching call with a senior project manager the other day we were reviewing how he had transformed his performance. He had made substantial progress on all of the traits of a professional influencer, but still something was missing. His SVP had congratulated him on the change, especially on his political awareness and analysis, but he thought my client should do something to improve his relationships with other senior executives. He couldn’t be specific, he just said vaguely that they needed to be better. As we discussed the problem it was clear that he had built levels of trust with his stakeholders (well, all bar one, but that's another story). He was adding significant value, engaging frequently and cultivating two-way problem-solving. In fact, many of his stakeholder were now beating a path to his door to seek his input. So, what was the SVP talking about? Finally, we hit upon the Read More