PEOPLE – What Does it Mean to Persuade?

In recent years there’s been a proliferation of books and blogs on the subject of influence and persuasion. Some are quite good but many are nothing more than a rehash of Dr. Robert Cialdini’s material. Another problem is this; what some people call influence or persuasion is nothing more than vague advice without any basis in scientifically proven data.

If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, you know what I share is often called “the science of influence” because findings are based on the research of social psychologists and behavior economists.  In this series we’re working through the word PEOPLE and we now come to the second “P” which stands for Persuade. This begs the question, what does it actually mean to persuade someone?

A formal dictionary definition might read as follows, “to induce to believe by appealing to reason or understanding; convince.” That’s okay, but I prefer Aristotle’s definition. Aristotle told the world more than 2,000 years ago persuasion was “The art of getting someone to do something they wouldn’t ordinarily do if you didn’t ask.”

I like Aristotle’s definition because it’s nice and simple; get someone to do something they’re not currently doing. If you’re a manager and your employees make it to work on time everyday then you don’t need to change their behavior and no persuasion is necessary. The same could be said of your child; if your child is doing his/her homework then you don’t need to persuade him or her to study.

But here’s the problem; quite often people aren’t doing what we’d like them to do and when that’s the case, we need to communicate with them in a way that hopefully leads to a change in behavior. How we communicate; i.e., persuade, can make all the difference in hearing “Yes” or “No.”

Earlier in this series I shared why influence is Powerful; because it’s rooted in science. What I share with readers isn’t just someone’s good advice because sometimes people’s “good’ advice has no bearing for you. And sometimes people succeed in spite of themselves! Imagine a relatively healthy 85-year-old person telling you they’ve smoked two packs of cigarettes a day for more than 60 years and tries to convince you it wouldn’t harm you. Would you want to emulate their behavior just because they’ve lived a good long life? Of course you wouldn’t. Like most people you’d probably prefer to know what decades of studies have to say about healthy eating habits and lifestyle choices.

And so it is with learning the science of influence because it’s rooted in six decades of research by social psychologists and behavioral economists. We’re much better off following the advice of people who study this for a living vs. people who might have made it big more by chance than skill.

Having shared that, I’d change Aristotle’s definition ever so slightly by replacing “art” with “science.” Doing so makes our definition of persuasion read as follows, “The science of getting someone to do something they wouldn’t ordinarily do if you didn’t ask.” If you’re in business you might say there are "best practices" in how to communicate if you want to get solid bottom line results.

So taking our lesson from science, here are a few examples of how you might want to alter your communication:

• Stop making statements and start asking questions because it engages the principle of consistency. Once people give you their word they’ll do something, the odds of them following through go up significantly vs. telling them what to do.
• Make sure people know your credentials up front. The principle of authority clearly shows that people listen to those with knowledge and expertise, but they have to know what your expertise is before you start talking.
• Tell people what they stand to lose by not going along with your request because the principle of scarcity tells us people are more motivated by what they may lose as opposed to what they might gain.
• Take extra time to personalize whatever you do for someone else. Reciprocity is the principle that tells us people feel obligated to give back to those who first give to them so going an extra step is usually met with a better response.

These are just a few ways to incorporate scientifically proven principles to persuade into your everyday communication. Next week we’ll examine the “L” in PEOPLE to see how persuasion can have a Lasting impact on people.

Brian, CMCT 
influencepeople 
Helping You Learn to Hear “Yes”.