Influencing styles

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Introduction The ability to influence and persuade others is key to success. People who lack influencing skills tend to be powerless and undervalued in the workplace. The Influencing Skills Finder is useful for those of all ability levels who are interested in enhancing or accelerating their personal development at work or in their everyday lives. This assessment will highlight your influencing styles and enhance your ability to leverage them to your best advantage. In addition, you will learn to recognize a variety of influencing methods, some of which you may wish to employ in your business affairs. Those in positions of power or influence who have benefited from using this assessment include:

• Managers – both line and staff • Professionals • Consultants and advisors • Change agents and developers • Social and community workers • Teachers, lecturers and instructors • Political and community activists

By employing the easy-to-use self-assessment materials (questionnaire, scoring and categories of influencing skills), you will be able to create:

• A framework to analyze your influencing skills. • An influencing skills profile that specifically indicates how you influence others. • A plan to help you develop your ability to influence and persuade others.

The Influencing Skills Finder – A Quick Overview • The Influencing Skills Finder assessment is user-friendly. It does not require a

sophisticated understanding of applied behavioral sciences principles. • The assessment is self-scoring and offers a subjective assessment of your skills. • The scoring system does not assess the strength of influence – only the styles used. • You can expect practical, highly useful outcomes from the assessment. • This is not a measurement of your intelligence or aptitude. There are no “norm” tables –

just the six style categories, one of which will best apply to your skill set. • Once you establish your influencing style, we encourage you to create a personal action

plan. Your plan should: Set personal development objectives Identify areas where improvement is possible Establish precise behavioral goals Break down complete tasks into subtasks

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Step 1: Review Styles Below are the six possible styles of influence and their key attributes. Read and consider the attributes of each style before moving on to the questionnaire.

1. The Asserter “I stand up for what I want.”

2. The Expert

“I know my subject.” 3. The Politician

“I am influential in the circles where decisions are made.”

4. The Preparer

“I research topics before forming an opinion.” 5. The Presenter

“I convey my ideas persuasively.” 6. The Client-Centric

“I meet my audience’s needs.”

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Step 2: Complete Questionnaire The art of persuasion is key to success and a communication skill worth studying and enhancing. This questionnaire will help you determine your persuasive influencing style. Knowing and focusing on your style will give you a leg up on the competition and a clear business advantage. Consider each pair of statements below. Think about the situations when you are with other people and seek to influence them. (Choose either a work situation or a social situation – you must decide on one or the other – not both.) Allocate points to the boxes on the right to indicate which of the statements is most true for you. You should allocate exactly three points to each pair of statements – 3 being the most true for you and 0 being the least true for you. Points may be distributed in one the following ways: