VitalSmarts
Introduction to
Influencer: The Power to Change
Anything
Douglas L. Finton, Managing Director
Vital Skills International, LC
Principal Associates of VitalSmarts
What Could You Do with More
Influence?
• Move
your strategy from PowerPoint to reality.
• Translate your organizational values into dayto-day behavior.
• Create a sustainably, robustly diverse
organization
• Engage everyone in cost management.
• Improve employee engagement.
• Get compliance with new processes or policies.
We Lack Influence
85% of organizational change
efforts fail.
– Arthur D. Little
Problem
We Lack Influence
Big Point. The most important capacity we
possess is the ability to influence behavior—that
of ourselves or others.
And yet few of us have any systematic way of
even thinking about this most precious capacity!
So, when it comes to our toughest influence
challenges, we fail.
In Search of Influencers
Worldwide Search
• Articles:
To find the best and most-tested
methods to influence profound and persistent
problems we examined over 17,000 articles.
• Influencers: We found leaders and scholars
who (1) had succeeded where others had failed,
and (2) had data to prove it.
• Experience: We used these methods to
influence rapid behavior change in over 50
organizations.
Meet the Influencers
Most all of the Influencers we
found were profoundly
influenced by the work of Dr.
Albert Bandura.
Three Keys to
Rapid & Measurable Change
Focus on Results
Identify measurable results
you want to improve. Focus
attention on the vital behaviors
that influence them.
How’s this?
• “I’d love to loose weight” vs.
• “I need to eat fewer calories than I
burn” vs.
• “I will loose 10 pounds and 5%
body-fat by September 1 of this
year”.
Now how about your results?
Principle #1: Vital Behaviors
Vital Behaviors
What’s a Vital Behavior?
A vital behavior:
• Leads
directly to better results.
• Breaks self-defeating patterns.
• Causes many other positive behaviors to follow
naturally.
Identify Vital Behaviors
The Big Idea
Even with complex and
long-standing problems,
just a few vital behaviors
can lead to enormous
change.
Find the vital behaviors,
and find a powerful
leverage point for change.
Examples of Vital Behaviors
Vital Behavior
Candid dialogue during the planning
phase
Improve our ability to confront those
who cross our personal boundaries
Improve how we disagree
Desired Result
On time project
performance
Create and maintain a
functional diverse workforce
Lasting and happy
relationship
Slow down when you get near the
lines!
High quality coloring
Write down everything I eat
Get fit
Find Vital Behaviors
Don’t look for influence strategies (such as
creating public awareness)—just look for
crucial moments and the behaviors you’d
need during them.
(E.g., Diversity: when individual boundaries
are crossed, is the person able to speak
candidly and respectfully to the offender
about the boundary, and reach a new
agreement around respect?)
Vital Behaviors
Not the End
• We
are not suggesting that once you find the
vital behaviors, all challenges are over.
• It’s a whole new challenge to influence people to
actually do the behaviors.
Principle #2: Make Change
Inevitable
To achieve such amazing success, Influencers
used every aspect of the Influence Model.
Why Change Seems
Impossible
We live in a quick fix world
looking for “silver bullet”
answers to complex influence
problems.
Why Change Seems
Impossible
Your world is perfectly
organized to create the
behavior you’re currently
experiencing.
Six Sources of Influence
Influence vs. Quick Fix
Influencers succeed where the
rest of us fail because they
“over determine” success.
They marshal a critical mass of
all Six Sources of Influence to
make change inevitable.
Source 1: Personal Motivation
The influence of
the pleasure or
pain of the
behavior itself.
Source 1: Personal Motivation
Problem
Many Vital Behaviors
are boring, frightening,
uncomfortable or even
painful and many wrong
behaviors feel pretty
good—for a while.
How Would It Feel?
We spend most of our lives morally disengaged…
we are unconscious of the moral and human
implications of our choices.
As a result…
• We
mindlessly behave in ways that undermine
our values
• Even when we do behave consistently with our
values, we often derive little joy from it.
What’s a Manager to Do?
Connecting with Human
Consequences
A medical devices company has various
employees share “Mission Moments” at monthly
company gatherings. These employees share
the story of some patient whose life is better
because of one of the devices the company
provided.
Source 2: Personal Ability
The influence of
skill.
Source Two: Personal Ability
Problem
Many Vital Behaviors
are
far more physically or
emotionally challenging
than we realize.
So we grossly underinvest
in building skills.
What about Our Department?
Increasing Personal Ability
A manager trained employees on skills for
speaking to colleagues who fail to support
diversity in viewpoint and process on the team.
In the training, front line employees practiced
these skills with supervisors and more senior
colleagues.
Sources 3 and 4
The influence of
other people –
through modeling,
praise, helping, and
enabling.
“Why don’t people do what we’ve
asked them to do?”
1. Peer Pressure. No one else does it.
2. Leadership Modeling. My boss doesn’t do it
with her boss.
3. Social punishment. When you try it others
become offended.
4. No accountability. When you don’t do it, no
one bugs you about it.
5. No expectations. When you start working
here, no one tells you it’s expected.
The Promise
Sources 3 and 4—The Promise
• Small changes in your social system can lead to
big changes in behavior—Add a friend. Throw in
some encouragement. Build a little
accountability. And change happens.
• You don’t need to have relationships with
everyone you’re trying to influence.
• You just need to gain influence with those who
do.
Page 93
What about Our Department?
Increasing Social Motivation and
Ability
A manager asked highly respected team
members to be “Mentors.” They were given
training in holding others accountable before
anyone else received it. Each committed to be a
role model of “holding bosses accountable” for a
30 day period. After the 30 days, each enlisted a
colleague to join them for the next 30 days. And
so on…
Source 5: Structural Motivation
The influence of
costs, incentives,
and
accountability.
Source 5: Structural Motivation
Problem
Rewards, incentives, or
costs encourage the
wrong behaviors or
discourage the right
ones.
Reward Systems Matter a Lot
In Broward County, Florida, an elderly person facing
a competency hearing was evaluated by three courtappointed experts and defended by a courtappointed attorney.
The psychiatrists were paid more when they judged
someone to be incapacitated than when they judged
them to be competent ($325 versus $125).
What do you think happened?
Reward Systems Matter a Lot
Of 598 competency
proceedings in the year, 570
ended with a verdict of
incompetence.
Source: Kerns, 1995
Source 6: Structural Ability
The influence of
space, data,
cues, tools,
processes, and
other
environmental
factors.
Source 6: Structural Ability
Problem
We are blind to the
incessant and powerful
force the environment
exerts on our own and
others’ behavior.
What Environmental Factor Is
This?
1. What’s
available.
2. How close it is.
3. Cues that tell
you how much
you’re eating.
What about Our Department?
Increasing Structural Ability.
Change the Data Stream. A manager publicly
posted department “Energy Use” data every
month.
Add Cues and Reminders. Two boxes were
placed on every meeting agenda—1)Energy
usage/recycling targets; 2) commitments
kept/not kept from previous meeting. Every
meeting started and ended with these boxes.
Three Keys to
Rapid & Measurable Change
Measure 3-4x/Year
Focus on Results
Identify measurable results
you want to improve. Focus
attention on the vital behaviors that
create them.
Not chest-beating but
the systematic influence of
motivation and attention.
Implement
Influence, Not Training
Leader-led cascade.
Leaders are responsible
for change.
To learn more:
Contact Vital Skills International, LC
A Preeminent Provider of Crucial Skills Training & Consulting
Principal Associates of VitalSmarts
www.vitalskillsintl.com
(248) 650-6290
Daniel L. Brunet and Douglas L. Finton, Managing Directors