Influence and .....

Linda and I were sitting down for dinner with one of our corporate clients the other day. Our client mentioned that they were reading the blog and loving it and had begun to notice that I have not made any entries on it.

It is true that I have not. However I found myself considering how that meeting has begun to influence me. Our clients observation came at a time where I had been starting to draft blog entries and getting ready to enter some here. Also I have been been preparing a short 40 minute keynote on Influence. Linda and I were talking about it.

When we begin planning our courses it often begins with a starting point that is in a form of a question. Like what is influence? (I know rocket science eh)

So I have been conducting a personal study by asking people that question. I have had all kinds of responses like influence is kindness, influence is making people do things, influence is motivating people to your way of thinking. All of these things sound correct even maybe good. Then Linda said "what is influence to you"? I said it's about connecting. She said connecting and ... ?

There was a long pause and then I heard "purpose". I agreed that it is. We said Influence is connecting with a purpose.

We are really excited about our networking with NLP event coming up on March 13 and one of the most exciting things for me is faciliting the patterns and processes of NLP and the fun filled games we have scheduled for you and discovering each and everyone one of your purposes to connect.

You see, our business client connected with me and us with them and the purpose was to think and share and experience past success and future plans. I was influence into to writing this because our client noticed and I had a purpose to start writing and Linda is a writer and a great teacher.

Needless to say it was a very influential dinner.

Cheers.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The hypnotic contract

Under what conditions would you allow someone else to tell you what to think?   If you have watched a stage hypnotist, you have seen what looks like one person exercising remarkable control over the thoughts and actions of another. It is fascinating, in part, because we have all seen it happen in real life. Suddenly someone we know seems to be relying on someone else to do the thinking.  Even if the influence is good, it is a little frightening. The secret is that there are no magic words.  In order to lead someone into hypnosis, that person has to be willing to go there. Often the people you see on stage are more than willing. For whatever reasons, they are enthusiastic about giving up self control and allowing someone else to take charge. They know that there are limits to what can happen on stage and they are only agreeing to give up control within those limits. What you see in hypnosis is an agreement between two people. Like all agreements between human beings, it stretches as far...
Read more

Good with people

What do you think of when you hear the phrase "good with people?" When a wine is good with steak, it means that both the steak and the wine taste better when enjoyed together. If you are 'good with people' that could mean that both you and they perform better when you work together. "Good with people" should not be confused with charm or grace. Many famous leaders have, in the absence of any obvious charm or eloquence, managed to get people to produce at high levels. Some introverts fail to be influential; some extraverts fail to be effective. The most useful criteria for "good with people" is the performance that results when an individual is working with others: does the sum exceed the total of the parts? Or would they all have been better working from separate cubicles? We are entering the season of networking: it's a perfect time to observe the difference between the people who are working the room and the people who are making the room w...
Read more

The fine line between observations, suggestions and commands

I have been watching Tony Robbins this week in the documentary called " I Am Not Your Guru ." You can read a nicely ambivalent review in the Financial Times here.   I think the ambivalence is built into the process, which might be surprising given the loud celebration that characterizes the Date with Destiny in the film. For those of us whose work has evolved from NLP, there are lessons to be learned from modelling the most famous and successful practitioner of NLP (Robbins has far surpassed all the founders by all measures of success). Because he does so much so well, Robbins lets us see how fine the line is between observing and suggesting. Let me explain. Robbins frames his "interventions" both with the exercises and performances we do not see in the film and with his invitations. The film opens with an intervention with a young man who says he is suicidal; it is only later that we see Robbins say he is looking for someone who is suicidal to work with. Since...
Read more