Persuasive communication internally

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This area of the site was written for very experienced trust fundraisers.

This section is about persuasive communication techniques. Communicating well is only one part of persuasion internally, though. A lot more is about understanding the place where you work and “how to make a good impression and get things done”. This is all covered in the Internal politics web page.

Make it honest

The following involves a lot of influencing techniques. However, it’s worth being aware that, even with the ones that appeal more to the subconscious, people will be aware of what you’re doing, even if only subliminally. So, you need to come from a good place. All you’re doing is strengthening relationships and making it easier for people who could potentially say yes to do so. Little here will “get one over” or “slip something past” someone.

A structure to persuasion

In The Necessary Art of Persuasion, a Harvard Business Review article, Jay Conger reports on studying 23 business leaders over 12 years. He advocates the following structure:

1. Establishing credibility
2. Framing the situation in such a way that there’s common ground
3. Reinforce their position with vivid language and compelling evidence
4. Connecting emotionally with the audience

He highlights the most common mistakes he’d seen that undermine effective persuasion:

1. Attempting to make the case up front, with a hard sell. He sees persuasion as often coming out of negotiation and says that starting out with a strong, clear position gives potential opponents something to push back against.
2. Resisting compromise. This sends the message that persuasion is a one-way street.
3. Thinking that persuasion is simply a matter of having the best arguments
4. Assuming that persuasion is a one-shot event. Conger highlights that, actually, arriving at a common position involves listening, testing the position, incorporating compromises and trying again. It can be slow and difficult, you do it because it’s still worth it.

EAST

The Cabinet Office’s Behavioural Insights Team specialises in applying the insights of behavioural psychology to business situations. They came up with the acronym EAST to summarise ways to make your calls to action particularly strong:

Easy: Make it the easiest approach you can: the default option, as simple to action as possible, delivered through a simplified message. Daniel Kahneman, the big thinker in the field, says the most effective way to change people’s behaviour is to make it easier to do what you want them to.

Attractive: Make it attractive (for example, colourful and rewarding). 

Social: People are swayed by “social proofs” – others do it, so it must be good. Show how others, especially peers, take part. Make the action social. 

Timely: Prompt people at the right time and show there are immediate benefits to them for acting.

Creating a strong call to action

Monroe’s Motivated Sequence is more focused on the way things are phrased, rather than so much on the message. So, they are complementary. It can help you to create a call to action with real impact. There are five steps:

1. Get attention
2. Establish the need
3. Satisfy the need
4. Visualize the future
5. Action/Actualization

There are plenty of breakdowns online to help you analyse these five elements, if you need them. One thing I’d say is: I’ve done a lot of identifying needs and lacks of things internally and it can get you a reputation for being negative. So, after I’ve thought through what I want to say I’ll do a pass at the end to check if there is a more positive formulation. Monroe’s structure lends itself to that.

Moving people when there’s uncertainty

As behavioural psychologist Daniel Kahneman notes, moving people under conditions of uncertainty is difficult—the first thing they do is freeze. They’re scared of what they might lose. Therefore, it’s good to tell people what they will lose if they fail to move. 

They also don’t look inside themselves for answers—all they see is ambiguity and their own lack of confidence. Instead, they look outside for sources of information that can reduce their uncertainty. So, you need to marshal evidence from acknowledged experts—such as good practice guides—that aligns with the rationale for the initiative. (Qua Professor of Influence Robert Cialdini) 

Conversely, when you start wheeling out guides and toolkits, you can create an element of paralysis because people aren’t sure what to do with the information. You need to know the people you’re working with in Services and drip feed things to them. Once you’re confident they’ll assimilate new ideas, then you can drop your two big toolkits on them, with the pages you’ve highlighted for them to read.

Reciprocity

If you do things for people, they can feel obligated to help in return. Robert Cialdini’s principle of reciprocity is that you should give first, not wait, and you shouldn’t treat things as transactional. It should be: meaningful, unexpected, and tailored/personalised. You’re not looking for “tit for tat” reciprocity, but a sense of sharing, where reciprocity is underlying.

The value of doing something nice for someone changes over time. People value a favour most highly right after you bestow it. In fact, its value to them will diminish over time, but – as the person who did the favor – you’re likely to value it even more highly as time passes. This can create tension, so take these attitude shifts into account when you request a reciprocal favour. (Goldstein et al, 2017). If you’ve done something for them and want them to reciprocate, don’t say “It’s nothing” when they thank you. Say something like, “Of course; it’s what partners do for each other” (Cialdini, Influence, 2002)) Flynn found one thing that increased both the social value of the giver and that person’s productivity: it wasn’t the number of favours done, it was the number of favours exchanged. (Flynn, F.J. & Lake V.K.B. (2008))

Sign up early; shorter intermediate deadlines

This isn’t just good manners. If you ask people well in advance, they’re less likely to ask themselves should they do something, whereas if you ask them shortly before they’re more likely to ask themselves do they want to, in the context of all the other things they could be doing. However, once they’re signed up, shorter deadlines are more likely to be met than longer ones (Martin et al, The Small Big, 2015). 

When scheduling appointments, get the other person to select the time, so they are invested. (Goldstein et al, ibid., 2017).

Active, public, effortful and unpressured commitments are best

Prof Robert Cialdini in Influence (2007) says the best commitments are:

1. Agreed to in public (Goldstein, N., et al, ibid., 2017). Once they have committed to an agreement, people are reluctant to back out of even a bad deal (Martin et al, ibid., 2014). When working with slippery senior managers, I’ve emailed in reply to their commitment cc’ing in other relevant people: it only works for so long, because they realize what you’ll do, but it at least establishes more honest communication.
2. Active. Getting them to write the commitment themselves helps – Cialdini’s recommendation has seemed to work for me.
3. Effortful
4. Given in absence of outside pressures