Harnessing the Science of Persuasion Essay Example

large body 3f psychological research suggests there are six basic laws of rinning friends and influencing people. OCTOBFR 2001 H a r n e s s i n g t h e Science o f P e r s u a s i o n cially compelling-similarity and praise. Similarity literally draws people together.

In one experiment, reported in a 1968 article in the Journal of Personality, participants stood physically closer to one another after learning that they shared political beliefs and social values. And in a 1963 article in American Behavioral Scientists, researcher F. B. Evans used demographic data from insurance company records to demonstrate that prospects were more willing to purchase a policy from a salesperson who was akin to them in age, religion, politics, or even cigarettesmoking habits.

Managers can use similarities to create bonds with a recent hire, the head of another department, or even a new boss. Informal conversations during the workday create an ideal opportunity to discover at least one common area of enjoyment, be it a hobby, a college basketball team, or reruns of Seinfeld. The important thing is to establish the bond early because it creates a presumption of goodwill and trustworthiness in every subsequent THE PRINCIPLE OF encounter.

It's much easier to build support for a new project when the people you're trying to persuade are already inclined in your favor. Praise, tbe other reliable generator of affection, both charms and disarms. Sometimes the praise doesn't even People like those who like them. have to be merited. Researchers at the University of THE APPLICATION: North Carolina writing in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology found that

men felt the greatest regard for Uncover real similarities and offer an individual who flattered them unstintingly even if the genuine praise. comments were untrue.

And in their book Interpersonal Attraction (Addison-Wesley, 1978), Ellen Berscheid and The retailing phenomenon known as the Tupperware Elaine Hatfieid Walster presented experimental data party is a vivid illustration of this principle in action. showing that positive remarks about another person's The demonstration party for Tupperware products is traits, attitude, or performance reliably generates liking in hosted by an individual, almost always a woman, who inretum, as well as willing compliance with the wishes of vites to her home an array of friends, neighbors, and relthe person offering the praise. tives. The guests' affection for their hostess predisposes them to buy from her, a dynamic that was confirmed by Along with cultivating a fruitful relationship, adroit a 1990 study of purchase decisions made at demonstramanagers can also use praise to repair one that's damaged tion parties. The researchers, Jonathan Frenzen and or unproductive. Imagine you're the manager of a goodHarry Davis, writing in the Journal of Consumer Research, sized unit within your organization.

Your work frequently found that the guests' fondness for their hostess weighed brings you into contact with another manager-call him twice as heavily in their purchase decisions as their reDan - whom you have come to dislike. No matter bow gard for the products they bought. So when guests at a much you do for him, it's not enough. Worse, he never Tupperware party buy something, they aren't just buyseems to believe that you're doing the best you can for ing to please themselves. They're buying to

please their him. Resenting his attitude and his obvious lack of trust hostess as well. n your abilities and in your good faith, you don't spend as much time with him as you know you should; in conWhat's true at Tupperware parties is true for business sequence, the performance of both his unit and yours is in general: If you want to influence people, win friends. deteriorating. How? Controlled research has identified several factors that reliably increase liking, but two stand out as espeThe research on praise points toward a strategy for fixing the relationship. It may be hard to find, but there has Robert B.

Cialdini is the Regents' Professor of Psychology to be something about Dan you can sincerely admire, whether it's his concern for the people in his department, at Arizona State University and the author of Influence: Science and Practice (Allyn & Bacon, 2001), now in itsfourth his devotion to his family, or simply his work ethic. In edition. Further regularly updated information about the in- your next encounter with him, make an appreciative fluence process can be found at www. influenceatwork. com. comment about that trait. Make it clear that in this case Which brings us back to where we started.

Persuasion skills may be more necessary than ever, but how can executives acquire them if the most talented practitioners can't pass them along? By looking to science. For the past five decades, behavioral scientists have conducted experiments that shed considerable light on the way certain interactions lead people to concede, comply, or change. This research shows that persuasion works by appealing to a limited set of deeply rooted human

drives and needs, and it does so in predictable ways. Persuasion, in other words, is governed by basic principles that can be taught, learned, and applied.

By mastering these principles, executives can bring scientific rigor to the business of securing consensus, cutting deals, and winning concessions. In the pages that follow, 1 describe six fundamental principles of persuasion and suggest a few ways that executives can apply them in their own organizations.

Give what you want to receive. Praise is likely to have a wanning and softening effect on Dan because, ornery as he is, he is still human and subject to the universal human tendency to treat people the way they treat him. If you have ever caught yourself smiling at a coworker just because he or she smiled first, you know how this principle works. Charities rely on reciprocity to help them raise funds. For years, for instance, the Disabled American Veterans organization, using only a well-crafted fund-raising letter, garnered a very respectable 18% rate of response to its appeals.

But when the group started enclosing a small gift in the envelope, the response rate nearly doubled to 35%. The gift - personalized address labels - was extremely modest, but it wasn't what prospective donors received that made the difference. It was that they had gotten anything at all. What works in that letter works at the office, too. It's more than an effusion of seasonal spirit, of course, that impels suppliers to shower gifts on purchasing departments at holiday time. In 1996, purchasing managers admitted to an interviewer from Inc. agazine that after having accepted a gift from a supplier, they were

willing to purchase products and services they would have otherwise declined. Gifts also have a startling effect on retention. I have encouraged readers of my book to send me examples of the principles of influence at work in their own lives. One reader, an employee of the State of Oregon, sent a letter in which she oftered these reasons for her commitment to her supervisor: He gives me and my son gifts for Christmas and gives me presents on my birthday.

There is no promotion for the type of job I have, and my only choice for one is to move to another department. But I find myself resisting trying to move. My boss is reaching retirement age, and I am thinking 1 will be able to move out after he retires.... [F]or now, I feel obligated to stay since he has been so nice to me. Ultimately, though, gift giving is one of the cruder applications of the rule of reciprocity. In its more sophisticated uses, it confers a genuine first-mover advantage on any manager who is trying to foster positive attitudes OCTOBER 2001 and productive persona! elationships in the office: Managers can elicit the desired behavior from coworkers and employees by displaying it first Whether it's a sense of trust, a spirit of ctwperation, or a pleasant demeanor, leaders should model the behavior they want to see from others.

A group of researchers went door-to-door in Columbia, South Carolina, soliciting donations for a charity campaign and displaying a list of neighborhood residents who had already donated to the cause. The researchers found that the longer the donor list was, the more likely those

solicited would be to donate as well. To the people being solicited, the friends' and neighbors' names on the list were a form of socia! evidence about how they should respond. But the evidence would not have been nearly as compelling had the names been those of random strangers.

In an experiment from the 1960s, first described in the Journal of Personality and 50ciat Psychology, residents of New York City were asked to retum a lost wallet to its owner. They were highly likely to aftempt to return the waUet when they ! earned that another New Yorker had previous! y aftempted to do so. But ! eaming that someone from a foreign country had tried to retum the wallet didn't sway their decision one way or the other. The lesson for executives ftom these two experiments is that persuasion can be extremely effective when it comes from peers.

The science supports what most sales professionals already know: Testimonials from satisfied customers work best when the satisfied customer 75 Harnessing the Science of Persuasion and the prospective customer share similar circumstances. That lesson can help a manager faced with the task of selling a new corporate initiative. Imagine that you're trying to streamline your department's work processes. A group of veteran employees is resisting. Rather than try to convince the employees of the move's merits yourself, ask an old-timer who supports the initiative to speak up for it at a team meeting.

The compatriot's testimony stands a much better chance of convincing the group than yet another speech from the boss. Stated simply, influence is often best exerted horizontally rather than vertically. likely to direct

someone's future conduct than the same choice left unspoken. Writing in 1996 in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Delia Cioffi and Randy Garner described an experiment in which college students in one group were asked to fill out a printed form saying they wished to volunteer for an AIDS education project in the public schools.

Students in another group volunteered for the same project by leaving blank a form stating that they didn't want to participate. A few days later, when the volunteers reported for duty, 74% of those who showed up were students from the group that signaled their commitment by filling out the form. The implications are clear for a manager who wants to persuade a subordinate to follow some particular course of action: Get it in writing. Let's suppose you want your employee to submit reports in a more timely fashion.

Once you believe you've won agreement, ask him to summarize the decision in a memo and send it to you. By doing so, you'll have greatly increased the odds that he'll fulfill the commitment because, as a rule, people live up to what they have written down. Research into the social dimensions of commitment suggests that written statements become even more powerful when they're made public. In a classic experiment, described in 1955 in the Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, college students were asked to estimate the length of lines projected on a screen.

Some students were asked to write down their choices on a piece of paper, sign it, and hand the paper to the experimenter. Others wrote their choices on an erasable slate, then erased the slate

immediately. Still others were instructed to keep their decisions to themselves. The experimenters then presented all three groups with evidence that their initial choices may have been wrong. Those who had merely kept their decisions in their heads were the most likely to reconsider their original estimates.

More loyal to their first guesses were the students in the group that had written them down and immediately erased them. But by a wide margin, the ones most reluctant to shift from their original choices were those who had signed and handed them to the researcher. This experiment highlights how much most people wish to appear consistent to others. Consider again the matter of the employee who has been submitting late reports. Recognizing the power of this desire, you should, once you've successfully convinced him of the need to be more timely, reinforce the commitment by making sure it gets a public airing.

One way to do that would be to send the employee an e-mail that reads, "1 think your plan is just what we need. I showed it to Diane in manufacturing and Phil in shipping, and they thought it was right on target, too. " Whatever way such commitments are formalized, they should never be like the New Year's resolutions people privately make and then abandon with no one the wiser. They should be publicly made and visibly posted.