Sunday, July 19, 2009

How to increase your personal wheel of influence

At the annual WITI keynote last month, I heard about the "personal wheel of influence" - about how you treat every business interaction as a "relationship". The idea is simple- people intuitively understand that relationships are a lifelong thing, not one-time transaction and it alters behavior from short term wins to long-term mutual benefit behaviors; inspires give-take and inspires us to think in terms of increasing "social currency" defined as our value to others. Think of a wheel with YOU at the center. Around this draw all other interested parties into circles (sales, marketing,customer etc) and then pretend that you are not in one meeting but in a long term relationship at every meeting you have. What would you do to grow the inner circle? Add value to others. Key to growing the YOU circle is understanding what your value is and to grow that vale. If you engage from the perspective adding value, the personal wheel of influence grows automatically - an outcome, willingly supported by others of what you do. To know your key value and grow it - complete the following sentences:
1. - I am known for... (write 2-4 things)
2. - I want to become known for ...(write 2-4 things)
and then have fun!

No comments: