What the Hell Will Persuade Him?! : A short-short story

Too Smart for His Own Good: How intelligent people can avoid being off-putting

Many people wish they were more intelligent, but I’ve had clients whose very intelligence hurts them.  My Psychology Today article today offers a composite example followed by suggestions.

Asking: Sample language for common requests at work, in relationships, and more

You ask and you get rejected.

You ask and you get no response.

You ask and they say “later.”

How you ask can improve your results.

My clients report that they’ve learned best when I teach by example and then ask them to say what principles were embedded. So, I do that for you in my Psychology Today article today.

The Power of Color: An easy, yet powerful tool for influence

There is an extensive research literature.on the psychology of color. My Psychology Today article today offers some findings.

Leadership Lessons from Four Presidents: Part 1: Lincoln

Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin’s new book is Leadership: in turbulent times. It profiles Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson.

In this first installment of a four-part series in Psychology Today, I offer quotes from the book that address what made Lincoln successful. The subsequent installments will do the same for the other three.

32 Powerful Influencing Words,,, and 10 that are overrated

Much has been written on the art of influence, but many of my clients find such advice too difficult to implement. 

They’ve had more success in trying to influence someone’s behavior or attitude by, where appropriate, using the 32 words I list in my PsychologyToday.com article today.
 

Giving a Persuasive Talk

I’ve written previously on public speaking: Good Public Speaking Without Fear  and interviewed one of the world’s most successful speakers, Tony Robbins, in which he outlined the key to an effective talk.

In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I focus on a specify type of talk: the persuasive speech.  That can be as brief as a two-minute presentation at a staff meeting to a keynote speech at a convention.

A Kinder, Gentler Approach to Kim Jong Un

Today, C-SPAN broadcast the United Nations’ unanimous Security Council vote to increase sanctions against North Korea and its nuclear-threatening Supreme Leader, Kim Jong Un. Speech after speech seem psychologically oblivious, merely returning threats of might with threats of greater might.

Of course, it’s possible that the sanctions will work. Some people understand nothing but pain and the threat of more pain. And it’s possible that Kim Jung Un is simply "crazy:” a psychopathic, megalomanical, sociopathic monster, as is often claimed.

But on the possibility that Kim Jong Un is not crazy but just a human being who for, some psychological and practical reasons, has felt backed into a corner and thus feels he must threaten and alienate the world with nuclear threats, assassinations, and human rights violations, even at the cost of great pain to his people, I thought it might be instructive to you if not to him to write a letter to him.

I can't imagine he'd actually read it, so its primary purpose is to offer my readers an approach to dealing with a hated person and to conflict in general that is more consonant with Psychology Today's and its reader's humanistic sensibilities. Perhaps the tactics I use in the letter may be useful as you address conflicts in your life. In that letter, which I post on PsychologyToday.com, I embed those tactics in parentheses and italics.

Creating Connection in Conversation

A career counseling client of mine lamented that he never seems to make that seemingly magical connection that gets him the job. 

He mentioned that his wife does make such connection and got a job she thought she wouldn't get.
I explained that many factors could be at play and that some are out of his control but there are three things that may help. 

He found my describing them of value and so I wrote about them in my PsychologyToday.com article today.

Tools of Influence: Excerpts from influential speeches that demonstrate powerful rhetorical devices

In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I offer another approach. From 200 of the most influential speeches of modern times, I selected 11 excerpts that brilliantly illustrate a powerful rhetorical device.

And above is the YouTube video of me performing those excerpts. 

When You Want to Persuade Someone

If a sailor hopes to make it to Hawaii, s/he must stay alert to the need to adjust a sail, change course, etc.

Similarly, in our conversations. we must we stay alert to the need to change tactics.

In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I discuss the situation in which an employee feels overworked and micromanaged.

Cultivating Charisma

I wish the world focused more on its steak than its sizzle but charisma is key to influence, and it's learnable. 

In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I offer tactics derived from our most charismatic leaders.

A Lesson in Persuasion: The Feedback I Gave on a Job Seeker's Cover Letter

A client asked me to review a request for an informational interview that he was planning to send to nonprofit managers. He said, “Give it to me straight in the eye.” I did so. 

In response, he said that while difficult to take, he found the feedback inordinately useful, not just in improving his letter but as a lesson in writing, persuasion, and thinking. 

So, I've decided to post it as today's PsychologyToday.com article.

Gaining Charisma

Alas, America is soooh much about artifice, the superficial. Succumbing temporarily to that because a client requested it, my PsychologyToday.com article today is on gaining charisma.

Trial Lawyer Gerry Spence on Persuasiveness

The master trial lawyer has much to teach us about persuasion. And Gerry Spence certainly is a master. He has never lost a criminal case either as a prosecutor or defense attorney. He has not lost a civil case since 1969.  Spence has more multi-million dollar verdicts without an intervening loss than any lawyer in America, including $10.5 million in the Karen Silkwood case  He is in the American Trial Lawyers Hall of Fame, which includes John Adams and Clarence Darrow.  

I interviewed Gerry Spence today for my PsychologyToday.com article today. HERE is the link.