Don’t raise your voice, improve your argument.
The transformation from a ‘One-Man Show’ to an able leader
I recently came across a quick read by an Indian Hindu monk, philosopher, author, and religious teacher “Swami Vivekananda”. I am so inspired by his thoughts and his way of moving forward that I planned to put his preachings into my words. I will start with this inspiring quote:
“Don’t raise your voice, improve your argument.”
This book is based on Effective Persuasion. We face scenarios in our day-to-day lives where we have to persuade the people in our office space or at home to get some work done effectively, hence it is a very essential skill to have. But before knowing the techniques it is suggested to know the type of persuaders and their qualities.
So, there are four types of persuaders, and I hope you’ll understand more about them with a few examples from your workplace scenarios.
1. People who are poor in persuading others and have low sensitivity towards the concerns of the people whom they persuade.
At the workplace, they avoid taking on additional work and take their own time to complete the work allotted to them. They do not come forward and help others even if it doesn’t cost them anything. They keep aloof from the team members and do not persuade them to get the work done.
2. People who are poor in persuading others, but have excellent sensitivity to the concerns of the persons who they persuade
These people are low in self-confidence and have too much concern for others’ convenience. But mere goodness alone cannot get the results if not backed by mental toughness. Most often, others misuse their kindness to benefit themselves.
3. People who relentlessly chase others and have low sensitivity to the concerns of the people whom they chase
These people are dictators. They are action-oriented in nature and highly focused on getting results. In the process of achieving the results, they indiscriminately chase others to achieve and don’t pay attention to the hardships and limitations of the job. As a result, people don’t like working with the person and end up churning to another job.
4. People who relentlessly chase others and at the same time have excellent sensitivity to the concerns of those whom they chase
These people are iconic leaders and have the capability to achieve great goals by promoting excellent team spirit. They are adept at inspiring and motivating the team members working with them, and mentoring them to transform into good leaders. They judiciously express the above two qualities as the situation demands and achieve great results.
Now that you know the types and characteristics of the persuaders, adding to that let’s understand how one can balance their characteristics with these Greek persuasion techniques.
1. Ethos
If you want to encourage someone to act in your suggested direction, You should have some credibility. In other words, a pursuer should be well versed in the matter under discussion and have certain achievements that stand as a testimonial for his worth. A success story is a skillful narration of an incident that highlights and establishes one's abilities, initiatives, and ambitions, otherwise the listener will not care enough.
Hence the pursuer should put the following questions to themselves before plunging into the activity of persuading anyone:
- Does the person to be persuaded respect me?
- Does the person to be persuaded believe that I am of good character?
- Does the person to be persuaded believe that I am trustworthy?
- Does the person to be persuaded believe that I am well-versed in the matter to be discussed and have the requisite expertise to deal with it?
2. Pathos
Human beings are essentially driven by emotions and Pathos is used to establish the emotional connection with the person being persuaded. If the person is emotionally connected to the pursuer the act of persuasion might not be effective. The best way to enable this is via narrating a story, incidents, events, analogy, Metaphor, etc.
To start with, these are the suggested questions one can ask themselves:
- Does the narration invoke a feeling of love, Sympathy, and Favourable disposition in the listener?
- Do my words offend the convictions of the listener?
- Does my approach lead to synchronizing with the listener?
- What makes me establish a common ground with the listener?
3. Logos
Humans have two faculties i.e emotions and logic. The former is related to the heart and the latter is to the brain. ‘Logos’ is all about using logic, reasoning, evidence, statistics, and facts to substantiate the claims made in the suggestion. It helps people to take better and more informed decisions and to strengthen the impact of persuasion. It can be anything such as Historical facts, Survey reports, Research analysis, facts, and figures. Using “Business Intelligence” in the process of pursuing business matters is nothing but using “Logos”.
Before implementing Logos in your proposition, Rethink the below questions:
- Does my conversation make sense to the listener?
- Is my message highlighting relevant facts related to the matter?
- Does the Statistics that I am presenting is relevant to impress the listener?
- Am I giving evidence and examples to give strength to the proposal?
Kairos
It can be any one of the above mentioned techniques but the difference is using these techniques at the right place and time.
