The exact question is, “I understand not being overly emotional or direct with a co-worker or boss is best, but what if you really need to get something across to them, or you need a definite win? Sometimes being tough can get you the end result as opposed to really getting agressive to make your point. If you’re nice and tactful about it and your boss doesn’t take you seriously and you fail, your boss could always go back to you and say ‘you know, you really didn’t seem that upset by me not backing you on that issue.’ It’s like a lose-lose situation.”

Fantastic question. And now, a fantastic answer.

A: Peon,

Great point. Let’s break it down 3 ways.

One way to slice this is to recognize three ways to attack a situation like this: with power, rights, or interests. The emotional impact approach is a set up for an interest-based conversation, which takes time and has its risks… chief among them being that interest-based conversations tend to be played in the near-term at the lowest common denominator. This is a fancy way of saying that until you “train” the other side that you’re really about meeting mutual interests—and by interests, I mean “what people need” as opposed to “what people say they need”—you’re going to run into walls like you describe above. The only antidote for this is to start building relationships with people when there is no issue to discuss. (See my post on likability.)

But what if you didn’t do that, and now here you are, in a must win situation?

1. Power. You could go straight at the person. There are a number of forms of power, though if you’re a subordinate, formal power ain’t one of them. This means that you’re going to need to know your stuff to an extremely convincing degree, or threaten to go over the person’s head. And now hang on a sec… making an overt threat like that is only going to get you kicked in the proverbial groin, so don’t go thinking that I just advocated threatening your boss. I don’t. In this case, I’m talking about something far more subtle… like suggesting that the decision get opened up to a broader group… or talking to a peer in a different area and then mentioning as much to your boss. Both of these avenues use transparent communications to let your boss know that s/he may hear about it from other sources and therefore should “be prepared.“ Another form of power is entirely interpersonal and it goes like this: if your boss doesn’t like conflict, challenge him. If she does like to fight, stand your ground and earn your say. If she doesn’t like decisions, pre-sell your idea to a group and then go back and tell her that the team is unanimously behind it… and so on. This approach takes some huevos… but no one promised winning was nice.
2. Rights. ”The contract says.“ ”This is what’s fair.“ And so on. Using rights to force someone to see your point of view means focusing them on some objective standard. And after 19 years in various work environments, including several summers in a law office, and after 35 years of life, I can tell you: rights doesn’t work. People are not rational. Facts are meaningless until interpreted, and all interpretations are subject to the errors, omissions, quirks, and prejudices of the human mind.

Another way to slice this is purely at the interpersonal level: how can you get your point across most effectively? You have five options in this model:

1. Fight. Not with fists, but with directness and persistence. As in, ”Look, Boss, with all due respect, I’m not leaving this office until I’m convinced you fully understand me, because when you do, I think you’ll have a different course of action.“
2. Accommodate. This is what you’re currently doing. It won’t get you a win. Grow a spine.
3. Compromise. Splitting the baby is the ultimate in meh.
4. Explore. Another way of talking about looking for mutual interests. Works, but takes time and requires a relationship because you need to share information that could make you vulnerable along the way.
5. Stall. Postpone the decision by saying something like, ”Hmm… I’m thinking… that I should run a different slice of the data. Let’s regroup later today.“ Repeat as necessary until you’re feeling the flow and think you can sway the final decision.

And finally, there’s this perspective: don’t worry about it. You’re not paid to make the decision, your boss is. Let him/her make it. And if s/he screws it up, say, ”Don’t even think about blaming me for this. I sat here and told you exactly what was going to happen. So whuddya say you and I work on a communication plan that ensures you do hear the important stuff next time?“

Good luck!

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Communicate as if you were the recipient of the communication.

Forget your role as transmitter. No one cares that you “have the floor;” people only care if you grab them. (Not literally.) If you can do this, you’re golden.

But how? Emotional impact, folks. I don’t care how popular the wisdom is to “just give the facts,” there are very few times when it is appropriate to deliver only facts, and fewer times still when it is possible. You are ALWAYS selling.

To recap:

Communicate as if you were the recipient… and since you probably don’t like dry, droll, boring, drawn-out communications, give your audience the same brief, high-impact, emotional punch that you look for in others’ communications!

(Is this beginning to sound like the recipe for a commercial? It should… billions of dollars annually tell us that the commercial is the most effect form of communication (at its best); that’s the form people buy when they have to pay for their words. Think about it: commercials couple a single message with an emotional (often entertaining) element, while limiting themselves to a ridiculously brief window.)

Emotional impact can take many different forms, as this video will demonstrate…

(RSS readers, click through for the video!)

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Whatever the reason, people in generally just seem a little less douchebaggy. And you know something, it feels good!

It’s like the Christmas season has arrived a full month early, and without the songs. I love the Christmas season. Maybe one day I’ll write about how I think the holiday has been nationalized; suffice it to say, I think “Merry Christmas” has gone the way of kleenex, cellophane, Coke, and rollerblades in terms of becoming a generic term for something bigger, regardless of your religion. To me, at least, “Merry Christmas” means, “Hey, Buddy, let’s you and I call a truce on the douchiness for a few days and just smile at one another. Cool?”

And that’s what I’m seeing now:

People smile easier.
People seem quicker to help one another out with small things.
People make more small talk with strangers.
People drive slower. (Apparently, not all manifestations of de-douchiness are good.)
People share.

I’ve spent a lot of time at O’Hare airport lately, which as an experience can be pretty douchebag inducing. I fell prey to it a few weeks ago when, on a Saturday morning at 7am, a woman decided that because I was working on an iPhone and she had an iPhone, too, we must be friends and I must want to stop what I was doing and chat with her. Boy, was she wrong.

But that was before the election, when being a douche was totally in vogue. Since then, I’ve noticed myself being more patient, friendlier, and more helpful. With the ORD meanderthals strolling from gate to McD’s… no, how about Corner Bakery… wait, is Starbuck’s cheaper for the same food…, I find myself offering advice like, “Your best bet is the tomazzo bagel from the American Bagel company,” or “Here, have my PowerBar.”

My friends are reporting similar trends. A restauranteur friend of mine says that for six weeks leading into November, nearly all the conversations in his joints were about the economy or the election. Now, conversations are still on the important topics, but they’re more civil and open.

Another friend of mine said that we’ve elevated our collective consciousness and are now vibrating on a higher plane. I have no idea what that means.

All I know is, we seem to be less douchebaggy. Keep up the good work, Barack!

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(RSS readers, if you can’t see it, there is a video here… click through to view…)

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How many times have I posted a brilliant blog post, only to then go to catch up on three days worth of RSS blog feeds and find that someone else just posted about the same topic? It happens to all of us… heck, many of us are reading one another’s stuff regularly, so it’s bound to happen… we have each others’ words imprinted on our collective subconscious! Sometimes we do it on purpose in order to build off of an idea.

And you know, I think we’re generally OK with the back and forth of ideas, because we’ve gotten to know one another a bit in this here blogosphere, and as we have, we’ve come to recognize each other’s styles, points of view, and pet topics. We know what is “borrowable” and what makes up the core of another’s message. We’ve seen the cross-traffic (or at least the links), so we know that when someone is building off one of our ideas, we’re going to get a link or at least a mention. And if there’s a miss, that there’ll be a make-good in the future, maybe in the form of a correction, or a plug on Twitter, something. We’re cordial and friendly. We balance cooperative and competitive forces as we support one another while also trying to be more insightful, more helpful, and more expert. It’s a process of that keeps us focused on the greater good, builds the community, enhances our offerings to the outside world, and brings out our best.

Not everyone knows (or cares) about the rules of the game. There are those who are the blogging equivalent of script kiddies, who cut content from others and paste it on their own sites as if it were their own. If there is a reference to a source, it’s buried and incomplete. And while when you can’t find the source of a quote (after spending time searching for it), you acknowledge as much and ask your readers to help locate it, they take that quote and purposefully strip out the source.

I came across one such blogger last night, who shall remain nameless because I don’t want to drive a single visitor to the site. I gave the person a heads up, gave them the link to the original article that they had swiped, and a reason to use it. They were so insulted they just took down the whole darn post.

Which was just fine by me.

The irony is, the person describes himself (herself?) as (1) a Baby Boomer and (2) net savvy.

Uh… when you steal half an article from CareerBuilder and are outed less than 24 hours later by a guy who was quoted in the article who saw his name come back through Technorati, not so much on the savvy, ya know?

I’m all for tearing down generational boundaries, so no comment on the Boomer part of the equation. But if by “savvy” you really mean, “the one eyed man in the land of the blind,” then just say so.

The only price for admittance into the Net world is being honest about who you are.

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Out of a lack of options.

Until a better option comes along.

In fact, the only thing that keeps them engaged with you is the fact that—while unlikable—you’re at least predictable, and they’ve figured out how to get what they need from the relationship… more or less. Eventually, they’ll give you the boot. And the more self-confident they are, the sooner that boot will come.

You know why?

Because they don’t like you, Silly!

Beware: the context in which you work affects how your unlikability will impact you:

If you are an unliked manager…
You actually may be OK, as long as your abilities are respected and the results are there. In a role of formal power, we need to distinguish between personal like, which is almost irrelevant in this case, and professional like—a.k.a. respect—which leads to loyalty, peace of mind, and, ironically, personal like. We must also distinguish respect from fear, as the two are often confused at a practical level. Fear occurs when respect for your power outlives respect for your ability to wield it responsibly, and it is unhealthy on many levels: it closes off lines of communication, it sends your best people looking for new jobs elsewhere, causes people to start “going through the motions” at work (you know how some people just won’t invest personally, won’t quit, and won’t say anything about what they need or want?).

There’s a colorful term for how people treat a boss of whom they’re afraid, which is NSFW (not safe for work). It’s a compound slang word. The first half is “grin.” Let’s just say the second part rhymes with “ducking.” Rest assured, this technique creates miscommunications galore for a boss.

If you are an unliked subordinate…
Your options are limited. You may be the world’s greatest at your job, but that’s all you’ll ever be, because once you hit the management ranks and find yourself in need of relationships with clients, peers, subs, bosses, and vendors for advancement, you’ll find yourself with nothing.

And if you’re an unliked salesperson…
You’re toast.

So how do you know if you’re liked? It really doesn’t matter what people say, and it really doesn’t matter what you think. The only thing that matters is how people act, especially in that split second after you’ve said something, before the controlled, practiced, purposeful reaction takes over. Watch for that slight hesitation before a smile, a smile that you could swear starts off like a sneer, or fidgeting of any kind that doesn’t precede interactions with others. (You’re not dumb. You know when someone doesn’t like you. You’ve known how to pick up that vibe since junior high. Trust yourself. If you need help, read Paul Ekman’s research on micro-expressions.)

Here’s a three question likability quiz:

• Do I take genuine interest in others, or are people a means to achieving personal goals?
• Do I enjoy helping others, or are they lucky enough to know me?
• Do you live in a good world, or a brutish world in which it’s kill or be killed?

How do you get liked? Work on your world view (until you find you take a genuine interest in the people around you, enjoy helping them, and see the world as filled with more good than bad… I’ll even cut you some slack, and say you really only need to be deep in two or maybe even just one of these areas). Regardless of how smooth you think you are, the way you see the world will reflect outward. Like you, people aren’t stupid. They may not call you out on bad behavior, they may excuse it for you, they may lack the self-confidence to stand up to it, or they may not care about it, but they see it.

And eventually, they’ll have seen enough.

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What?! Did he just say “irrelevant?”

I did. Now be quiet and pay attention.

(And as a sweetener, at the end of this post I’ve included a link to the actual content of an entire book which lays out for you how you’re completely messing up your career, and what to do when you want to start getting it right. So hang in there, Sparky.)

I understand, oh ye careerist, that the Holy Grail of Executive Training appears to be a strategic finance class that shows you precisely how to calculate the impact of an increase in bad debt allowance on your Q3 P&L. I also understand that by the time you get to corporate executivedom, you will be so consumed by the relative merits of a bond offering versus a stock offering versus a sale that you will have little time for P&L reviews and will be forced to hire quality underlyings—with the mindset you have today, ahem—to handle such items.

So what are you to make of this mystical transition? How will you respond to my cry that thy vision of tomorrow’s job is no more than a cursed mirage, offering no respite from the desert wasteland that is your work life? How can you possibly prepare for such craziness?!

For starters, take advantage of the link below and start reading How to Self-Destruct: Making the Least of What’s Left of Your Career.

Here’s a little snippet from this week’s installment, from a chapter on screwing up an executive job interview:

I’m neither strategic nor execution-oriented, and I want to capitalize on my severe shortcomings in these areas [to self-destruct]. Any tips?

Don’t take the lead by anticipating questions.
If you get the gist of where the interview is heading, keep it to yourself! The willingness to take appropriate risks in pursuit of your goals is a desirable trait in leaders. In an interview, determining the pattern of the interview and then leading your interviewer along could get you the job by signaling such risk-taking.

What if I want to get the job?

Plan to answer every question from the perspective of the position you are interviewing for.

If you can’t see yourself in the new job, neither can the interviewer. This means you need to go beyond projecting confidence; it means you need to demonstrate deep awareness of the types of issues, struggles, opportunities, and decisions you will face in the new role, as well as an appropriately high-level perspective for addressing them. You need to do all this in addition to interviewing fundamentals like sitting up straight.

Want the rest of the book? Click here and scroll down. The first 5 chapters are already live… the rest are being posted one at a time each week.

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