Amplify Your Influence

Transform How You Communicate and Lead

Rene Rodriguez

• Publisher: Wiley
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN:
  9781119858683
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781119858751
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business Communication
• Index: Business

Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly Bestseller

Apply the latest advances in neuroscience to your real-world persuasion and influence strategies for immediate results 

In Amplify Your Influence: Transform How You Communicate and Lead, celebrated keynote speaker, trainer and leadership coach Rene Rodriguez delivers an eye-opening roadmap to using applied neuroscience to improve readers' communication ability, critical thinking, cultural awareness, and leadership skills. 

Based in the author's proprietary AMPLIFII system and methodologies he has taught to over 100,000 participants around the world, the book offers practical tips, useful frameworks, guided practice, and simple application exercises to help readers create new and lasting behaviors that effect change in their life and work. 

Amplify Your Influence shows leaders how to: 

• Leverage various human motivators for positive outcomes and results 
• Frame and communicate their ideas in a way that encourages engagement and gets an active response 
• Intentionally choose a communication style based on their influence objective 

Perfect for executives, managers, sales professionals, and other business leaders, Amplify Your Influence is required reading for anyone seeking to improve their ability to effect change in the people around them, whether they're in the office, the boardroom, the classroom, or at home. 

PART I
The Concept

1
The Power of Influence

The AMPLIFII™ Formula = Frame/Message/Tie-Down

AMPLIFII can influence your business and your life for the better. But to share its powerful message, we first must be persuaded to listen. That's the most crucial challenge in the world of influence—getting others to listen to what we say.

We live in a world where seemingly everyone competes for our attention. We're constantly bombarded with emails, text messages, social media, meetings, advertisements, movies, television, and more. With advertising alone, the average person sees an estimated 6,000 to 10,000 ads delivered via a variety of formats every day—almost double the number of more than a decade ago.¹

The reality is that all these distractions clamor for our precious attention. So do you. You want an audience to listen to what you say because you also have an agenda to market, whether you're selling a product, teaching a class, sharing a vision, managing people, or simply talking with another person.

Control the Room

Not long ago I gave a keynote address to a group of sales and marketing professionals in Dallas, Texas. The biggest challenge was not what to talk about—I had a clear plan—but that my speech overlapped with 600 conference attendees eating lunch.

That meant 600 people clanking plates, forks, knives, and dozens of amazing staff darting around doing their jobs oblivious to a speaker trying to deliver a message.

Tough Gig

For those who have never had to conduct business or deliver a speech over lunch, it's one of the most difficult gigs possible. That is, unless you know how to control the room. At this event, however, the good news was that another speaker preceded me so the worst of the clanking and most of the eating would be over by the time I got on stage.

My predecessor, however, wasn't so lucky. He didn't start his presentation by walking through the audience to gain their attention or offer any other upfront attempt at connection. Instead, he walked onto the stage and began his talk. He delivered a passionate speech from the heart and with incredible messages. The problem was that his speech was marred by clanking dishes, silverware, and rude attendees speaking loudly as if the speaker weren't there. He was obviously flustered, and those paying attention could feel his pain.

Lesson one: Gain control of the room and capture the attention of your audience.

The Right Approach

Then it was my turn. It seemed like the clanking and chatter got even louder as I walked onto the stage, and I knew I had to act quickly to avoid the imminent disaster that awaited me. After the obligatory welcoming applause, I immediately asked everyone if they would please stand up. When everyone was standing, I began:

All of us here in this room have one thing in common. We all need to influence others with our ideas in a highly distracted world. Today I find myself standing on stage in front of 600 people eating lunch, clanking plates, and having side conversations. It's a situation not that different from one all of you face regularly when trying to convey to potential clients your value proposition over that of your competitors.

So what do we do? First, we want to ensure that we present our value in the best possible scenario. For me to do that, I have to ask two things. First, let's thank our wonderful staff here today for their great work. If you still have a plate, please place it on the tray and take it outside so we can begin. You have a minute or so to do that while I ask the audience to do a short exercise.

By now the audience and staff were a bit shocked by my blunt beginning. Yet, they understood that it was highly relevant. They also could relate to my challenge because they wanted to learn how to capture the attention of their audiences, too.

I then went on to share a short story about my mother, who used to be a nun, and then asked them to shake the hands of three different people, come back, and sit down. By the time the handshaking was over, the staff had cleared the plates and the room was silent.

We all took a minute to reflect on the profound difference in the room. It was a teaching moment for the audience. They had just experienced firsthand how someone who wants to influence an outcome or decision first must eliminate the distractions—external or internal. In this case, the distraction was the room dynamics.

To deliver our ideas or messages, whatever they are, we first must figure out how to present them in the best possible setting or situation. That means eliminating the distractions so that others will listen and act on what we say.

Powerful Force

Whether it's a salesperson trying to close a deal, a parent offering guidance, or a manager trying to motivate a team, the goal is the same—to influence behavior, thought, or an outcome. Leadership is about influence, and so is marketing, teaching, managing, selling, and communicating. Our buying behaviors and the relationships we build are often the result of external influences that we're not even aware exist. As much as we may not like it, even our opinions are often based on the influence of others and the stories they share with us.

The opportunity to influence is everywhere. Just knowing that has a positive impact on our ability to communicate more effectively.

Unfortunately, many people don't understand the extent of influence and miss opportunities to advance their careers, earn greater income, and make a bigger impact on the world around them. That's why learning to harness the power of influence—to AMPLIFII it—is a crucial tool to increase success and improve the quality of life for all of us.

Simple Definition

Imagine walking into a room and people immediately sit up and listen to what you have to say. Or holding a meeting and participants quickly grasp and adopt the changes you propose.

This is influence, the capacity to have an effect on an outcome. That sounds simple. But in reality influence is a complex science as well as an art that can be learned to improve our ability to communicate and connect with others to get results. With the wisdom and skill set to truly influence others—to change other people's minds—we can better control outcomes in business and in life.

Influence is the how of leadership. Influence should be at the center of a manager's professional development, too, because in a world where people have choices, it takes more than command, control, or a title to affect outcomes. Human beings don't respond well to being forced, obligated, or pushed into doing something. They respond best when they are inspired to do so.

Inspiration

Working with tens of thousands of people over the years, I've learned that inspiration happens when our future actions align with what we believe in—our values. We are paid to come to work, yet some people struggle to find motivation. The same people, though, will work hard to build a home for a family through Habitat for Humanity and feel motivated and fulfilled at the end of the day even though they haven't earned a dime.

From the point of view of science and the brain, this inspiration happens when our prefrontal lobe (the executive center of the brain) connects with our limbic system, which is the home of our values. Our inspiration comes from that connection between what we value and the actions we take. This is also w...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Foreword
• Introduction
• PART I: The Concept
• PART II: The Formula
• PART III: The Skills
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Index
• End User License Agreement