Change the Way You Persuade

Change the Way You Persuade

by Gary A. Williams and Robert B. Miller

Reprint r0205d

May 2002

HBR Case Study

A Pain in the (Supply) Chain

r0205a

John Butman

HBR at Large

How Resilience Works

r0205b

Diane L. Coutu

Different Voice

Turning an Industry Inside Out:

A Conversation with Robert Redford

Change the Way You Persuade

r0205c

r0205d

Gary A. Williams and Robert B. Miller

HBR Spotlight: Practical Strategy

Divestiture: Strategy’s Missing Link

r0205e

Lee Dranikoff, Tim Koller, and Antoon Schneider

Why Business Models Matter

r0205f

Joan Magretta

Disruptive Change: When Trying Harder

Is Part of the Problem

r0205g

Clark Gilbert and Joseph L. Bower

Tool Kit

Read a Plant – Fast

r0205h

R. Eugene Goodson

The Entrepreneur

A Test for the Fainthearted

Walter Kuemmerle

r0205j

Managers typically use a one-size-fits-all approach when trying to influence

their bosses and colleagues. New research shows that’s a mistake. Persuasion

works best when it’s tailored to five distinct decision-making styles.

CHANGE THE WAY YOU

PERSUADE

by Gary A. Williams and Robert B. Miller

I

t’s happened to you before. You call a meeting to

try to convince your boss and peers that your company

needs to make an important move – for instance, funding a risky but promising venture. Your argument is impassioned, your logic unassailable, your data bulletproof.

Two weeks later, though, you learn that your brilliant proposal has been tabled. What went wrong?

All too often, people make the mistake of focusing too

much on the content of their argument and not enough

on how they deliver that message. Indeed, far too many

decisions go the wrong way because information is presented ineffectively. In our experience, people can vastly

improve their chances of having their proposals succeed

by determining who the chief decision maker is among

the executives they are trying to persuade and then tailoring...