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Improving your Memory with the Memory Palace Technique

Do you find it hard to remember task your manager has set you? Do you sometimes go shopping and forget what ingredients you need to buy or do you want to improve how you can remember answers to exams and test?

A technique named the Memory Palace, which was made famous through the “Hannibal” books by Thomas Harris, can help increase your memory skills which will open up new possibilities for you.

The Memory Palace is one of the most powerful memory techniques available and is easy and fun to learn! The Memory Palace technique is based on the fact that we remember the details of the places we know; our home, place of work or local street.

By adding abstract images to these places with sounds and smells you can record large amounts of information that you can quickly access when needed.

If you would like to improve your memory skills then this technique can help and is easy and fun to use.

Memory Palace Technique                                                                                             

            

Picking a Palace

First you need to pick your palace, your palace is a place you know well, this could be your house, your school, place of work or even a street you know well. You should be very familiar with the palace you choose, you need to be able to close your eyes and re-call all of the details of the place or building.

When you imagine your palace, see it from your eyes as if you were there now, you need to feel associated with your palace, seeing what you can see, smelling the smells, hearing any sounds, tasting any taste and feeling the rooms temperature or objects you may brush pass, as if you were walking through your palace for real.

Close your eyes and in your minds eye remember all the details of your palace as if you were there now.

Distinctive Features

 

As you walk through your palace, start form the beginning this may be a front door or garden gate and notice all the details of your palace, if you can see a door notice the color of the door, be aware if the paint is peeling off or just been newly coated, whatever the details are become aware of them all now.

As you walk through your palace, in each room follow the same routine looking from left to right or right to left, as you visualize the room, be aware of any new taste or smells, make a mental note of anything that sticks out, anything that grabs your attention.

If you struggle to remember parts of your palace either pick a new palace or physically go to your palace and walk through it for real.

Continue to walk through your palace until you can easily remember all the details of every room.

Association

Take the list of items you want to remember and again visualize your memory palace from the beginning, we will call all the memory palace features that stuck out as a memory peg.

Using a “memory peg” (a feature from your memory palace; example door, picture etc) combine it with the element you want to memorize; make this as crazy and unusual as possible, as our mind will quickly remember the unusual.  

For each item you want to remember try to give it a visual reference, a sound, a taste, a smell and a feeling (internal or external)  

As an example, if a Personal Assistant wanted to remember a list of tasks you need to complete for your manager and your memory palace is your own house, you may start by being stood outside your front door.

As you look at your door a giant letter E comes through the letter box, getting bigger and bigger made out of the material you get in a car airbag. As it get so big it touches your face, feel the material on your face and smell the plastic smell and then the giant E quickly deflates like a large balloon making a trumping type sound. This represents your first task, checking your E-mails.

As you walk inside your palace past your front door, the next thing you see is your lamb on a table, the lamp is turned on and sizzling on top of the lamp light build is a piece of bacon, as you breath in you can smell that lovely bacon smell. Tasting the bacon in your mouth, which will remind you of your second task collecting your manager’s breakfast.

You can use anything in your memory palace that will associate your task, as a second example I may have walked past the door and seen a dancing pig wearing a muffin jacket to remind me of getting my mangers breakfast, like we said the weirder the better.

By associating these weird images to a place and items you know well, your front door, your table and lamp you can walk through your memory palace recording large amounts of information.

Visit Your Palace

Repeat the journey a couple of times (especially if your new to this technique), starting from the same point each time, paying attention to all your memory pegs. Once you have finished, re-walk the route starting from the end (your last memory peg) and walking all the way back through your palace until you end at the beginning, seeing your visual images in reversed order.

This technique takes a little bit of practice and for all you NLP-ers who follow this blog you are associating your items using VAKOG

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Motivating Your Team with The GROW Model

Having the skills to motivate your team is not as easy as many new mangers think it will be. Do you find that you can easily motivate some employees and not others, even when you are using the same approach? Why is that? Because we all have different personality types and while two people’s personalities may work well together, other personalities will not, it often down to how the individual filters the information you give them.

If you had a motivational tool that worked with all staff members, how would you implement this technique in your place of work? Today’s article will teach you how to use the GROW model (a coaching technique) to motivate your team.

GROW – Goal, Reality, Options and Will

The GROW model is a set of coaching questions to help your team achieve their goals, by asking a set of questions to move your teams thinking into a positive direction you can start to motivate your team and improve their performance.

First, you need to agree a Goal and Outcome with your team. What is your team goal? You can ask this question to your team; make the goal specific, measurable and realistic. You have to believe in your goal if you want your employees to believe in it, also be consistent don’t have a goal that conflicts with another company goal or you will lose motivation in an instant. 

Under each GROW heading you will find an explanation for the section and a list of potential questions you can use/ask to help your team achieve their goals. Each question is designed to move your employee’s way of thinking to a solution focus outcome.

Questions can be asked to a team or on an individual basis. You do not need to use all questions, rather use the questions as a reference or pick and choice questions that suit your goal or job sector.  

Goal Questions:

The Goal – what do I/We want to achieve? Keep this as simple as possible! The goal questions will support your team to understand the goal and when it will be achieved.  

  • What is the aim of this discussion?
  • What is the long term goal?
  • What is the short term goal?
  • Who is it for? Who are your end customers?
  • What do they really want? What is the benefit for your customers and you? What would make your customers/managers happy?
  • What do you need to deliver so your customer/line managers get what they want?
  • How long might it take to deliver? Is this feasible?
  • What would you consider as a milestone?
  • If everything went as well as possible, what would be the best possible outcome?
  • What does success look like to you?
  • How will you know that you have achieved your goal?
  • What is your budget? Is this feasible?
  • What will you look for when you deliver it? What would make the team unhappy? What would motivate them?
  • How will you measure your goal?
  • How can your passed experience help you achieve this goal?
  • What can you personally do to achieve your goal?
  • How much control does each of the team members have over the goal?

 

Reality Questions:

 

To achieve your goal you need to understand the Reality of your team’s current situation, skills, time constraints, attitudes, process and how far or near you are to achieving your goal.

  • What is happening now? – Who, what, where, how and when?
  • What is the effect or result of that?
  • How busy are you?
  • When things aren’t going well, who else can be brought in?
  • What is the current situation like?
  • Who is involved? What are they like? What can they add?
  • What’s working and not working?
  • Do you have enough time to achieve your gaol?
  • What is missing?
  • What is holding you back?
  • What can get you started?
  • What keeps you awake at night?
  • How easy is it to get things done?
  • How often have you tried?
  • Who is involved?
  • What is your part in the team?
  • What has already been started?

 

Option Questions:

First look at the overall big picture and the break this down in to smaller details, in NLP we call this chunking down. Remember that all your team members are all different and have different experiences and knowledge, this experience and knowledge will open new possibilities and options.

  • What are the two main options?
  • What else could you do?
  • What other options do you have?
    What if all constraints were removed?
  • What are the benefits and negatives of each option?
  • What factors will you use to weigh up the options?
  • If you had more time, what would you do?
  • If money was not an issue, what resources would you have?
  • If you had complete power what would you try?
  • How could you go about doing this?
  • How else could you go about doing it?
  • What could go wrong with that approach?
  • What would work well?
  • How long would it take to achieve each option?
  • What resource and expenditure would be needed?
  • What are the risks in each option?
  • What criteria will you use to select the main option?
  • What should you do first, next, last?
  • What are the cost and benefits of each of these ideas?
  • If you had more confidence, what would you try?
  • What could you sue as a back up plan?

 

Will Questions:

Once the team understands and believes in the goal and can see that this goal is achievable and realistic, they will have chosen their options and in most cases made a backup plan, your team will be ready to start moving towards their goal. The Will questions are designed to get the team thinking about starting their task.

  • So what will you do now?
  • What options will you choice?
  • To what extent does this meet all of your objectives?
  • What will you start first?
  • When will start (each step)?
  • What could stop you moving forward?
  • And how will you overcome it?
  • Will this address your goal?
  • How likely is this option to succeed?
  • What else will you do?
  • When will you know you are ready for this? How does it light your fire?
  • What will light your fire?
  • Is there anything stopping you from committing whole-heartedly to this?
  • Who else needs to buy in to it?
  • Who needs to know about the goal or action plan?
  • What needs to happen to make people enthusiastic?
  • What rewards for completion would help?
  • What additional help do you need?
  • What could I do to support you?
  • What can get you real excited about starting this project?
  • Is there anything thing else you need to before we start?

 

From a mangers point of view, you will agree that a list of questions does not always create the desired outcome, plan your questions in-advance and add them in the form of a discussion. You would have already noticed that none of the questions can be answered with a “yes” or “no” answer, the question are designed to form a discussion with your team.

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10 Goal Setting Questions

Do you have a goal or a dream that often pops up, making you feel excited, that same sort of feeling you got when you were a child heading out on holiday – a little buzzy feeling, starting in your stomach and rushing through your body like a rush of electricity. And then just as quick your dream or goal fades away, disappearing into the far distance, is the why you never achieve your goals? Is this why you never even start to work towards your dreams, the same reason why you’re in the same place now as you were in a few years ago.

You already know a Life Coach can help you achieve your goals, challenging your personal beliefs about yourself and helping you move forward step by step. To help get you started, read and answer these 10 Goal Setting Questions; read each question one by one, once you have read the question, empty your mind of all thoughts, like having a blank cinema screen in your mind. This way your unconscious mind will search for your answers and you will start them appear, in most cases on the blank screen.

  • If you decided to live your life to the full, knowing you could not fail, what would be the first change you would make?
  • What is the one thing you would start working on today that will make a big difference in your life?
  • If you had a list of 5 things in your life that you wanted to do more off, what would they be?
  • What’s the one thing you would love to do/achieve before you die?
  • What do you really love about your life and how can you make time do this thing more? – What would you sacrifice to achieve your goal?
  • If you were 92 years old, and this older you could give the you now some advice, what one piece of advice what would it be?
  • How do you know you are committed to achieving your goal?
  • If you wrote your goal down on a card to commit to achieving that goal, who would you give it to with purpose of them checking by a certain date, that you have started to move towards your goal?
  • By what date do you want to achieve your goal? – be specific.
  • What would change once you achieved your goal? – What would be the biggest difference in your life?
  • Finally one extra question; What day will you commit to, to start to achieve your goal?

 

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Why Managers should never ask “Why?”

Many managers, supervisors and employees will tell you they are great communicators, you will often see “communication skills” on a persons CV as part of their personal profile and/or skills section.

To be a “great communicator” you will first need to understand the power of “words” and “questions,” you will find many articles on this blog that will help you improve your communication skill’s, to understand language patterns and influencing techniques,  today you will learn about the importance of the question “Why”                                   

Why you should never ask “why?”                             

 Why is the why question so important? This is a good question and this article will explain all you need to know, first I would like to add that in some circumstances the “why” question can be very powerful, but today we look at the reasons, why Mangers should not use the “why” question with employees.

Why, oh Why, oh Why                                                       

Have you ever been asked “why didn’t you meet your targets?” “why is your team under-performing?” “why is that customer storming out?” when asked a Why question, is your first reaction is to feel Accused?

When asked a Why question, you will feel accused and automatically reply in a defensive way and as a manger you now know that your employees will also respond to why questions in the same way.

Why do people respond this way? You may ask a why question not meaning to accuse the employee, just wanting to understand more about the “subject.”As the why question automatically starts a defensive response, your employees will answer trying to justify their actions, often as the employee feels angry and defensive, they will unconsciously show these negative feelings as they communicate to you.

Many mangers will respond to this negative response (remember in many cases the manager was not originally accusing anyone of anything) with their own negative response to the employee “I don’t want to hear excuses..” this can go backwards and forwards, getting quickly out of hand, de-motivating your workforce.

Why Consistency?                                                        

I recently read a scientific book on persuasions skills; the book explained how people like to be consistent. As a manger finds themselves in the battle of the why question, trying to breakdown the reason the employee“didn’t meet their targets” “team is under-performing” “customer is storming out?” the employee will want to stay consistent with their first negative response and will often bring the conversation (or argument) back to this subject.

 Why do you do the things you do?                                  

We do a thousands task each day, why do you do them? The truth is we don’t always have a reason for everything we do; often people work an automatic pilot.

When you ask an employee “why” they did something, they often won’t know why, as their automatic pilot was in play. An employee when asked why will look for an answer and may not be able to find it, in some cases the employee’s subconscious will create a reason, why they might have done what they did.

Why the Cause, why not the solution?                                      

When asked a question the mind will look for answers, when asked why? The mind will look for the cause not the solution

  • “I never get any support”                                          
  • “The targets are not realistic”                                    
  • “The customer was never interested from the beginning”          

What if you could use questions that change your employees mind from looking for the cause to look for the solution? Would this help you and your team to communicate in a more productive way? Would a solution focused question help you move forward? Would looking at solutions instead of problems, put your employee in a more productive and positive mood?

Let’s re-look at the original Why questions – how could you re-word these question to direct your employees mind to be more focused on the solutions?

  • “Why didn’t you meet your targets?”
  • “Why is your team under-performing?”
  • “Why is that customer storming out?”

I agree in some cases the “problem” needs to be addressed, but as a manager would you prefer to be able to communicate with your employees in a way that motivates them to achieve your outcome? In this way you can look at the problem as an area of development.

  • “What can you do different next week to help you achieve your targets?”
  • “How can you manage your team differently to ensure they perform well?”
  • “If you could re-wind the tape, and handle the situation with the customer differently, what would you do to ensure the customer left with a smile?”

As you can see by re-wording the Why question you can gain a better response from the employee, we all work better when our emotions are in a positive place. With the second question, I have added a presumption, “how can you mange your team differently..” the mind will automatically presume you can manage your team differently. Compare this to an alternative question “can you manage your team differently?” Now you have a choice and you may choose to say “no” – you can already start to understand the power of words, how can you use this new knowledge to improve your Management Skills.

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Life Coaching in Manchester

Benefits of Life Coaching

Employment King use a mixture of NLP Techniques, Hypnotherapy, Coaching and Guidance questioning to help you move forward in all area’s of your life by focusing on what you truly want to achieve

 
   Past clients goals include:    Employment King specialise in:
  • Achieving a work/life balance
  • A change in Career Direction
  • Starting up your own business
  • To Improve your relationships
  • Making better decisions
  • Quicker personal development
  • Increase in confidence
  • Maximum motivation
  • Building Confidence
  • Reducing Negative Self Talk & Lack of Self Belief
  • Increasing Motivation
  • Phobia Removal
  • Self Esteem Boosting

Our coaches are trained and qualified in NLP, Coaching, Hypnotherapy and Information Advice & Guidance; these techniques help our life coaches understand your situation and needs, empowering us to help you move forward quickly into a positive future.

Life coach sessions are a journey, which starts once you realise that you want to make a change. One of our life coaches will act as your guide on this journey making the path along the way fun, rewarding and most importantly ensuring that you reach your intended destination.

Life Coaching in Manchester

Do you need to make a change? Do you want a different direction in life? Do you want to achieve your goals? Then you will want a life coach because a Life Coach can make your changes happen quickly.

We offer face to face Life Coaching session in Manchester City Centre, if you are not living your dream, then a Life Coach can help.

The questions used in life coaching help you look at your situation from different angles, the questions will allow you to explore your metaphors finding the answers you already had stored away in your subconscious mind.

What To Do Next?

Many people like to coach themselves using Employment King’s Online Coaching Course a 12 week e-coaching course with over 36 activities including videos, audios and presentations. If you want a Life Coach to support you, you can choose:

Online Coaching Course £59.99

Click This Link NOW for more details. The online coaching course is a 12 week course for confidence and motivation with over 36 sessions including videos, e-books and audios.

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How to be Successful

Learn from historic successes

Just One Chance

Many people come to me saying they just need one chance to be successful or I just need one chance to be a millionaire.

Day in day out this can be seen on Reality TV shows like The X Factor “This is my only chance” “This is my last chance” “I will only have this one chance”

Really? Why, what are you doing tomorrow?

This idea that if they catch that one chance or that lucky break that they will be able to succeed. This can be a limiting belief as trial and error is devalued as part of the route necessary to succeed.

How Others Become Successful.

Many successful people make mistakes, get things wrong and may face their lowest ebb before they reach the height of their potential. If you only have one chance and you get it wrong, you will extinguish the flame of your dream. Successful people don’t see mistakes as a failure, but as a learning point.

3 Case Studies for Business Success:

Henry J. Heinz

 Started working when he was 9 years old and became the founder of the famous brand “Heinz”.

From an early age, Henry helped his mother sell vegetables from their back garden and generated new custom by knocking on neighbour’s doors to offer a selection of vegetables from his wheelbarrow.

By the age of 17, Henry was earning £2,400 annually – a handsome salary for a worker in the early 1900’s.

In 1869, Heinz founded the Heinz Noble & Company with L.C. Noble, selling – horseradish.  After almost a century of relative success the company faced ruin and Mr Heinz declared himself bankrupt in 1975.

By learning from his mistakes Henry along with his family was able to take the company in a different direction, established under the new name of H&J Heinz.

By continuing to strive for success and being innovative in his approach Heinz was able to create Tomato Ketchup, 12 million bottles of which are sold throughout the world each year.

Walt Disney

 One of the most famous names worldwide – Disney was multi-talented as a  film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, entertainer, international icon.

How did it all start? After WW1 Disney set up a Company with cartoonist friend Ubbe Iwwerks which collapsed as quickly as it had begun.

Following this in 1922 Disney gave it another shot and formed ‘Laugh-O-Gram Films’ which was also declared bankrupt before Disney had a chance to finish the company’s production of “Alice in Wonderland”.

Undeterred Disney made his way to Hollywood to find success as a film director however this also failed to work out for Disney.

Finally Disney decided to seek support from those closer to home as he asked his brother to finance the costs of setting up a studio, this became The Disney Brother Studio.

The studio grew and Disney hired more staff with the success of the production of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit’s. Disney then continued to enjoy this success as he created Steamboat Willy and the character Mickey Mouse.  Disney was finally able to realise his dream as he started to make full length animated films.

Tom Cruise

 Tom grew up in a poor family, the family constantly travelled as Tom’s dad chased employment across the USA. Tom has Dyslexia and due to travelling with his family never spent much time in school.

When attending school Tom would be placed in remedial classes and was not an academic success.

Tom found that he was good at athletics and started to compete in many sports, but a knee injury quickly put an end to any dreams of becoming a professional athlete.

Raised in religious family Tom considered priesthood, after a year in a Franciscan Monastery Tom felt priesthood was not for him and that he should continue to search for what was right for him.

Tom’s mother encouraged and supported Tom to pursue a career in acting, with Tom’s passion and drive a successful acting career quickly followed as he has reached worldwide recognition and notoriety for his acting abilities and achievements.

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10 Ways to Stay Motivated at Work

Workplace Motivation

We have all been there on a Monday morning, you walk into work. No matter how many deadlines you have, you’re just not motivated to work – the Monday morning blues! How do you quickly become motivated?

Employment king have put together 10 quick tips to get you and keep you motivated at work. I use these techniques with my clients, when you first read some of the techniques, like my clients you may feel they sound silly, but once you try them you will soon see quick results.

Mind Magic

This is an NLP technique, if you have not come across NLP before, read the technique first before trying it.

1. You’re generally un-motivated because when you’re thinking of your working day most people, think about a time at work when you were bored or hating the job you are doing. This is generally a colour picture in your mind, often this picture is big and bright a plays out like a movie would. This image or film you generate makes you feel un-motivation, as our mind and emotions work as one. To get rid of these negative feelings (the Monday morning blues) In your mind, freeze the film/image, put a frame around the image and then move the image away from you, push really far back in your minds eye, making it smaller and smaller until the picture becomes a dot – how do you feel now? Has your un-motivated feeling gone? If you can still see the picture (and your feeling unmotivated) push the image further away, make it blurry or cover it in a mist – have the negative feelings gone? In most cases they have, if not repeat the exercise.

2. Now, in your mind, imagine yourself at work enjoying yourself, see yourself at your best, getting your work done, enjoying the duties your undertaking. Make this picture big, bring the picture close and make all the colours in the picture stronger and brighter. Imagine the picture the size of a cinema screen, press play and turn this image into a film, if you can, step into this film and watch the scene unfold from the eyes of the ‘you’ in the film. How do you feel? Good? Positive? Where does this good and positive feeling start in your body? In your stomach? In Your mind? Make the feeling stronger, imagine the feeling as a colour, what colour is it? Make it brighter. Describe this feeling and notice the feeling flowing through the whole of your body, notice the speed and direction the feeling has taken, notice the temperature of this positive feeling and make it stronger, double it! How do you feel now? Most people start to feel positive after this exercise, if you don’t try it again.

Set Goals – we like something to aim for

3. Set yourself some daily goals write them down and think about what you as a person will get out of achieving these goals? Use these goals to help you plan your day, we all work best when we have to archive something positive. Record why you want this goal, to get away from something? Boredom? Etc, or to gain something? Promotion? Etc. When planning your day add in a time(s) to stop and have a break.

 4. If you are working a big project and you’re starting to feel overwhelmed, break the project down in to realistic chunks. If your working with others, ensure everyone is clear on what they have to do and what the others are doing to meet the project completion date.

5. If you can’t do something, get help, many people stress about not being able to complete a task and feel they will look daft asking others for help. Most people are only too happy to help a colleague.

6. Have something to look forward to at night or at the weekend, if all your going to do is go home and wash the pots, you will start to feel negative, on the other hand, if you have a fun activity to do at night you will start feeling excited, this will put you into a good mood.

Exercise – a healthy body a healthy mind

7. Exercise is a great way to add to your motivation, exercise makes you feel healthy and feeling healthy makes you feel good. Exercise before work; go for a swim or run. Other people enjoy exercising after work and often say the exercise gives them a much needed boost after a hard days work.

8. Drink lots of water, always have a bottle of water near your desk. Our body needs to take in high amounts of water each day; drinking water has been proven to increase brain activity.

Extra – a little extra goes a long way

9. Use an image board; why do you work? Is it the money, looking for promotion, enjoy helping others – what ever your reason is for working (if it’s money, what will the money get you-holidays etc) put pictures of you doing this activity, buying the goods, being happy on a large notice bored, you can draw, paint, cut out pictures, put pictures of your head on top of a models – be creative like you would when you was in nursery school and fill a big A1 bored with all these fun images of you being at your best. Put this bored somewhere you will be able to see it everyday; on the back of your bedroom door, this is a great way for your unconscious mind to keep you motivated.

10. When you do something wrong at work, write it down and then circle it. Mind map all the things you have learnt from this mistake and what you can do to improve for the next time you have to complete the same task. Our mind enjoys learning and successful people throughout the world always see mistakes and an opportunity to learn and improve – what a great re-frame.

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How to Influence People at Work

Build Rapport

People like people who are like them.

Everyone has something in common with another person, the key is to find out what this is and use it as an icebreaker. Spend a little time each day asking people about their children, partners, holidays etc.

This shows that you are interested in the person not just their value in the workplace. Remember, we like to say yes to people we like. Listen intently when others are talking, reassuring through positive body language, nodding and reassuring that you are interested.

Don’t interrupt and always ask questions, this indicates that you are interested, if they feel safe and they like you they will keep on saying yes. Mirroring body language can be equalising – When talking to someone who is sat down you should also sit. By sitting down (or standing up if required!) you ensure your eye line is level with the other person. You are establishing yourself as an equal rather than an aggressive or submissive individual.

Respected or Popular?

One of the most critical mistakes colleagues make at work is the pursuit of popularity rather than respect.

Most of us are concerned with how others see us and can dwell on this, when respect rather than popularity will make you more influential. During a meeting if part of your agenda is to retain popularity this will reflect in your body language and you may appear submissive.

The top of your agenda should be to concentrate on getting your point across. Don’t guess answers or say yes if you don’t agree, give your opinion and back this up with evidence; you can do this with a smile, in a calm voice while being relaxed, this helps when your opinion differs from that of the person(s) your talking to.

Demonstrate creativity and leadership, this will highlight your knowledge and show that you are not just following others.

What would you like to achieve?

We follow authority and experts, share with people your expertise on the topic/discussion, don’t be embarrassed people wont know about your strengths and experiences until you tell them.

State what you want to achieve straight away, don’t try to cover what you want to say in cotton balls, don’t add pleasantries “I hope you don’t mind” etc as this can sometime make the message less clear then we want it to be. You want others to see the benefits and possibilities of your ideas.

Be truthful, if something has not worked tell them and back this up with your strongest suggestion, this will show you as knowledgeable and honest. Your message has to be constant throughout, to increase people following through on your ideas get them to write it down, people tend to live up to what they have written and signed.

Can you listen?

We all have two ears and one mouth, so we should listen twice as much as we talk. As well as listening to what people are saying, you need to hear what is not being said. By listening to others you can easily find out what motivates them and what de-motivates individuals.

If you help others, others will help you.

Help your colleagues with work, getting others a sandwich while your getting your dinner, hold open doors. If you help people, then they will feel more compelled to help you. When presenting ideas and suggestions to others, explained to them “what they will get out of it” not just what you and/or the company will gain.

When you are thanked Don’t undermine your powerful position by saying something like, “Oh, it was nothing; I do that all the time” Say “I was glad to do it, I know you would do the same for me”

Timing is Everything.

Plan your timing, if someone is busy or has other things on their mind they will not take in what you are saying, in many situations you need to ensure your first conversation/presentation convinces them as you may not get a second chance.

Looking for Fame?

Often people look for the fame and glory of giving an idea, you have come up with a positive suggestion that can help others and/or the company move forward.

If you want to take the fame for this idea, often you will not listen or take on board other people’s suggestions that may improve your original idea. Step back, become emotionally dissociated and critically evaluate all ideas including your own. You do not have to be popular to influence others.

Show the way.

Explain what people will gain and also what they will lose, people are motivated either towards something (a positive) or away from something (a negative)

Make your suggestion/time scarce as people hate to miss out an opportunity, tell them they can only succeed if they follow your direction, as you are the expert.

Show people the way, prompt them and let them work it out for themselves. Never be to forceful as this will only work for a small period of time until people start to resent you. People like to feel they have contributed to what they are doing.

People are followers, once you have people on board with other.