CHAPTER 1

Claiming Your Own Sense of Influence

Have you ever tried hypnosis?

As a Type-A, extroverted Gemini, I’ve always been a hypnotherapist’s “problem child.” I have trouble sitting still, tend to keep one eye slightly opened, overthink what’s happening, and fear losing control (will I end up onstage barking like a dog or something?), so I typically resist.

But recently I tried hypnosis at the suggestion of a career coach and found I liked it. I realized that you maintain a lot of awareness and control under hypnosis, as you’re just being guided deep into the subconscious to where the creepy crawlers (thoughts, fears, hopes, trauma, and dreams) live. And, if you trust the person guiding you, you feel safe.

During a recent session, I was guided to find a place I think of as peaceful and relaxing: the beach. Since I grew up by the beach in Southern California, it’s familiar to me and the undulance of the waves is comforting.

Next, I was instructed to surround myself with people or beings who will protect, guide, and serve me in different ways. I chose God, my husband, and my father. I figure with them by my side, I can be completely myself.

The process then encouraged me to explore the sense of self I attain with this calm, clarity, and safety. What’s possible? What’s not right for me? Where should I be focusing my efforts? Where are the guardrails that will keep me intentional, confident, and safe? What’s my truest voice in this powerful, calm, present state?

That last one is a doozy: What’s my truest voice?

I’ve been a writer for as long as I can remember. I’ve written poems in high school; short stories in college (I even minored in English); and articles, books, blogs, and whatever else I could pen in my professional life. Surely I knew my voice, right? But is that my truest voice?

Even this book is a challenge for me. When my amazing editor turned me loose to start writing, he gave me this encouraging—and terrifying—guidance: “Write from your heart. Don’t write an academic or business book. Write the book you know the world needs now. From you.”

Yikes!

Finding our voice isn’t accomplished through one hypnosis session, a group hug, or an encouraging thumbs-up from a parent or teacher. It can take years of work to peel back the stories, tapes, limitations, stereotypes, and beliefs others have imposed on us. But doing so is crucial to being able to influence others. How can you help others be who they can be if you don’t have clarity on yourself?

Finding Your True Voice

If you’re reading this and thinking, I know who I am. I know my voice. I just need to know the steps to tell others, then you may be sorely disappointed by what comes next: you’re likely not as self-aware as you think. You may assume you’re self-aware because you check in with yourself, journal daily, see a therapist, follow fifteen self-help blogs online, and share your feelings openly and freely . . . but that assumption is likely flawed.

Your true voice is something more rare, special, and confident than you may have explored previously.

Start by reframing your self-assessment and sense of voice. Ask yourself what your voice sounds like to someone else. If you were to mimic yourself, how would that sound? If your voice were silenced, who would notice and who would fill the void?

Did you have quick answers to those questions? I didn’t think so. Most of us don’t.

What’s your truest voice?

Maybe you do have all the answers. Maybe you are the smartest person in the room and the one everyone goes to for guidance. There’s still more. There’s still a bit left on the rim of the dish that you haven’t tasted yet. Strive to find that. Stay curious to what’s possible, and resist the temptation to solve for what seems abstract or to judge what you read. Your open-mindedness will serve you well here as you deploy your influence!

Even as I write this book, leaning in (uncomfortably at times) to my editor’s advice and sharing my thoughts, ideas, and recommendations, I worry about how you’ll judge me and my true voice. I believe there may be concepts or thoughts in this book you’ll disagree with. Did you writhe at the mention of Donald Trump or Greta Thunberg or Mark Zuckerberg? Maybe you don’t agree that these Rules are vital to having influence and have found alternative shortcuts. Perhaps you question my motives. Being vulnerable is scary stuff, I get it! But I still write, speak about what I know and believe, and trust that you’ll accept me and my vision for what it is: a tool to help you live the most fulfilled, authentic, and impactful life you’re capable of.

Your truest voice is often what you hear when you clear your mind of all the noise and worries and fears of judgment and consequences. It’s what you discuss with your psyche as you’re trying to fall asleep, wondering how you could have expressed yourself differently had you been more real. When you can speak from your heart and your head—about what you believe to be true and what you know is real and important—you find your true voice. You may even get excited about sharing the you that’s become unleashed: you’ll start to feel more at ease in your skin, confident in your delivery and message, less worried about how you’ll be perceived and received, and more concerned about the impact and trust you’re building with the people whose lives you’re passionate about influencing.

As you move through the process of sharing your vision with the world, check your own assumptions along the way. What do you believe is true about your reader or audience or boss? Are you coming into conversations hot and defensive, or open-minded and receptive?

This is a struggle for a client I was hired to coach to greater levels of influence in his company. He’s been so conditioned to be defensive—from his upbringing and the early part of his career—that he assumes others want to find fault with his thesis or reject him without considering his views. As a result, his senior leaders tell me, every discussion with him—from the mundane to the serious—feels like a battle. Even when he realizes they’re all in the room just to touch base, it takes him a long time to trust that the other shoe isn’t about to drop, keeping him in attack mode. “Is this his authentic, true voice?” they ask me.

After conversing and exploring the tools shared here with him, we find that there are ways to reframe his personal narrative (what he tells himself) about his deep need to feel he must protect himself. As I encourage him to do more questioning and listening at the outset of these conversations, the walls slowly start to come down.

Challenge your assumptions, then commit to and hold yourself accountable for continual growth, self-improvement, open-mindedness, and love. With new framing, you’ll see more color, pattern, and texture in daily interactions and feel more acceptance, security, and warmth. And your message will be crafted to be the right one at the right time for the right audience.

To claim your voice, identity, and influence style, consider:

• ▸ When do you feel most peaceful, calm, and confident in discussing your ideas and vision?
• ▸ Who are your champions—the people who’ll follow you, hold you accountable, and advance your vision?
• ▸ When do you feel the most angst or uncertainty positioning yourself, speaking up for your beliefs, or standing firm in your convictions?
• ▸ If you were your most real, true self, what would you sound like? How would you hold your body? Who would you surround yourself with?

Your voice, like your DNA, is uniquely yours. All you. Sure, the tapes and messages of our parents, friends, boss, community, and culture shape how our voice projects, but what you feel in your heart, in your head, and in your gut—and how you share that with others—is all you.

Should You Influence Others?

By now you’re likely feeling excited about claiming your voice and being someone who can influence others. But just because you can, does it mean you should?

Amy’s story rings true here. Amy had an impressive career for her young age, and her mentor, parents, and advisers encouraged her to go out on her own. Everyone around her recommended she run her own company as the one true way to capitalize on all she was capable of and have maximum influence over her market and career.

But Amy faced a challenge: she wasn’t sure she wanted to be an entrepreneur. She wondered if there was another way to make a difference and asked me to help her sort it out.

We cataloged her skills. First, she was great at sculpting a business need or idea. She could, as she described it, “see around corners” and sense where a trend was headed. Working for various startups and private equity (PE) firms, she’d leveraged this talent to make other people a lot of money. She’d been brought into these firms early in their development and shored up the areas of the business where her strong opinions would be leveraged. Then, when the business right-sized or started to take off, she’d cash out and get recruited away. The PE firms loved her diverse background—from software (think early days of AI) to consumer goods to medical devices, she had a gift for growing opportunity.

Why wouldn’t she do it on her own? Some suggested she could be an independent “hired gun” for companies or their investors, and she could swoop in and out of these emerging companies under the cloak of night, cashing her checks along the way.

“I just don’t feel that having my own business would be fulfilling,” she shared. She worried that such a high focus on transaction could take away the part she loved the most—seeing the idea, knowing who it would serve or benefit, and then bringing it to life. Yes, the money was great. But when she shared with me that she was using a lot of what she’d earned to fund her personal project— helping to end food deserts in the neighborhood she grew up in—the disconnect emerged: just because she could didn’t mean she should. And just because she should (according to her advisers) didn’t mean she would.

You must want to have influence. All the self-help books, well-intentioned advice from loved ones, and professional development tools in the world won’t get you to take that step off the diving board and into the water if it’s not in your heart to do so. That must come from you. You must feel, unequivocally and unapologetically, that you have a moral and personal obligation to do what you’re meant to do, to be the person you’re crafted to be, and serve in the way you’re meant to serve. Then, and only then, should you raise your hand in the meeting, start a nonprofit, quit your job, or march in the streets. You’ll need that kind of conviction and strength to do it.

Defining Influence

For those of you craving a bit of science talk here, the word influence originates from the Latin word influere, meaning to flow or stream into. Influence is, in fact and in practice, something we do, give, and teach so that others will do, give, and teach what we’ve shared. It’s a quality we carry and possess, refine and communicate, and build over time. Influence flows from us to others so that it will flow to others from them. Okay, enough science talk.

The classic definition of influence is to sway a person, action, opinion, or course. Having influence means driving—directly or indirectly—the way something plays out. Some people call it “affect,” and others refer to it as a force or quality that causes something to be or act in a way that might not have been originally intended. You can influence someone to think differently about an issue, choose a different toothpaste, or behave differently toward a population. Influence can lead us to follow someone that others follow (read: peer pressure) or resist calling out what seems blatantly obvious.

Some influence is situational—a doctor influences the patient’s decision about whether surgery is needed—and some is more evergreen. You could argue that Maya Angelou, Jamie Dimon (of JPMorgan Chase), Nelson Mandela, Elon Musk, Malcolm X, and Princess Diana have been people of influence. Except for Jamie Dimon, I doubt any of them owned a red tie.

Defining Terms

Let’s define some of the terms you’ll read about in this book:

A person of influence These people live the New Rules. Sure, they have bad days like the rest of us, but their ability to spread their beliefs and views such that others want to follow them makes them a rare breed. We look up to them and admire how they live. Even under the microscope of social media or traditional media scrutiny, their influence is upheld. We believe the world is a better place with them in it, want to buy what they put their name to, and will get behind them to drive change.

Having influence This is what most of us can and will achieve. We stand up for our teammates and others trust us. We tell the company hard news, and they forgive us. We share the truth with our spouse, and they love us anyway. We have influence at work, at home, with friends, and online. Over time, having influence becomes a more solid foundation from which to operate—we can have influence within one community and then leverage it to grow our influence in another. This happens when someone known for being a leader in the tech sector, for example, pivots to sustainable investing, and their clients and staff go along.

There are also different types of influence, which map elegantly to different forms of communication:

Persuasive influence As the name implies, here we use influence to convince someone of something. I want you to purchase this beachfront property, hire me, vote for me, or support my idea. I would use my persuasive skills to influence your buying decisions.

Demonstrative influence When I influence you by showing you how to do something or by demonstrating why one option is better than the other when you’re trying to make a decision, I’m using demonstrative influence. I’m taking the widget apart to show you how it’s constructed, thereby influencing your opinion or beliefs about its quality.

Inspiring influence This is the type of influence we love to see! This is Martin Luther King Jr. on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial talking about a better future, a world where we would all live in harmony. Evange-lists, politicians, CEOs, and even parents can deploy inspiring influence to help us drive out evil, to teach us right from wrong, and to make us eat vegetables when chocolate sounds so much better.

Informative influence Nuts-and-bolts influence, or informative influence, might seem less creative or inspiring, but it’s more practical. The doctor explains why the procedure is in your best interest, and you agree to proceed. In this case, you are being influenced toward a choice or view because the information and data support that direction.

Influence Doesn’t Come with Rank

Today, influence isn’t relegated to people of a certain job title, gender, age, lifestyle, skin color, religion, or culture. In the last fifteen years, my client base, for instance, went from mostly men in corporate executive positions in US-based companies to entrepreneurs, social change and human rights advocates, teachers, athletes, and writers around the world. Women, young industrialists, celebrated athletes, content creators, professionals on the autism spectrum, LGBTQ+ people, and individuals navigating life with a disability began to seek my help to grow their influence and impact in bigger and more meaningful ways.

Perhaps the reason you’ve picked up this book is because you wonder if you, too, could have significant influence. Maybe you’re wondering if now’s the time for you to assert your opinion, lean into that new idea, or launch that movement that’s been burning in your gut like gas station sushi. The need is there, the timing is right, and the ache is real—but are you the right person to champion this idea?

Influence emerges from all ranks and positions. While status and authority are often accompanied by title and position in the company or organization, that has all shifted, too. Today, people in all corners of the globe are resubscribing to their purpose and passion. I see junior accountants stand tall in company meetings and point out discrepancies in corporate philosophy (think “The Emperor’s New Clothes”). I witness female doctors lean into their voice, dispelling their cultural narratives of “silence is golden,” and assert their opinions in all-male board reviews. I see new entrepreneurs push back against their parents’ values and chart a personal and professional path that previously took the courage of a fifty-year-old with a healthy IRA to pursue.

Admittedly, this new system of influence building challenges the thinking of those who embraced the older models. As generations of professionals stay in their jobs longer, and those around them begin to assert themselves differently, they also need to shift their thinking. The old system of coercion and compliance is replaced by collaboration, and this rocks some boats.

Working with a client who has been the boss for thirty years and done things one way, but now has to focus on diversity of thought and be open to new ideas and feedback, sometimes feels like doing brain surgery. No longer can these clients bark out orders or instructions or advice and expect not to be challenged. They must stop telling and start asking. While the process is painful at times (for both of us), the result is astounding. To see someone make the shift from “boss” to “leader” is breathtaking! They learn to empower and embrace, to be empathetic and real, and to watch others succeed where they’ve failed. This new thinking helps institutionalize the need for the New Rules of building influence.

Can We Fake Influence?

Have you ever known a boss, a teacher, or a local politician who seems to present a canned message, who looks to the teleprompter on cue and shakes hands with just the right amount of enthusiasm to appear warm, but whom you wouldn’t trust for a New York minute? If we’re not paying close attention, we can mistake these people as having influence when we simply got influenced by them in the moment.

I see this play out on social media. Someone I follow, whose posts I enjoy, recommends a product—say, a shoe brand, mascara, or soda—and I feel compelled to buy it. Sometimes, without even thinking about it, I’ll reach for my credit card because, “if it’s good enough for her, it’s good enough for me!” And a transaction occurs. Affiliate and influencer marketing at its best!

Being able to entice a fan or follower to a purchase is having influence over that person, but it’s not exactly following the Rules as laid out in this book. It’s transactional. New Rules–type influence is lasting, deep, scalable, and empowering.

As we move through this process together, we’ll focus on all the ways you can genuinely show up as a person with influence to have influence when it matters. We’ll reject the belief that influence, or presence, is a one-size-fits-all set of prescribed tactics. We’re creating something bigger and more beautiful than any set of paint-by-numbers kit can produce. We’re building a vision that’s as unique and marvelous as you are!

I remember being asked to attend a job seeker workshop with a friend of mine who was between jobs. She didn’t want to go alone, so I was enlisted as her “plus one.” The only rule, she informed me, was that I was not allowed to speak up if I disagreed with the speaker (for fear of embarrassing my friend).

The presenter gave a thorough list of dos and don’ts for what to wear to a job interview to display power and confidence, as well as how to dress for success throughout your career. As she spoke, the audience frantically scribbled notes and made lists.

I struggled to maintain my promise to my friend, because the advice sounded like a 1950s book on how to be the ideal employee: “Limit your clothes to neutrals, like navy, white, tan, or ecru,” she mandated. At this instruction, someone shot up their hand: “What’s ecru? Is that like bone?” and so on. She offered these eager job seekers tips for how to not stand out (to avoid the risk of not fitting in), how to show their chameleon self, and how to be an attractive candidate the employer would view as moldable to their culture and company.

WTF?

Facing friendship suicide, I shot my hand up and asked, “But what if authentic to you is to wear bright colors and blue eye shadow and to express your personality with a sparkle or two?” The speaker replied, “Then you likely won’t get the job,” at which point my friend pretended not to know me.

“But is that such a bad thing?” I questioned. “If you had to work at a place that wanted ecru-clad workers, and you saw life in full color, would you be happy there?”

I was asked to meet my friend in the parking lot and not participate in the rest of the workshop.

How to Use the Rules

The New Rules are not meant to be an à la carte menu of options for you to pick and choose according to your comfort level. They work as a well-orchestrated symphony of perfected synchronized instruments that empower you to be the unique person you are, share the mission and vision you care deeply about, and confidently influence those around you to move in your same direction.

As you deploy the Rules, you may find some harder to unpack and try on than others. In the past, it may have been easier to focus on your wardrobe, messaging, and data than on your own true voice and being real. You may have seen others commit to inclusivity and rolled your eyes. Maybe you listened to someone share a great, confident, and consistent story and wondered where they got it from. Over time, however, you’ll focus less on what you’re wearing, how you’re standing, and who has the biggest title in the room, and more on how you can be all that you’re meant to be.