One of the questions someone asked me to cover in my blog was, “how to make people listen and act as the manager wants”.
Well this has the potential to be the shortest post I have written, because in essence – you can’t.
You can’t really make people do anything they don’t want to.
As a leader or manager, if you want someone to do something, especially where they have a choice, then you have to focus on making them want to do it.
When it come’s to making people listen to you, I think the onus here really lies with the speaker, if you want people to listen – tell them something interesting, and usually that means telling them what’s in it for them, or make what you are telling them interesting.
When it comes to making them want to do something, this is really about inspiring them and motivating them. Explaining why what they need to do is important, what’s in it for them, what the benefit is. This could also be just a question of courtesy and politeness, personally I always try and ask people to do them, I try to refrain from telling them and this usually has a much better possibility of success.
I would also say that anyone looking to get into leadership in order to make people listen and act the way you want is doing it for the wrong reasons.
This sounds more like a search for power and control. Admittedly, you wouldn’t be the first person to seek a leadership position for such reasons.
My advice would be quit trying to control people, and look to work with them and have them work with you, rather than for you.
Gordon Tredgold
www.leadership-principles.com
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