Must Have Resource: Influencer: The New Science of Leading Change

I don’t know if you caught Joseph Grenny’s session at Willow Creek’s Global Leadership Summit…but his book Influencer: The New Science of Leading Change ought to move straight to the top of your reading list.

I was intrigued during Grenny’s talk.  I downloaded the audio and listened to the session again right after the Summit.  Captivated by the idea that something in the research could help our work in connecting unconnected people…I downloaded the book.  And I was not disappointed!  Influencer is a gold mine!

I love this line from chapter one:

“At the end of the day, what qualifies people to be called ‘leaders’ is their capacity to influence others to change their behavior in order to achieve important results (p. 6).”

I don’t know about you, but I have a non-stop desire to figure out even better ways to influence people to get connected, to step into leadership, to become a disciple and to disciple others.  What if the learnings of this team of social scientists could help me do that?

Influencer consists of two parts.  The first part of the book focuses on the three keys that all successful influencers adhere to and that we can use for our benefit:

• Focus and measure develops clarity about the result we seek.
• Find vital behaviors helps identify high leverage behaviors that drive results.
• Engage all six sources of influence to overdetermine change.

The second part of the book focuses on the six sources of influence.  Packed with real life examples and full of very practical application, Influencer is both an easy read and a book that is going to end up having a huge impact on the design of our strategies.  The very first source of influence provides a great example:

Personal motivation answers the question: “Is the vital behavior intrinsically pleasurable or painful?”  Further, “can you help others want to do something they currently don’t want to do?  Is it possible to help others learn to love what they presently hate?”

When I read this set-up, I couldn’t put the book down.  This was a section that had me from the first line.  The best part about this chapter (and the other five) was it included of very practical principles, applications and takeaways that are sure to end up in what we do.  The “act like an influencer” segments along with the summary makes this a very practical book.

Most of the books and resources I review here are clearly ministry related.  I’m so excited about the potential of Influencer because it promises to help rearrange what’s possible as we work to connect people.  I’m sure I’ll be writing more about what we’re learning.  In the meantime, you might want to pick up your copy of Influencer: The New Science of Leading Change.