Influence Is Your Superpower: The Science of Winning Hearts, Sparking Change, and Making Good Things Happen

The same skills that make a good marketer can help make a positive changemaker, argues Yale School of Business professor Chance in her encouraging debut. Influence, or having “the ability to create change, direct resources, and move hearts and minds,” she posits, “is our human advantage” and one that people are born with; here, she suggests ways of using it for good. Her early experience in telephone sales and later career as a marketer taught her to roll with rejection and revealed to her just how much developing charisma and deep listening skills can help convince people to change their minds. To that end, she describes such techniques as maneuvering around a target’s “gator brain”—the tendency to focus only on immediate risk—and employing the “kindly brontosaurus” strategy, a means of gentle persuasion that refuses “no” for an answer. Chance’s peppy delivery and ideas on how to frame a proposal make her methods feel doable, and she covers a wide range of scenarios, from women standing up for themselves to political candidates looking to pick up votes. This is worth a look for anyone who cringes at the prospect of a cold call. (Feb.)