Million Dollar Influence: How to Drive Powerful Decisions Through Language, Leverage, and Leadership

Even senior people, business owners, and board members are unaware of the nuances of influence on a daily basis. They think in a straight line and try to ＂strike deals,＂ use hierarchical power, make ＂trade-offs,＂ or bargain as if at a flea market.

They unwittingly sacrifice vital needs to gain minor and temporary bright, shiny things. Influence is not about fast-talking, it’s about fast-thinking and carefully constructed language that one applies within a specific context. Influence is thought to be programmable--that is, it can create scarcity or consistency of positive responses. In reality, it’s about accountability, innovation, and leverage.

No pre-pandemic strategy is worth a cent in a post-pandemic world. There is no ＂new normal＂ or ＂return to normal.＂ There are only new realities. In this book, one of the boldest, most aggressive, most successful consultants in the world makes his predictions and provides recommendations that may frighten and stun, but ultimately can lead to market domination.

Million-dollar influencers understand that influence doesn’t mean kissing up to everyone. While we may all be equal as human beings, not everyone has a stake in the outcomes in the business of influence. Some will resist change for the sake of resisting change. They lack imagination or let fear hold them in place. Recognizing actual stakeholders will guide your positioning of stakes in the ground that will mark critical positions leading to your desired outcome.

Features

• How consensus building is something to live with, not something to die for
• The fundamental difference between accountability and authority
• The need for innovation and even improvisation in wielding influence
• The scientific and magical contrasts of language
• How to effectively maneuver within political environments
• How to rally the right stakeholders at the right time
• The powerful role of consequence

Alan Weiss is one of those rare people who can say he is a consultant, speaker, and author and mean it.

His consulting firm, Summit Consulting Group, Inc., has attracted clients such as Merck, Hewlett-Packard, GE, Mercedes-Benz, State Street Corporation, Times Mirror Group, The Federal Reserve, The New York Times Corporation, Toyota, and over 500 other leading organizations.

He has served on the boards of directors of the Trinity Repertory Company, a Tony-Award-winning New England regional theater, Festival Ballet, chaired the Newport International Film Festival, and been president of the board of directors of Festival Ballet Providence.

His speaking typically includes 20 keynotes a year at major conferences, and he has been a visiting faculty member at Case Western Reserve University, Boston College, Tufts, St. John’s, the University of Illinois, the Institute of Management Studies, and the University of Georgia Graduate School of Business. He has held an appointment as adjunct professor in the Graduate School of Business at the University of Rhode Island where he taught courses on advanced management and consulting skills to MBA and PhD candidates. He once held the record for selling out the highest priced workshop (on entrepreneurialism) in the then-21-year history of New York City’s Learning Annex. His Ph.D. is in psychology. He has served on the Board of Governors of Harvard University’s Center for Mental Health and the Media.

He is an inductee into the Professional Speaking Hall of Fame(R) and the concurrent recipient of the National Speakers Association Council of Peers Award of Excellence, representing the top 1% of professional speakers in the world. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Management Consultants, one of only two people in history holding both those designations.

His prolific publishing includes over 500 articles and 60 books, including his best-seller, Million Dollar Consulting (from McGraw-Hill) now in its 30th year and sixth edition. His newest is Legacy: Life is not about a search for meaning but the creation of meaning (Routledge, 2021). His books have been on the curricula at Villanova, Temple University, and the Wharton School of Business, and have been translated into 15 languages.

His career has taken him to 60 countries and 49 states. (He is afraid to go to North Dakota.) Success Magazine cited him in an editorial devoted to his work as ＂a worldwide expert in executive education.＂ The New York Post called him ＂one of the most highly regarded independent consultants in America.＂ He is the winner of the prestigious Axiem Award for Excellence in Audio Presentation.

He is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award of the American Press Institute, the first-ever for a non-journalist, and one of only seven awarded in the 65-year history of the association. He holds an annual Thought Leadership Conference which draws world-famous experts as speakers.

He has coached former candidates for Miss Rhode Island/Miss America in interviewing skills. He once appeared on the popular American TV game show Jeopardy, where he lost badly in the first round to a dancing waiter from Iowa. Alan is married to the lovely Maria for 52 years, and they have two children and twin granddaughters. They reside in East Greenwich, RI with their dogs, Coco and Bentley, a white German Shepherd.