The Art of Organizational Influence - Part 1

In my years of coaching technology leaders, I've observed that many of the challenges they face aren't technical at all - they're human. As you grow in seniority, you will increasingly find that getting stakeholder buy-in becomes an important factor in your professional success.

Recently, I spoke with a senior engineer struggling to drive change in his organization. Despite his strong technical skills and clear vision for improvements, he found himself unable to implement meaningful changes and was considering leaving. His story provides valuable lessons about how to effectively influence change in complex organizations. Here's what I've learned about making things happen in the real world of technology organizations.

Understanding the True Nature of Problems

The first and most crucial realization is that what appears to be a technical problem is often an emotional or political one. When technical leaders can't get initiatives approved or implemented, they typically blame process, prioritization, or technical disagreements. However, the real blockers usually lie in human psychology and organizational dynamics.

Business people don't have the same conception of the long-term health of a system as engineers do. They use the same words (flashback to every time you've heard someone in a suit say 'agile', 'tech debt' or 'estimate'), but they mean entirely different things in their consciousness.

When they push back, they're often not pushing back against your proposal but against the narrative in their heads.

The Power of Narrative and Identity

One of the most powerful tools for organizational influence is narrative - the stories people tell about you and your initiatives. Every interaction contributes to this narrative. Every time you pop your head into your boss's door, you add one more data point to their perception of you. And their reaction will be the reaction that causes least cognitive dissonance - ie one that perpetuates their narrative about you. To gain influence is to consciously shape this narrative.

A CTO needed budget for a principal engineer and was asked to write a detailed document justifying the hire. "What should I put in the document?" he asked.

While the document mattered, the real issue was more fundamental: I asked - "Why do you want to be in a situation where you have to write a document when you want to do something?"

The reason he had to write a document when he wanted something was because when he popped his head into his boss's cabin, the reaction was one of tension - of having to deal with a person who made no sense. To get to a point where the answer is always yes, he would have to change this fundamental reality of the relationship.

Without this he is – and you are – fighting an uphill battle.

In the rest of this article, I will show you some techniques for upping your influence game.

Building Influence: A Strategic Approach

Here's a practical framework for building and exercising influence:

1. Start with What Others Want

The fundamental shift that many technical leaders need to make is from pushing their own agenda to understanding and aligning with others' needs. If you're having trouble getting buy-in, it might be time to stop pushing and rather getting people in the habit of saying yes to you (The Socratic Method of Organisational Influence, if you will).

Trust, or goodwill, is the currency of politics. Some call it 'social capital'. People don't want to think. Help them out by being on their side. For one quarter, focus exclusively on asking people what they want and helping them achieve it. This builds trust and creates social capital you can later spend on your initiatives. Humans are very simple creatures. If they've said yes to your ideas before, they will continue to say yes. As I said - they don't want to think.

A crucial part of this approach is understanding and articulating Return on Investment (ROI) in terms that matter to others.

Consider a common scenario: an engineer wants to update dependencies or optimize code. Instead of focusing on technical elegance ("we should use only the specific AWS SDK modules we need instead of the whole package"), frame it in terms of business value ("let me help you understand how this investment of QA time now will pay off in terms of deployment speed and reliability").

If you can't articulate why someone should invest organizational resources in your initiative, you need to rethink your approach.

Remember: what seems like an obvious technical improvement to an engineer isn't always worth the organizational overhead. Learn to evaluate and present your initiatives not just in terms of technical merit, but in terms of concrete business benefits: time saved, risks mitigated, or opportunities enabled.

2. Be them

In order to start with others want, you will have to 'be them' for a while.

At rBus, we sold employee transportation services to corporates and as such we often had to pitch to corporate admins. Our head of sales had a fascinating technique.

During client meetings, he'd start by sitting across the table from the prospect, laptop open, discussing pricing and features - a typical sales setup with clear "seller" and "buyer" sides. But then, at a crucial moment, he'd do something subtle yet powerful: he'd pick up his laptop, walk around to the client's side of the table, and sit next to them.

As they worked through the details together, he'd use language like "when you and I do this" and "we will tell them that this is not acceptable" – who is the them? his own company! – subtly shifting the dynamic from a transactional sales pitch to a collaborative planning session. The prospect was no longer being sold to - they were now part of the solution design.

This same principle applies to driving change within organizations. It's not just about what you're proposing - it's about who people think you are when you're proposing it.

Talking to another CTO about getting buy in he said 'I go with a spreadsheet of the RoI on any measure I'm proposing. I told him my technique

"When I have a big ask from business leadership, I make sure they see me in the office when they come in. I make sure they see me in the office when they leave. I dress like them, and I only talk about business."

This isn't about superficial mimicry - it's about identity. Business leaders need to identify you as one of them before they'll truly hear your ideas. Technical leaders often think they can win purely through logic and data, but these are identity issues. When the esteemed stakeholders look at you, they need to see someone who thinks like them, who understands their concerns, who shares their priorities.

Also, and I say this with utmost seriousness – nothing changed the trajectory of my career as much as taking the needs of business leadership seriously and only then trying to convince them of a middle-ground that worked for both the short and long terms.

3. Create Witnesses Through Regular Cadence

ie Document.

Documentation isn't just about technical knowledge - it's about power and influence (muahahahah - He who keeps the notes has the power!). But seriously, when you maintain clear records of decisions, commitments, and progress, you create a shared reality that others must acknowledge. The 'must acknowledge' bit is important. People will always reach for a version of events that makes them a hero. An impartial, historical record of everything forces people to acknowledge the past correctly.

The way to collect this record is through boring-ass, regular cadence meetings. Regular meetings aren't just about status updates - they're about creating shared understanding and witnesses to decisions and commitments. These meetings provide a platform to:
- Document decisions and commitments
- Build consensus
- Create accountability
- Maintain momentum on initiatives
and most importanly
- it creates a permanent record that people can't wiggle out of. The first time they try to wiggle out, let them, but make it uncomfortable. This should make them more aware of their accountability. Only drive the knife in the second time ;-). Basic iron-fist-velvet-glove stuff.

Any organisation that doesn't have regular cadences is not a serious organisation.

4. The "Help Me Understand" Technique

One powerful tool is what I call the "help me understand" technique. Instead of confronting or challenging, phrase your concerns as requests for clarification:

"Help me understand - the document says this, but our spec says that. Can you help me understand why the two are different?"

This approach has to be used sparingly though. Use it too much and they'll go for drinks without you and say 'help me understand' to the waiter and burst out laughing. When used well though, it defuses a number of emotional booby-traps. It places you in a subordinate posture rather than a confrontational one. It makes others feel respected and heard and allows them to recognize and frame issues in a way that is less threatening to them and so avoids triggering defensive reactions

To be continued...

In the next edition, I will talk about more advanced methods of influence building - the art of giving credit and managing up, amongst others. That will be a paid post as that knowledge could be dangerous in the wrong hands. Get your subscription today :-)

Organizational influence is a skill that can be learned and improved with practice. The key is recognizing that technical excellence alone isn't enough - you need to master the human elements of organizational change. Start by building trust, understanding others' motivations, and creating allies rather than adversaries. Remember, the goal isn't to win arguments, but to create an environment where your good ideas can naturally flourish and take root.

Remember the sales lesson: success often comes not from pushing harder from across the table, but from finding ways to get on the same side as those you're trying to influence. Whether you're dealing with business leadership, product managers, or other teams, the key is to shift from being seen as an outsider pushing change to an insider working towards shared success.

The most successful technical leaders aren't necessarily the most technically brilliant - they're the ones who understand how to work with human nature rather than against it. As you develop these skills, you'll find that your ability to drive meaningful change grows exponentially.

One last word

If you've tried everything and your organisation is too toxic for you, it might be time for a change. If yes, then head on over to my recruiting website where I'll connect you with the best startup engineering teams that are hiring.