Did you, like me, and many others round the UK tune in for the latest series of Sherlock? Personally I consider it to be one of the best written TV shows of some time what with the clever observations, intricacies of the plot and not to mention some extremely good filming (I especially liked the slow motion scene when Sherlock was shot) make for really compelling viewing. According to recent press articles the final episode screened at the weekend attracted 8.8 million viewers which represented 32.1 percent share of the viewing audience at that time……..a sure fire hit then which hopefully we will see back on our screens soon.
Anyway you are probably wondering why this is appearing as a blog on our Curium site and not some TV critic site……..well the link strangely enough is Charles Augustus Magnussen’s ability to identify pressure points which in Sherlock’s case happened to be John Watson. Magnussen used these pressure points negatively to blackmail and own individuals but what if you flipped it on its head and decided to use the same technique positively to get people on side and working with you.
Let me explain, we all have certain things that make us tick, certain approaches or personalities that just seem to get us motivated, animated or feeling positive. Well on a one to one basis if your manager or a colleague knows you well they should hopefully know what these are and be able to tailor their approach to get a positive bought in response from you. Now let’s grow the audience by 30, how does that same manager or colleague deliver the same message to a large group and increase their chances of getting the same positive response from all in the room? How do they ensure that half of the room don’t just turn off and hear their message as background noise?
I’m sure many of us have all done some behavioural profiling, the structure of which is based on the whole brain thinking model which breaks down into 4 areas: Thinking, Feeling, Logical and Creative, but how often do we structure our communication to appeal to all 4 areas of the brain? You can be pretty sure that you will have people in the room who each have a preference for one of the 4 therefore the room will cover all 4 of the areas. So remember next time you want to maximise your chances of success when communicating try and appeal to all 4 areas and more importantly try and understand your people and their ‘pressure point’.