Love him or hate, him the USA electoral process has been surprised by Trump’s ability to garner support. The question has to be asked how does he do it? Enlisting people into the dream is the second most important task of leadership that follows identifying a direction to lead in. I was not a fan of ‘The Don’ but decided I needed to investigate what was drawing people to his message.
You may have heard it called engagement, vision casting and generating buy-in but they are all synonyms for an essential leadership skill. It is the ability to ENLIST people into the dream, not to just to get them to buy into the message but feel passionately engaged with the dream. With this in mind, I decided to watch his campaigns. I spent copious amounts of time watching the news channels and unpacking what I consider to be his keys to success. I must admit that the more I watch him the more I could sense what was drawing people in.
The caveat to this discussion is that enlistment needs to be backed with robust strategy and implementation. That aspect of his campaign is still to be determined and is not the scope of this discussion. In this blog, we are going to investigate what techniques is ‘The Don’ using to enlist people.
You may also raise the objection that he has many detractors and opposition. Agreed but that is also the nature of leadership. However, he has gathered an ardent following. Not everyone will enlist in his dream but that is true for any leader trying to sell his vision.
Trumps Persuasion Techniques.
Technique 1: Pathien before Sapien
Trumps rhetoric is peppered with phrases like ‘it’s terrible’, ‘it’s a disaster’, ‘they are thieves and rapists” and the list could go on beyond the bounds of appropriateness. Behavioural psychologist W. Jarvis regularly told me, “Information is processed through the pathein brain before it’s processed through the sapien brain”. What does this mean? Put into layman’s terms, information is processed emotionally (pathien) before it is processed logically (sapien). The word Pathein has its roots in the Greek notion pathos. Aristotle explained in his treatise on rhetoric, that pathos represented an appeal to the emotions of the audience and elicits feelings that already reside in them. Think about it for a moment. The most memorable and influential speeches delivered by famous leaders were usually aimed at their followers’ fears, values, emotions and motivations (pathien). Whether it was Martin Luther King Jr., Winston Churchill or John F. Kennedy, they all had one thing in common they communicated to the emotions of people.
Ask any lady buying her 50th pair of shoes that she does not need. We make emotional decisions that we then justify logically. Often the shoes get purchased with the weakest of logical arguments, but hey they look and feel great. The emotional brain has won again. People tend to buy with their hearts and rationalize with their heads. Leadership is no different. People buy-in to the dream emotionally first and logically second.
Trump is an ‘emotional engager’ he seeks to touch on the raw emotions of people and activate those emotions. He not only taps into the emotions but he then amplifies the emotion. This generates a major dissatisfaction with the status quo and in many instances incites fear, the strongest of human emotions.
Application: Amplify
The difference is the strategy that people buy into is linked to a ‘Need’ that makes them feel emotional. It is a problem they want to be solved and are willing to put energy into.
- What emotion does your dream ignite?
- How can you amplify that emotion and the antithesis of the emotion?
Technique 2: Tangible and Understandable.
Closely linked to the previous point, Trump ensures that he is addressing the emotional need he has amplified. People will engage in a strategy that ‘moves them’. Rather than talking about foreign policy, economic structures and some of the more complex issues of running a country, he launches his campaign talking about a Wall. Think about it for a moment. He wants to build a Wall for goodness sake. If I was in his campaign strategy headquarters I would not imagine ‘Building a Wall’ getting major traction. Yet the wall is a metaphorical representation of a felt need. It is a visual metaphor of that wall that will keep bad people out, protect jobs and provide a sanctuary for all those on the right side of the wall.
The Dons delivery of his grand plan, “I am going to build a wall” resonates because it is simple, tangible and understandable. As broad and simple as “The Dons” plans may appear, they are plans nonetheless. People want to know that if you are going to communicate the problem, you also have an answer. Trump delivers answers to the fears he has previously amplified. Persuasion has followed the same formulae for centuries. Create dissatisfaction and provide an answer. This is change management 101. Generate a burning platform and then deliver the pathway to change.
Application: Communicate
At some point, people want your plan to deliver a solution. The plan does not need to be comprehensive, but there is an expectation there is one.
- Communicate your pathway forward.
Technique 3: Ooze or Lose
“I don’t use teleprompters” the Don declares, as he goes on to mock every politician who does. To a degree he is right. His aversion to the teleprompter represents his desire to connect. “The Don” delivers energy to the crowd by being in the moment, fully engaged and viscerally connected to his message.
Trump is the embodiment of his message and typifies the leadership maxim, ‘A message is caught as much as it is taught’. As a leader, you need to be the embodiment and incarnation of the message you are delivering. If you don’t believe in what you are saying, no one else will. In essence, to be brilliant at enlisting people, you must become “Mr. or Mrs your Message”. Congruence in the delivery of your message is essential in the process of enlistment. Your body language, tone and message all needs to scream, “I believe in this”. The antithesis of this is politicians who communicate in staged ‘head speak’ and do not capture the crowd.
Application: Connect
It is a mistake to think that mere words cause buy-in, people will catch the congruence and authenticity of your message.
- Do you embody your message?
- What do you need to do to ooze your dream?
Technique 4: Rapport opens the Door
It seems that every time I turned on the TV at some point in his campaign message he would declare his “Love for the audience”. Judging by how many times I heard him say “I love you …” I am surprised he has any more love to give. Either that or Mother Theresa would have some stiff competition if she were still around. Bizarrely, people seemed to believe the message and feel Trump has their best interests at heart. Resonating the old adage, “People don’t care about what you know until they know how much you care.”
Application: Rapport
Leaders gain influence by building rapport. Once you have rapport people are more likely to believe your message.
- Verbalise your appreciation.
Hey Aiden
Your analysis of the Don’s leadership impact is great and insightful, the appeal to the emotional brain, (heart always beats head), simple understandable message “the wall”, spontaneity (lack of prompt cards) and reach out to the audience through empathy with his audiences viewpoint.
It is a package that is certainly working.
The response by the Don’s critics only appears to reinforce his zeitgeist. Those that criticise his simplest message, his off the cuff, his proposed lack of depth on topics, his apparent divisiveness is you’re not in Don’s camp, appears to only add more to his appeal.
This is politics at its most interesting, what creates an appeal and moves people. It is also thankfully politics in America, still the most powerful nation in the world, but one that as an outsider we can witness but not influence.
I don’t want to comment on Don the man (don’t know the chap) or how this will pan out for the US and the world but certainly there are learning’s for anyone working trying to change, through leadership in what ever form the world, workplace, environment around them.
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Very insightfully Keith and so True. There are learnings for any leader or change agent. The Key to it all is motive and intent behind a message.