Influence, Persuasion and Negotiation

Influence, power and authority are often used interchangeably, yet confusing them is one of the costliest mistakes a leader can make. This module sets out French and Raven's six bases of power, Weber's three types of legitimate authority and the position, push and pull strategies, alongside the ethical line between persuasion, coercion and manipulation. The negotiated end of apartheid by Mandela and de Klerk shows influence outweighing formal power.

Persuasion follows learnable rules rather than innate charm. This module works through Robert Cialdini's seven principles, from reciprocity to unity, reads the 2014 Ice Bucket Challenge against them, and covers foot in the door, door in the face and pre-suasion. It sets out where each principle tips into manipulation and how to apply them ethically in public service, alongside ideas from Dale Carnegie, Daniel Pink and Harry Mills.

The words you choose, and the order you put them in, measurably change whether a case lands. This module moves from Aristotle's ethos, pathos and logos and Churchill's speech of 4 June 1940 to Jonah Berger's Magic Words and the Heath brothers' SUCCESs framework. It covers Cicero's five canons, named rhetorical devices, Lakoff on framing, primacy and recency, and how to build a committee paper that a skimming reader still understands.

Much of what people communicate sits in tone, posture and timing rather than words, but reading it well depends on humility. This module corrects the seven per cent claim drawn from Mehrabian, then covers Schulz von Thun's four sides of a message, active listening, incongruence and baselines, Dieken's three habits and Goleman's emotional intelligence. The TSA's SPOT programme shows the limits of reading behaviour, alongside Ekman, proxemics, culture and video calls.

Negotiation is an everyday, voluntary exchange, and the strongest agreements come from understanding why people want something rather than what they demand. This module covers Fisher and Ury's principled negotiation, soft, hard and principled bargaining, anchoring and framing from Kahneman and Tversky, and the core concepts of BATNA, reservation price and ZOPA. The Camp David talks of 1978 show interests and a single negotiating text unlocking agreement.

Everyone brings an instinctive negotiating style to the table, usually long before any theory is applied. This module maps five styles on the Thomas-Kilmann dimensions of assertiveness and cooperativeness, shows how to diagnose a counterpart quickly and adapt without changing your substance, and reviews evidence on personality, mood and gender. It draws on Herb Cohen's power, time and information and G. Richard Shell's six foundations, alongside walking away and the debrief.

Good negotiators are distinguished more by preparation and process than by charm. This module draws on Howard Raiffa's characteristics of effective negotiators, the five phases from prepare to agree, the discipline of if and then, classic tactics, the negotiator's dilemma and Gavin Kennedy's red, blue and purple behaviour. A composite local government reorganisation case shows the toolkit at work, alongside packaging, silence, written confirmation, the pre-mortem and repeated games.

Under pressure, people must feel heard before they will move. Drawing on Chris Voss's Never Split the Difference, this module covers tactical empathy and its four core techniques of mirroring, labelling, calibrated questions and the accusation audit, the difference between 'that's right' and 'you're right', the Ackerman bargaining model and the three kinds of yes. The 1993 Chase Manhattan Bank robbery shows labelling succeeding where direct questions failed.

Negotiating across culture, distance and unequal power changes the style of a negotiation more than its substance. This module uses Hofstede's dimensions and Edward Hall's high and low context communication with care, compares negotiation, mediation, arbitration and litigation, and sets out Goldberg, Green and Sander's interests, rights and power alongside William Ury's third side. The Black Sea Grain Initiative shows shuttle mediation working across extreme power and distance.

This module takes negotiation into pay, contracts, supplier terms and collective agreements, where deadlines and consequences are real. It covers distributive and integrative negotiation, value creation through trades, Rollin and Christine Glaser's strategy matrix, salary negotiation, ethical and legal limits, multi-party talks, public procurement, contract structures, trade unions, advisers, renegotiation and mergers. The 2023 Hollywood writers' strike shows a strengthened BATNA and a genuinely new issue at the table.

Influence in organisations is mostly built before it is needed, in conversations nobody minutes. This module covers stakeholder mapping by power and interest, building a personal board of sponsor, mentor and peers, the pre-meeting, managing up ethically, timing, alliances across silos and the reciprocity ledger. The Grameen Bank case shows Muhammad Yunus building a national institution through expert and referent power, and the disclosure test separates coalition building from toxic politics.

This capstone introduces no new theory: it shows the programme's frameworks working together in four recent cases. Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard before the Competition and Markets Authority, the Good Friday Agreement, the NHS resident doctors' pay dispute and the United Auto Workers' Stand-Up Strike each combine interests, BATNA, the third side and invention. It closes with what separates excellent negotiators and three Monday morning actions.