No matter how stubborn the group or how tangled the bureaucracy, there are tricks you can use to get people moving in the same direction. I’ve spent years working with clients and government agencies to wrangle stakeholders and help them avoid public relations disasters. The skills I’ve gathered are the foundation I use to encourage groups to collaborate, make real progress, and build things they would never accomplish alone—even when the parties involved are notorious for resisting cooperation. These same strategies are at the heart of effective public relations (PR), too. Whether you’re trying to align stubborn stakeholders or craft a message that actually moves people, this is the foundational knowledge you need to get what you want. This guide is stripped of fluff and packed with the practical PR and negotiation tricks that actually work, so you can get what you want without wasting time or losing your mind
People are inherently selfish.
I know, it sounds terrible, right? But it’s completely true. People will usually operate in their own self interest simply because it’s how we’re wired to survive as a species.
This doesn’t mean people don’t act out of altruism or for the good of the whole. It just means asking someone to act in a way that isn’t selfish is a bigger ask than asking them to do something in their own best interest. Knowing that helps you judge how much you’re asking the other person to move or give up.
Know the other party’s priorities, wants, and non-negotiables.
When it comes down to it, PR is manipulation. Now remove the judgement from that statement: manipulation isn’t inherently good or bad. It’s a tool. The goal is simply to get the other party to align themselves with you or take a specific action, and to do that you need to understand their starting point.
Know what the other party cares about in advance. Write it down if you have to, but don’t go in blind. If you don’t know, make a guess and hold it in the back of your mind. You can ask questions to clarify that guess during conversations later.
Here’s how you use each:
Priorities
This is the most powerful of the three. If you’re short on time, spend your time on this one first. Priorities inform your positioning when writing messages or engaging in negotiation.
When you’re trying to get multiple parties to agree on something, you have to show them that it aligns with their priorities to do so. This is also how you get people to spend resources on things they may not otherwise be tempted to spend on.
For example, if you want several institutes currently operating on separate, siloed systems to move to a shared system, you have to make the move to do so align with each institute’s priority. Even if the change is a simple one, it’s still going to require each group to want to retrain their people, handle the headache from the change, etc. If one institute prioritizes efficiency, talk about how the new system will help cut transaction time down. If another prioritizes the comfort of their people, talk about how much of a headache the old system is for those people.
You can also use priorities to handle pushback. Reminding someone of their priorities is a great way to refocus a conversation or gently call out hypocrisy without sounding like an ass.
Wants
This is the other party’s wish list. Checking boxes on this list will put you in a position of power to sway the other person to your side. Think of this as the “nice to haves.”
It’s pretty common for people to not be honest about what they want or not be able to articulate what they want, though, so keep your own list rather than relying on theirs.
Non-negotiables
These are the items the other party won’t budge on at all. The only way to move someone away from a non-negotiable is to give them a tremendous win, but doing so will almost always cost you in the long run.
For example, if you’re selling high heels but the other person has a foot injury that fully prevents them from wearing heels, you won’t be able to sell them on the heels. You can learn from their non-negotiables, though, and use that to your advantage. In this example, you won’t sell them on a pair of heels, but you might learn the other person hates the fact that they can’t find cute shoes that fit their needs at all. That becomes your opening.
Know who has what power.
Understanding the power dynamics in a room often shows up those “best secret tips of elite negotiators” lists, and they then proceed to tell you all about body language tells and other unhelpful junk. Knowing who has the power has nothing to do with how someone is sitting. Everyone has explicit and implicit power. Figuring out what that is doesn’t have to be complicated. Your job is to know who is able to take what actions and who is able to influence which other people. That’s it.
Remember: every person has some degree of power. Your goal is to figure out what that is without disregarding anyone.
What power someone has
This is the literal answer to the question, “Does this person have the power to make this move forward?” Know who has the power to sign off on things in advance to keep things efficient. Knowing who can do what will also help you reverse engineer the steps you need to make a change.
Who someone can influence
Don’t underestimate the power of relationships. Even children have power over purchases (ever heard of Pester Power?). You can use this to spread ideas incredibly effectively.
Be honest about risk.
Trying to hide risks associated with taking a project on, making a purchase, or changing positions is a really common mistake. You don’t have to hide risk, you just need to be honest about it.
Everyone has a different risk tolerance, and you probably aren’t going to be able to move them from one end of the spectrum to the other during a single engagement. Being up front with any risks helps the other person decide whether this specific ask is within their window for risk tolerance. Being honest builds trust that is way more valuable to you if something does happen to go wrong later. You’ll need trust to combat expected issues together. And having a paper trail explaining the risks clearly also covers your butt later if things do go wrong.
One of the best industries to learn from if you’re trying to understand how to identify someone else’s risk tolerance is the financial industry. Investment firms have done a lot of research into risk tolerance for their personal finance products, and you can take these same principles into other industries.
Move people along a spectrum to change their beliefs.
One of the most useful PR concepts I learned in college was the idea of every belief existing on a sliding scale. You see this most often when talking about political alignment. The idea of a hard left and right describe how far from the center someone is, and they also give you an idea of how much change someone will have to go through to switch their beliefs.
You cannot force someone to jump from one end of the spectrum to the other without a mental breakdown. There’s just too much cognitive dissonance. You have to scoot them along the spectrum instead. Use this idea to figure out the best order to present ideas in and determine how much engagement different groups of people will need to change.
When you’re offended, respond with curiosity.
It’s easy to end up so invested in a project that any hint of criticism or dissatisfaction feels like a personal attack. Instead of a knee-jerk reaction, take a moment to ask why the other person might be responding the way they are. Responding with curiosity is one of the best, and easiest, ways to find the source of the true issue fast.
Here’s an example: Let’s say you’re leading a project and someone angrily emails you saying the timeline is “completely unrealistic.” Instead of getting defensive, you might respond by asking which milestones feel too aggressive. This can reveal that they’re actually worried about a specific resource constraint or competing priority that you can then address directly.
The best part? Responding with curiosity keeps you in a position of authority, conveys that you are genuinely trying to help, and makes you look like an angel in the eyes of the public.
Use news story structure.
The second most useful PR concept I learned is how to structure a news story. Why? News story are incredible effective at getting a message across quickly and clearly while still inviting people to dive in to learn more.
News stories start with the most critical information first, then add layers of detail as they go. Think of it like an upside-down pyramid: the widest part (the most important stuff) is at the top. The first paragraph tells you who, what, when, where, why, and how. Each paragraph after that adds more context and detail, getting more and more specific. This structure means readers can stop at any point and still walk away with the key message. It’s brilliantly efficient, and you can use it for everything from emails to presentations.
This concept can be applied to any form of communication. The inverted pyramid structure has been a cornerstone of effective journalism and communication for over a century, and it works because it respects your audience’s time while ensuring your key message gets across.
The most powerful question: Why would they care?
Now it’s time to check your work. If you have a draft strategy or message ready, take a hard look at it and as, “Why would the other person care?” Be brutally honest with yourself, especially if you’re working on something related to the public interest. Remember the first point about people being inherently selfish? Combine that idea with the simple fact that most people are also incredibly busy with their own lives when you answer this question.
You need to get crystal clear on exactly why someone would care if you want to have any chance of grabbing their attention. Once you know why they would care, speak to that. Enroll them in the idea. It’s a lot easier to get people to take action once they’re invested.
Now that you understand the basics, you can take on the world. Or you can apply these skills to your content creation process and Hack Your Content Creation Process even further.