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Squiggly Careers

Squiggly Shortcut: How to Influence People Who Disagree With You

Squiggly Careers

AmazingIf

Business, Management, Careers

4.9838 Ratings

🗓️ 26 February 2026

⏱️ 5 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

If influence sometimes feels uncomfortable or awkward, this is a fresh take that reframes it as collaboration rather than persuasion. In this Squiggly Shortcut, Sarah shares a practical, three-step approach to influencing with curiosity rather than control. Using the example of someone challenging the idea of squiggly careers, Sarah explores why pushing harder rarely works and why listening first is often your most powerful move. From opening up the conversation with genuine curiosity, to involving someone in shaping the solution, to landing on a payoff they actually care about, this episode is a simple guide to influencing in a way that feels thoughtful, not manipulative. Episode 538 🦞 Learn Like A Lobster: 🇺🇸PRH US - https://bit.ly/3KxTeBn 🇬🇧 Amazon UK - https://bit.ly/46lj8Av  📚 Resources Mentioned Episode 239: Ask the Expert with Connson Chou Locke - https://shows.acast.com/amazingif/episodes/239-ask-the-expert-influence-with-connson-chou-locke For questions about Squiggly Careers or to share feedback, please email helenandsarah@squigglycareers.com More ways to learn about Squiggly Careers: 📩 Download our free career tools: https://www.amazingif.com/toolkit/ 🦞 Join the Learn Like a Lobster Sprint: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNQl9gsac8BXnWe2qoGuHkLKwsygjP_Ma&si=l7kODG3JpopH0Irz 📮 Get Squiggly Careers in Action in your inbox: https://bit.ly/SquigglyCareersInAction 📚 Read our books: The Squiggly Career and You Coach You: https://www.amazingif.com/books/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Hi, this is Sarah from the Squiggly Careers podcast. And in this shortcut, I'm going to talk about how to

0:05.6

influence people who disagree with you. And I was thinking about the best way to bring this to life

0:10.8

and I thought it was probably through an example. So I want you to imagine I'm in a conversation

0:15.4

with somebody who disagrees with the idea of squiggly careers. Can you imagine? But it does happen. Not that often

0:22.0

anymore, but it used to happen a lot more. And I think the start of that conversation, so when you

0:26.7

get a sense, perhaps you're surprised by it or perhaps you knew that it might be coming, somebody

0:31.2

disagrees with you. Often our inclination might be to keep on talking, keep on persuading, you're trying to win someone

0:39.9

over to your way of thinking. I don't think that works that well. I think you are much better

0:46.0

off being open to listening because through that listening, that is how you then learn more

0:52.1

about what's getting in the way, why somebody actually really

0:55.5

disagrees. So if someone didn't like the idea of squiggly careers, let's imagine they said,

1:00.8

I just don't think it will work in our company or in our culture. Rather than then trying to

1:05.7

give them lots of reasons why it will work, I would now say, oh, that's really interesting.

1:10.3

Like, what do you think would get in the way?

1:12.3

What has worked really well?

1:14.0

So just listen and learn.

1:15.9

And if that first conversation, that's all you've done, that's okay.

1:19.5

I think sometimes, you know, really kind of big influencing takes a while.

1:24.9

You don't achieve it all in one conversation.

1:27.7

Secondly, I want to involve that person in challenge and building. So what I might say to them is,

1:34.8

let's say we were talking about careers in their company. What has really worked well for careers

1:40.0

in your organisation so far? What have people responded really well to? Or I might get them talking

...

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