Name: Nguyen Tran Lien Nhi
Student ID: 2212255033
INFLUENCE TACTICS
Influence tactics are described as deliberate actions and attempts intended for an agent to
affect how a target individual thinks, feels, or behaves, which can be seen as their attitudes,
opinions and behaviours in real life. These tactics implicate a range of strategies that
influencers aim at intentionally attaining specific changes in others’ perspectives or actions.
Over time, scholars have generally classified influence tactics as eight distinct ones used for
this purpose.
One of the most prominent is rational persuasion, where the influencing party seeks to
convince the target via logical reasoning, objective facts, and credible or factual evidence.
Using clear arguments and supporting data as the instrument, rational persuasion is believed
to uphold the agreement based on rational thought rather than emotional appeal or coercion.
For example, in a project where the outcome requires proposing a new software system, the
project manager recommends accepting a new project management tool as a way to improve
team productivity. This new adoption means a new meeting to discuss, and during this
meeting, she may present data showing that those companies having used the tool can reduce
project delays by a particular percentage (e.g. 30%). These logical arguments and concrete
conclusions is how she can persuade her team and leadership skills to approve the change.
Another example is when an engineer requests additional team members for a critical project.
In his proposal, he outlines the current project timeline, the number of tasks remaining, and
the estimated workload each task requires. He supports his argument with industry
benchmarks for similar projects and calculates the risk of project delays without more
staffing. This is how relying on factual analysis and logical reasoning can convince
management to allocate more resources.
Another one is inspirational appeal, where agents motivate the target by making a request or
proposal designed to arouse enthusiasm or emotions in targets, through which they appeal to
their values, ideals, aspirations, or emotions. One striking example is, in a project where the
outcome depends on gaining team commitment to a challenging deadline, a team leader
might inspire her members through the emphasis of how their hard work will contribute to
