“Do they want me there?”
That’s the question we’re about to explore. But let’s get there by starting one layer deeper.
Relationships are an easy thing to underestimate the importance of. Some people get it right away and invest heavily in relationships. They know something intuitively: without the relationship being where it needs to be, nothing can really happen the way it’s supposed to.
But other people spend years or decades denying the role relationships play in their work and life. They say things like “We don’t have to like each other to work together.”
If Jane Goodall showed up and watched those two people “work together,” I’m pretty sure there would be a lot of notes in her notebook about two apes that are doing almost everything they can to not work together.
It can be a long journey before it really clicks that relationships are the foundation of work, and dare I say of life, and whatever you try to build during your lifetime is all going to sit on that foundation. It can seem like we can all just show up, bring our skillsets, and things will go the way they should. But that isn’t ever how things play out.
I am going to cover several parts of relationships in the coming weeks, and I’ll clarify how these relationship components work across colleagues, clients, networking, and your personal life. But these posts aren’t just life lessons and hard-earned wisdom. I’ve done the OCD work of getting into the underlying neuroscience of each, making sure that these ideas check out at a lower level, right down to what’s happening in the brain.
So let’s take this one bite at a time, giving you time to do some thinking and experimenting with each part.
We’ll start with the linchpin of professional relationships (and of all kinds of relationships): Appeal.
Appeal makes or breaks relationships before the rest can matter
If you want to get invited to important conversations/opportunities, it all starts with looking in the mirror and asking a simple question:
“Do they want me there?”
Not “do they need me there?” or “should I be there” or “do I know the most about that?”
A few thoughts:
Humans make decisions emotionally and then rationalize next. The emotional response that gatekeeps things you can be a part of is appeal. And once someone finds you unappealing and doesn’t want you there, they’ll 100% figure out how to rationalize and explain it.
Above all else, professionals need to understand the unfair part of appeal: what you do for a living might be inherently unappealing. Especially if you’re in a job where you know the most, you should be there, and if they need you there. Those are the exact times people won’t want you there.
Engineers, analysts, security, legal, finance, SMEs, etc. are default-unappealing fields. They sound complex, they feel like limiters, and they can be super boring.
Brains want dopamine, endorphin, and oxytocin: they want progress, traction, and victories, they want to feel good, and they want to bond. But some fields (and the people in them) deprive brains of these things, instead flooding them with cortisol and adrenaline: stress and the feeling that they’re dealing with an enemy blocking them instead of a friend helping them.
Their brain has done this predictive work about you.
It’s not your fault that your field is unappealing. You just happen to be interested in and good at something most people’s brains don’t inherently like.
But this is exactly your opportunity.
Because anyone who makes an unappealing field appealing is SUPER appealing.
That dentist that everyone loves? The tax advisor that makes it not suck? The doctor that makes your kid feel at ease? The engineer who explains things in a way everyone understands?
We love these people. Almost everyone loves these people.
Because brains love what these people do. They help them win. They make it feel possible. They bond. They bring peace. And they actively reduce stress and frustration.
And you’ll notice, these are the people who get in the most doors. The ones you want to get into. Now you know why.
So, this week you can start thinking of the least appealing things inherent to your craft. Don’t worry too much about how important your craft is, or how much people should know about it, involve it, or like it. Look instead at if they actually do.
Here’s what you are looking for…
Is your field complex? Are you always “setting expectations”? Are you having to say no a lot, or ask questions that people hate? Do people feel like it’s going to be easy to talk to you about something? Are you going to use words they don’t understand? Are you going to ask them questions they aren’t able to answer?
Take all of these things and make them appealing. This is the skill of appeal.
All you have to do is reduce the cost of being around you.
Use allegory and analogies.
Share examples.
Start with the simplest way of understanding something.
Tell them that they don’t need to know all of the details, and let them know the important parts.
And every door will start opening, especially if you are needed and the expert.
Appeal is the key that unlocks doors. Not your skill. The presentation of that skill.
Need help? Here are a few ideas:
Talk to Claude or ChatGPT about this. Toss this post in as a prompt, go take a personality test like CORE Identity to give it some more context about you, tell it what you do, and ask it to help you pinpoint any appeal issues and fixes.
Come to my session this Friday on relationships. Don’t forget to use your subscriber discount code.
Get coaching. Let’s talk if you could use a tip. Just hit reply.
Good luck out there!
