{"id":3136,"date":"2011-06-17T01:20:41","date_gmt":"2011-06-17T01:20:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thesocialcmo.com\/blog\/?p=3136"},"modified":"2011-06-17T01:20:41","modified_gmt":"2011-06-17T01:20:41","slug":"the-nature-of-situational-influence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thesocialcmo.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/the-nature-of-situational-influence\/","title":{"rendered":"The Nature of Situational Influence"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a> In 1610 Galileo, now considered the father of modern science and observational astronomy, began to publicly support the belief that the sun, not the earth, was the center of our universe. His heliocentric beliefs met with bitter opposition from his peers and the church who condemned him as a heretic. It was no coincidence, as it has always been, that those who benefit most from the status quo prove to be the most resistant to any kind of opposing thought, no matter how much sense it makes.<\/p>\n

After a year of exploring the nature of influence, I firmly believe I am now, and have always been, inconsequential. That being said I also believe, like Galileo did about the sun and earth, that our view of influence is strongly based on the beliefs of those that benefit from it the most. This current self-centered view of influence puts man\/woman as the center of the influence universe \u2013 a view I do not share and believe to be the exact opposite of the truth; a truth many would consider heresy.<\/p>\n

So what if something else is the center and we all orbit around it? Perhaps its more than one thing where we are torn and pulled into different orbits as we near forms of influence with stronger gravity?<\/p>\n

In my mind, a form of influence known as \u201cSituational Influence\u201d is the center of the universe we all orbit. I will be exploring this topic over the next while in a three part series; the first part of which is the Nature of Situational Influence..<\/p>\n

The Power of Situational Influence<\/strong><\/p>\n

If we think deeply and track back our actions in life many of us would see a series of situations that propelled our actions and became the major influence in all of our big decisions. Indeed, if we look at the myriad of small decisions we make each and every day, we will see our priorities are affected and shaped by a series of interconnected events and situations that rise and fall as they collide against each other and challenge our values, beliefs and perceptions to drive behavior.<\/p>\n

The basics keys on Situational Influence\u2026<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Situations directly affect action.<\/li>\n
  2. Situations rise in priority according to urgency.<\/li>\n
  3. Urgency drives immediacy of action<\/li>\n
  4. We are oblivious to all of it.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Now, with that in mind, I am going to illustrate how this works using a rain metaphor and will return to our planetary metaphor in Part 2 and 3 of this series. But for now, rain is an excellent way to understand Situational Influence in its simplest form.<\/p>\n

    The Coming Storm<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Have you ever been caught in the rain or a sudden storm? Imagine back to how that affected what you were doing and how you changed your behavior to cope with the rain or escape the storm. Our actions changed according to how intense the rain or storm became. As it rose in intensity, it drove more immediate action in us.<\/p>\n

    The nature of situational influence works in much the same and is amplified by urgency.<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

    In the above illustration, Situational Influence is represented by four distinct states of rain from Drizzle, Rain, Storm to a Flood. Underneath these is how the urgency of situation makes it rain harder thus creating a more directly influential situation. While the examples underneath give examples of what can be possible motivating situations at each stage of rain.<\/p>\n

    Obviously, it would also be best to represent rough percentages that each person would experience each form of situational influence. While I am no statistician, I have assigned some arbitrary values to each based on the loose definitions and examples from above.<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

    Further, if we wanted to really explore this metaphor we can add another factor which would be duration of the situation. The interesting attribute to duration is that while a duration can vary wildly anywhere from instant to a whole lifetime such as an illness, it can be applied to any situation and any state of urgency. For example, you can be laid off and be out of work for a day or you can be out of work for years. An illness can be instant like food poisoning or a lifetime like cancer.<\/p>\n

    So what we have are 3 factors which help put basic boundaries of understanding around situational influence\u2026<\/p>\n