How To Get Your Boss To Agree To Anything You Want

If you could change anything about your job, what would it be?

Do you want a savvier office or a bigger holiday allowance? Perhaps you’d like more mentorship or opportunities to develop new skills. Are you thinking about getting a fatter paycheque at the end of each month?

Whatever it is that you want, there's a good chance you won't get it easily- unless you know the best tricks in persuading your boss. If that is the case, here's a quick guide to help you out.

Understand Their Point of View

Before you ask for anything, work out why you haven’t already been given it. Mapping out your boss’ mindset on this issue is important since it can help you find a way to counter his arguments.

Generally, you know your boss well enough to get a feel of how he thinks, especially when it comes to making big decisions. Despite this, make sure you still ask him. As long as you frame your request in a neutral, non-accusatory manner, he should be happy to answer your questions.

Collect Compelling Counter-Evidence

To get what you want, you need to be able to show your boss both that it’s a good idea and that any concerns your boss may have won’t be a problem. This involves collecting evidence.

If you’re looking for a career or salary boost, you need to prove you deserve it. Hunt down performance reports, output statistics, glowing reviews from clients and so forth. Similarly, if you want support for a new way of working, then find reputable studies and surveys that can back up your idea.

Present It As A Benefit To Them

As wonderful and deserving as you undoubtedly are, if the work change you crave only benefits you, it won't be on top of your boss’ list of priorities.

If you can find a way to present it as a gain for the business, he's going to be keen to hear you out. Bosses are almost generally keen about enhancing the productivity of their workforce and the monetary gains of their business. If you can argue that your suggestion will create improvements in those areas, you’re likely to be a winner.

Make It Easy To Implement

By this point, you should have built such a persuasive case that your boss is, at least, open to considering the idea. However, managers are busy people and if you let your boss go away without giving it much thought, it’s possible that he'll find the idea too ambitious.

To stop this from happening, lay out a quick and easy way to put your idea into practice and volunteer yourself for any of the required legwork. Talk about how the transition from your current position would work and how any predictable problems that are likely to crop up would be surmounted.

Make It Time-Limited And Reversible

One of the reasons why all of us, including managers, are so scared of change is that it can be difficult to correct if anything goes wrong. To encourage your boss to be bold, suggest that you run your idea for a trial period first.

This will give you and your boss enough time to see if the project will work for the business. Trial periods are much easier to agree to. They’re easy to extend, too.

Allowing your boss to backtrack might seem like a risk, but it makes the initial agreement much more likely. As long as you can prove that your idea will work, it’s unlikely that your boss will force you to revert back to your previous position or working condition.

Play Devil’s Advocate

No matter how persuasive your argument is, your boss is still likely to throw some criticism at your idea to check its value. Avoid getting caught off-guard by assessing your own idea first. Finding the holes in your proposal can give you the opportunity to prepare either a solution to a potential problem or a convincing reason why the benefits still outweigh the cons.

It can actually be an effective technique to bring up some of these negatives while talking to your boss. It'll show that you’ve seriously considered all angles and analysed the proposal thoroughly