What’s in a Few Words? Influential Communication for Commercial Leaders

There is good reason that communication (in its many guises) is an evergreen coaching topic.  Most of us will know at least one colleague or peer who is technically excellent, but who has not yet mastered the art of communication well enough to “bring people with them”. And it’s tough. There is a lot to think about - influencing peers, aligning stakeholders, managing expectations, navigating clients, and getting things done through other people. But it matters, because without influential communication, businesses can waste resources, suffer misunderstandings and see unnecessary conflict, and miss opportunities that would have benefitted the bottom line, especially in the current environment of fast change and competition. So it makes sense to invest in and learn influential communication – it impacts every part of a business and can speed things up, protect relationships and create capacity to generate income.

What often differentiates those who do communicate influentially from those who don’t, are two things: pressure and learning.

Communicating Under Pressure

Pressure changes communication. Without pressure, most professionals manage a reasonably balanced communication: not aggressive; not submissive/passive; nor passive-aggressive. Unintentionally, an aggressive style indicates “I’m right and everyone else is slowing me down” and a passive style indicates “my ideas, input and time matter less than yours.” When influencing, we're generally aiming for assertive communication in the middle of the two - to ensure neither party is prioritised or neglected. We’ve written about Situational Assertiveness before in our May 2025 Insights.

Under pressure, people tend to stray away from optimal, assertive communication. Some become situationally aggressive by being abrupt, impatient, overly corrective, dismissive of alternative views, and focused on being right rather than effective. Others become overly submissive by over-apologising, over-explaining, avoiding challenge, saying yes when they mean no, and softening every message. Usually, both approaches are coming from a place of good intention and are trying to solve the same problem.

Doer-leaders usually care, very much, about results. This means that aggressive-leaning doer-leaders can succumb to pressure, urgency, high standards, frustration and their own identity tied to competence. Submissive-leaning doer-leaders can succumb to conflict avoidance, wanting to be liked, imposter syndrome, fear of appearing difficult and sometimes hierarchy intimidation.

Below are some examples that we often hear of both styles exhibited in pressured workplaces, and what tends to create more influence instead.

Unintentional messages behind these communication styles can be detrimental. For example:

“Sorry to bother you…” can accidentally say: “My time matters less.”

“I’ll just do it myself” can accidentally say: “I don’t trust anyone else.”

“This might be a silly idea, but…” can suggest: “I’m not credible.”  

“Can you just do it” is sometimes interpreted as “My opinion doesn’t matter.”

Learning the Art of Communication

Many raise an eyebrow at us suggesting they learn more about communication, and think back to graduate training.  But it actually features as one of the most common coaching topics right through to exec level. Investing in influential communication means not just thinking about what you say — but how the other person experiences interacting with you, or as a coaching question often puts it “What is it like to be on the receiving end of you?”

That means influential communicators tend to prepare before important conversations, think about the outcome they want and be able to articulate it. They regulate their tone, ask more questions, reduce defensiveness (theirs and others’) and anticipate objections. As such, they are more likely to achieve their aims.

A particularly useful framework is to structure important messages, whether they warrant 5 minutes of conversation or 5 hours of decision-making quorum, around four simple points:

• Why is this important? To align interests.
• What exactly is being proposed? To be clear.
• How will this happen? To create high levels of understanding.
• What if we do? And what if we don’t? To identify advantages, or potential risks.

Influential communicators are also likely to be much more intentional about asking questions (and then listen to the answers!). Questions that we hear influential communicators frequently ask are:

What outcome are we trying to achieve?
What would good look like here?
What concern are we trying to solve?
Who else needs to be aligned?
What’s stopping this moving forward?
How do you see it?
What would make this easier to support?
Can I sense-check something?
What happens if we don’t act?
What support do you need from me?

Increasingly in our industry, this is where influence comes from - not from traditional hierarchy and positional power, but from the ability to communicate with people in a way that “brings them with you”.

Influential Communication as a Commercial Skill

So, we don’t see influential communication as a “soft skill” for doer-leaders, but rather a commercial skill, which sets apart those who struggle from those who succeed. Increasingly, the professionals who create the most value are not simply those who can produce excellent technical work, but those who can also communicate in a way that creates momentum around that work. This is particularly relevant for doer-leaders, whose success depends less now on personal execution alone, and more on their ability to influence and mobilise others without friction or delay. In pressured environments, where relationships and responsiveness matter, influential communication becomes a genuine differentiator.