Patience helps

My elder son is studying at UC Irvine as a freshman and has been declared captain of their cricket team from next academic year (starting Sep'17) as the current captain is graduating this year. Yesterday, he was tasked with making a presentation to the school's board for sports on the plans of the cricket team etc., and also to get the budget approved. Cricket not being one of the primary sport in the US, predictably has not been getting importance (in terms of getting the (football) ground for practice, funds for participating in tournaments, getting kits etc.,). My son made an angry presentation to the board and obviously it didn't go well with them. He was elated with the opportunity he got, but was disappointed with himself. As any dad would do, I tried cheering him up and sent out an email on how he should approach going forward as he is likely to captain the UCI cricket team for 3 more years (subject to his own performance). I sent out the mail and thought it has the lessons I learnt in influencing people and is therefore generic and might be of use. Here it is:

I'm so happy that you're getting so many opportunities and getting to know how the world works at a very young age. Pl. keep in mind the following (based on what I've learnt in the last 25years dealing with a lot of people)

1. Demanding something from authorities never work (unless you are indispensable). Relationships help. Over the next year you should try to build relationship with these authorities - meet them informally (deliberately arrange to "run into" them), talk about your progress and challenges (see next points).

2. People don't like whiners, especially if they are leaders (think Kejriwal). Instead of putting the same thing as a problem or an issue, put it as a "challenge" and tell what you are doing to address it and then explicitly seek "help" to overcome the challenges you are facing, but unable to solve yourself.

3. Passion helps. People get moved by folks that are passionate to a cause. You can't do it in one meeting, therefore #1 is very important.

4. Surprises are not appreciated, lobbying helps. You should keep talking to them thru the year and when they come to the decision making meeting they are already aware and hopefully sympathetic to your cause.

5. Appeal to their emotion. When you present, do not present it from your perspective. Present it from the perspective of what is important to them (in your case it might be pride of UCI, showcasing the diversity at the campus, showing that UCI cares for students from all parts of the world etc.,). Note they too are operating under constraints and will not have infinite monies and are looking to optimise whatever they have. 

6. Likability helps (various studies have shown it). #2 and 4 makes you unlikeable and 1, 3 and 5 makes you likeable. When people prima facie "like" you, they are most likely to consider your requests in a favourable way.

7. Patience helps. You might follow all of my advice above and still may not be in a position to influence the board the first time, may be 2nd time too. So, you need to be patient and keep doing all these and trust me eventually you'd be able to influence. (Pl. re-read the first habit Be Proactive in Stephan Covey's 7 Habits of Highly effective people and specifically the section on "increasing the circle of  influence").

I'm proud of what you've done and I'm sure you'd do a lot more.