Power Play: Plant the seed, and then walk away

Power Players are fantastic seed-planters. They give up just enough information to gently suggest a direction whilst still making it look like the direction is entirely the other person’s choice.

Power Players know for sure that most of us are simply looking for a stepping off point. Once we get that from the people we trust we can absolutely take it from there.

There is a particular skill to planting a seed. A few perfectly selected words followed by a pause then underlined with a mini-gauntlet being thrown down. Then you walk away. Quietly.

But this tactic only works if you know exactly what to say and exactly the chord to strike. Get it wrong and the seed becomes a stink bomb and they whole thing goes to hell in a hand-basket.

The best Power Players can conjure up magic with just a few choice words. And when you see it happen right it front of you, it really is sublime.

Learn this one as quickly as you can. It will be a trademark move for you.

Entrepreneur, strategist and author Rose Herceg co-founded Pophouse, specialising in social forecasting, market research and business strategy in 1998 before selling it to STW in 2006.

Until recently Rose was strategy director of the STW Group, working across 70 companies on strategy, social forecasting, trends analysis and innovation.

She is currently developing several online start-ups in media and media content.