Building your influence in the workplace requires mastering two critical skills: leveraging your networks and persuading others. In this course, you'll identify how to create an effective network by improving your interpersonal skills, accessing new information, and connecting with important organizational stakeholders. You'll also determine how to boost your ability to persuade effectively and gain others' buy-in, helping you build credibility, earn trust, and increase your influence.



Build Your Influence
This course is part of Boost Your Leadership Impact Specialization

Instructor: Harvard Business Review
Included with
What you'll learn
Create, assess, and strengthen your network while initiating and developing reciprocal relationships
Leverage your networks to achieve personal, team, and organizational goals and apply strategies for sustaining networks
Sharpen your persuasion skills to increase your influence and build your credibility by establishing expertise and earning trust
Discover how to persuade others by appealing to their logic and emotion, and develop strategies to overcome resistance to your ideas
Skills you'll gain
- Organizational Effectiveness
- General Networking
- Influencing
- Communication Strategies
- Relationship Management
- Interpersonal Communications
- Relationship Building
- Rapport Building
- Stakeholder Management
- Stakeholder Engagement
- Overcoming Objections
- Persuasive Communication
- Trustworthiness
- Professional Networking
- Leadership
Details to know

Add to your LinkedIn profile
October 2025
See how employees at top companies are mastering in-demand skills

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- Gain a foundational understanding of a subject or tool
- Develop job-relevant skills with hands-on projects
- Earn a shareable career certificate

There are 3 modules in this course
Networking isn’t “just political game-playing”—it’s a crucial skill for all managers. By learning to create an effective network, you can improve your interpersonal skills, access new information, and connect with important organizational stakeholders.
What's included
27 videos34 readings1 assignment
Boost your ability to persuade others to get the buy-in you need to accomplish your goals. By learning the art and science of effective persuasion, you build credibility, earn trust, and increase your influence.
What's included
8 videos31 readings1 assignment
What's included
2 assignments
Earn a career certificate
Add this credential to your LinkedIn profile, resume, or CV. Share it on social media and in your performance review.
Instructor

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Harvard Business Review
Harvard Business Review
Harvard Business Review
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Frequently asked questions
To access the course materials, assignments and to earn a Certificate, you will need to purchase the Certificate experience when you enroll in a course. You can try a Free Trial instead, or apply for Financial Aid. The course may offer 'Full Course, No Certificate' instead. This option lets you see all course materials, submit required assessments, and get a final grade. This also means that you will not be able to purchase a Certificate experience.
When you enroll in the course, you get access to all of the courses in the Specialization, and you earn a certificate when you complete the work. Your electronic Certificate will be added to your Accomplishments page - from there, you can print your Certificate or add it to your LinkedIn profile.
Yes. In select learning programs, you can apply for financial aid or a scholarship if you can’t afford the enrollment fee. If fin aid or scholarship is available for your learning program selection, you’ll find a link to apply on the description page.
More questions
Financial aid available,
¹ Some assignments in this course are AI-graded. For these assignments, your data will be used in accordance with Coursera's Privacy Notice.