Start With A Win - Building Trust and Empathy to Enhance Relationships with Pamela Barnum

Episode Date: July 1, 2020

In this episode of Start With A Win, Pamela Barnum joins us. She is an expert on body language, trust, deception, and human nature. Pamela delivered a TEDx Talk on what she learned from drug dealers about trust during her time as an undercover law enforcement officer.Pamela shares with Win Nation that we all make initial judgments about people within the first few milliseconds of meeting them for the first time, whether we realize it or not. Our brains read body language and determine if we can trust people or if we have some hesitations. This trust is an essential requirement for business and personal relationships, which can largely predict the outcome of our relationships, positively or negatively.  Today’s work environment primarily consists of video meetings rather than seeing one another in person. Be mindful as there are many aspects to consider as you speak with others via video. Continue to build rapport with your team and trust with others you interact with through video. People are looking for authenticity above all else in these times. While you need to be conscious of your background so it isn’t distracting, it is helpful for people to see your surroundings to gain a better understanding of who you are. Ensure to have your camera at eye level and dress as you would for an in-person meeting, so it feels more like a face-to-face conversation.Empathy should be one of your main goals in all interactions. Take a step back and truly try to understand the other person. Empathy is the gateway to other positive outcomes, such as collaboration, transparency, openness, and creativity. Ask clarifying questions when you don’t understand or to confirm you are comprehending what the other person is saying. When possible, remove any physical barriers between you and the person you are meeting with as well.  Overall, Pamela encourages listeners to be conscious of the subtleties you are projecting to those around you and do your best to communicate with authenticity.Connect with Pamela:https://pamelabarnum.com/“What Drug Dealers Taught Me About Trust”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2L4eU4iVmcConnect with Adam:https://www.startwithawin.com/ https://www.facebook.com/REMAXAdamContoshttps://twitter.com/REMAXAdamContos https://www.instagram.com/REMAXadamcontos/ Leave us a voicemail:888-581-4430

Every day is filled with choices. You're here because you're choosing to start with a win. Get ready to be inspired, learn something new, and connect with the Win Nation. And coming to you, Win Nation, it's Adam Cotto, CEO of remax welcome to start with a win producer mark how you doing buddy i'm doing so good i love it we have a really cool show today yeah i'm so stoked about our guest yeah i mean she's got like such a cool history amazing ted talk this is going to be a fun one this is a little bit outside of, you know, we usually be like, let's get somebody from marketing or something like that on. But this is somebody who genuinely understands human nature and psychology and how we kind of break through these barriers that we

run into. So you're ready to jump into this? Let's do this. All right. I have on the show today, Pamela Barnum, former undercover officer, federal prosecuting attorney. Today, Pamela speaks to audiences across North America on how to crack the code on deception and interpret body language. So Pamela teaches these skills to audiences on how to implement these techniques so they can negotiate better deals, increase sales, and build more trusting relationships. Some key things. Pamela, welcome to Start With A Win. Well, thank you so much for having me, Adam. I love your podcast, and I love the premise that it's focused around. So thank you so much for inviting me. Awesome. This is exciting because, I mean, first of all, you and I share a lot of history. I worked

undercover. You worked undercover. We were both in law enforcement, and both have a very entrepreneurial mindset, got into business. And you gave this TED Talk called What Drug Dealers Taught Me About Trust, which that is super counterintuitive. How did you come up with that? Well, I learned so much working undercover. And when I worked undercover, it was for months and months at a time with a different identity, et cetera. But authenticity, it may seem counterintuitive, but I learned so much about authenticity and building trusting relationships and what that looks like, deescalating, forming fantastic relationships that worked while I was working undercover. I love that. So you mentioned the word authenticity. That's huge in business. It's huge in relationships for crying out loud,

right? And we have to have a relationship with somebody that we do business with, whether or not we're buying or selling drugs, or we're in a business relationship, doing a business transaction of legal manner. Authenticity, how did you come up with that word authenticity when you look at this? Because frankly, that's not the first place that most people go is, I want to do business with an authentic person, but that describes it pretty well, doesn't it? I think so, because trust is really the most critical and essential ingredient in business. I think we can do business with people we don't necessarily like. We do business with people we don't know all that well, but we're really reticent to do business with people that we don't trust. And authenticity is so important there,

especially in that collaborative buyer-seller relationship that entrepreneurs are in all the time. And authenticity requires transparency, I think, more than ever. With social media and all the things that people can look up on their own, it's really the cornerstone and the foundation of trust. Do you think that that's like the first benchmark that people go after? I do. I think that when we're looking at someone and we're deciding, because immediately our brain is making decisions about whether or not we trust someone within milliseconds. Actually, they've even shown it to be within 50 milliseconds.

I know, Adam, when I see you, my subconscious is making a decision about whether or not I trust you. And it's not telling me whether I like you or we're going to be friends, et cetera. It's immediately, do I feel safe with you? Do I feel trusted? And my brain is looking for reasons to back up that initial response. So if we can do things non-verbally that will help people reach that destination of a trusting relationship easier, faster, that works for everyone in the connection. I love this. So we're going way down to the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs here. And you mentioned milliseconds.

We don't have milliseconds to have a conversation. So obviously, you're talking about non-verbal communication here. Absolutely. Can you kind of unpack that a little bit? How does that work in this authenticity? When you first see somebody, I mean, what are you looking for? How do you, I guess, for lack of a better term, how are you checking them out or whatever it might be to see, is this person authentic? Can I trust them? Well, the first thing, let's take a look at some online virtual stuff, because we have all been in a situation now where a lot of people are working from home, and some by choice, by necessity. So we're seeing things in a 2D world instead of 3D. So I want to go there first.

When we talk about authenticity virtually, I'm judging before anyone has even opened their mouth. We're all assessing one another on our screens and what we see going on in that person's environment. We're making decisions about them, their competence, their ability to do, their professionalism, all of that. And I would really encourage people, I know we talk about virtual backgrounds

and all the things that people have access to now. I would really discourage people from using those because it sends a message to people that, what are you hiding? So I may not even consciously recognize that that's what I'm thinking, but I'm wondering in the back of my mind, okay, what are they hiding? What's going on behind there? The trust component of that is, if I'm being vulnerable and showing you my surroundings and showing you what's going on in my home or my office, I expect the same vulnerability and openness on your part in order for us to establish trust. So that, that's the first part about

authenticity when we're looking. The second is when we're having that initial meeting. So let's say we're meeting in person. I want to know that the person is attentive and interested. That shows me that they respect me, and it goes a long way in establishing trust. So how many meetings have we been to with someone? As soon as we meet them, they have their mobile device out, they're checking something, they're looking at their watch, they're looking around, or we've been at a meeting

where they're looking past us to the next person behind us. They don't seem to be engaged. And I have a whole thing that we can talk about around posture and gestures and all of that. But those are two really quick things that come into play. First, showing engagement, being trustworthy, so important. I love this. I hope everybody's listening right now because this rewind this and listen to it. This was incredibly important. And it was fascinating because when, when we're on zoom right now, also, as well as on the audio podcast. So we're on video looking at each other. And as soon as the video came up, I'm like, Oh, Hey, Pamela, you have these trees in the back. You have Aspen trees in the background behind you. And she's like, yeah, I live in the mountains. And I go, oh, I live in Colorado. So I mean, the reality is, and I'm sure you were checking out what's behind me as well.

And obviously not a virtual background. I don't like those either. It's fascinating when you start to say what you're doing and say what you're thinking because it really makes so much sense. It's a safety thing. You're taught to look around the room and make sure there are no threats or what are the opportunities, things like that. And that's not just a cop thing. That's an everybody thing. I think the cops are telling themselves to do that. But I think more than anything, it's a human nature thing where you're going, oh, who's here? Who do I know? Who can I do business with? Are my friends here? Are there people here I don't want to be here with? Things like that. So this is cool. So why don't you go

a little deeper in that? So we're talking about environment and we're talking about the person themselves and how they treat you. Because I mean, obviously we're bringing our environment to each other right now. That's kind of an interesting way of reading it. Otherwise, we would meet them somewhere and it's a mutual environment. So this is like a one-up for us to know their environment, don't you think? Oh, absolutely.

It sends so many cues. And they've actually done studies and research around this that whether or not it's happening in person or virtually, people can make fairly accurate assessments of the person they're dealing with, their status, their professionalism, their competence, based on their surroundings. So I don't want to freak people out because I know a lot of people are working from home, maybe not necessarily by choice, and are wondering, you know, oh my goodness, I have kids at home, and I have all of this going on, and I didn't have a proper home office, so what do I do?

What is that looking like? I just want to let people know that the majority of people are giving you a lot of grace and understanding around that. And we're all doing the best we can with what we have, but we are making those judgments. So anything that we can do as a professional to make our surroundings reflect what we're trying to communicate to the other person is so important. And that goes, like you said, Adam, everything from your background to how you're dressed, how you put yourself together, it all sends a message about your brand and who you are as a person. And those are what I call the display signals. So those are the nonverbal cues that we're sending. That's what we display.

And how we interpret that and receive them are what we decode from that other person. So there's a whole bunch of stuff we can talk about that. And then the trust that's developed between those two is when they meet. So when we are displaying and we're receiving, we're decoding, then we start to put all of that together. And that's where trust is really formed. And the cornerstone for that, and I'm sure we'll get into a little bit is empathy. That's the most important part of all of this competence is great, you know, knowing what

you're doing, feeling confident, fantastic, all of that goes toward trust. But empathy is really where rubber meets the road, so to speak, when it comes to building trust. Okay, we got to jump into that real quick. Let's go straight to empathy here. Okay. I love this topic. Emotional intelligence, empathy. Tell us your perspective on that because we hear the word a lot, but to understand how that really creates the mechanics of an interaction here is where the gold is. So what can you share with us about that? Well, being able to identify the emotions that the other party is displaying is so critically

important. And there may be a number of reasons why that's happening that have absolutely nothing to do with why you're meeting them. There could be something going on in their personal world, something that's just happened, the information that they've received. So really being alert and watching for the emotional cues that the other party is sending, critically important. That's where the best negotiators succeed is when they are aware, like you said, emotional intelligence around that. And it is the cornerstone of all good negotiations. So if you can shift your mindset to try to understand or better understand where that other person is coming from. So you

know, we take real estate, for example, buyer seller relationships, when the buyer can step into the seller's shoes and vice versa, the negotiations are more successful for everyone. And I'm sure you more than anyone would be able to contest to that as would many of the people that you work with. And it builds trust because it facilitates that openness in our environment and it encourages collaboration over competition. And when we collaborate, there's so much more on the table for everyone. And there are nonverbal things that we can do that demonstrate empathy. So I'm going to give you a couple of examples. And there are nonverbal things that we can do that demonstrate empathy. So I'm going to give you a couple of examples. And they may, once you hear them, it's so obvious,

but we don't think about them. And therefore we leave them on the table. The first one, if you're meeting with someone in person to simply move out from behind your desk, that's huge. If you can be seated somewhere where there's nothing, where there's not a barrier between you, it opens up the relationship and it goes a long way toward building trust. You're removing that barrier. And if you can't help but be at a table, because of course, sometimes there's documents, et cetera, things you're showing. If you can at least eliminate the barriers between you on the table, that goes a long way. So not placing your coffee cup right between the two of you. And when I mentioned that, if you're communicating with

someone or you're negotiating with someone and they move a glass or a pencil or papers that were off to the side and they place them in between you, you should be alerted to the fact that things may not be going as well as you might think they are. And you may have to start to adjust your strategy a little bit and be more open, listen a little bit more so that you can make some shifts and some changes. So that removal of barriers. The other thing is, believe it or not, round tables. And everything I'm going to talk about is all backed by studies,

not just studies that Google shows up. These are actual research papers. I'm happy to share them with you or anyone. Round tables, believe it or not, are more effective than square or rectangular tables. Now, in all of our boardrooms, we have those long rectangular tables, and sometimes that's all we have.

And so we can make the best of that by maybe moving the chairs a little bit, putting people closer together. But there's a reason why romantic restaurants have round tables. It increases intimacy and closeness, and it actually goes further with creativity. We have more creative, honest, and open meetings when there are fewer barriers between us. So that's the first thing. Mirroring. I know it sounds triteite and I'm not talking about the Simon Says kind of mirroring

where you move your hand, I move my hand, or you cross your legs, I cross my legs. I'm talking about our mirror neurons are picking up on things that we're seeing. So if someone seems agitated or they're stressed, we pick up on those subtleties and it heightens our stress and anxiety if the person on on the other hand is calm and relaxed and open we start to mirror that and we can lower the confrontation and increase trust between us as well so one technique that i would encourage people to try when you're negotiating with someone is mirror their body language subtly very very subtly, and just small things. And then after a few minutes, when you know how you get that feeling that the vibe is really working and things are going well, then slowly shift your posture, do something a little bit different, watch and see

if they do that as well. And then you know, you've really solidified that ground of commonality. And it goes a long way in building rapport and expressing empathy with the person you're communicating with. I love this. I've been taking notes here. This is some good stuff. It's interesting because so many people are not conscious about how they converse with others.

They're just talking. And it's fascinating because they're allowing their body to give more of a statement than their mouth. And those that truly can read their body understand what the message is before they even say it. I mean, this is incredibly powerful information here. It's so true. You hit it so perfectly because our non-verbals, now there's been lots of research that says, you know, 60% or 93% is non-verbal over verbal. And really none of those studies have been able to be duplicated. But what we do know from all of the research is the majority of the messaging that the other person is receiving comes from our non-verbal communication.

So the tone of our voice, the pitch, the speed, how we conduct our body language, our surroundings, all of that is sending messages. And you're right, if we can learn to control some of that, and we can influence, and we can build trust in ways that don't require extra money, extra time on our part, just some slight shifts in the things that we do and understanding that what we're doing and how it's being interpreted by others can really make a huge difference. I know I've seen lots of people talk about, well, you know, their arms are crossed, so they're closed off. And that's a huge myth. And that could be, I've crossed my arms because I'm cold. It could be that I've been working out a lot at the gym and I'm trying to show off my biceps.

It could be a million different reasons. But if the person is interpreting crossed arms as closed off, then in their mind, it's closed off. So we need to work at keeping our gestures more open toward people. And then they see us as more open. They're more trusting. They're more engaged with what we're doing. And I think that so often, and I have to catch myself doing that, right? When we're connecting with people, you really need to be aware of the subtleties that you're

sending. So I have a really good friend who's a great realtor. And I've asked her, you know, what is something that you do when people approach and like, how are you so good at this? You know, one thing I always do is when people walk in, I'm always standing. I don't have anything in front of me. I seem open. I'm smiling. I make these gestures and I'm really, you know, happy to see them. And I let them know that I'm happy to see them. It goes a long way and we all get tired. I remember when I was working as a federal prosecutor, oh my goodness, sometimes the last thing I wanted to do is appear open and engaged and get up and do all of these things. But it really goes a long way in negotiating and getting to a deal that works for everybody.

So let's talk a little bit more about the nonverbals here, because you also mentioned video. We open with, okay, what's going on here? But a lot of these nonverbal things happen in person more than on video. What are the things we can think about on video besides our background so that we're not putting hurdles in front of our ability to work our way through a negotiation or something like that. What should we focus on when we're in this little box? Definitely posture. So if we've already looked after our background and we've made ourselves presentable, and I encourage people, when you're showing up to a virtual meeting, dress as though you were going to meet that person in person and just show them the respect and the professionalism that the meeting calls for. If it's casual, go casual.

If it's professional, be more professional. And one of the things that your producer Mark sent out, and I thought it was a brilliant list. He gives these tips to the guests. And I thought, this is so perfect. I wish everyone did this. Have your camera at eye level so that when you're connecting with someone, they can look you

in the eyes. That's so important, especially in Western or North American culture. Eye contact goes a long way in building rapport and establishing trust. There are other cultures where it's not as important, but in ours and with the virtual space, it's very important. Other thing is good lighting. You have great lighting, so I can see your face. I can see your expressions. I can tell what's happening, and that's important. If we see someone and they're in shadows and we can't really see their eyes, we can't tell if they're smiling, it's difficult for us to decode what they're trying to communicate to us. So those are some really easy things. A technique that many people

might not think about is having a chair that doesn't roll around a lot. I know that seems counterintuitive because it can be really comfortable, but it can also be distracting for the viewer and it makes it more difficult for you to place both of your feet on the ground. And they've, again, done studies around all this technique of having your feet both firmly planted on the ground. It does a couple of things. One, it makes your posture more confident. It makes you more comfortable. But secondly, it grounds you in a way that emotionally provides stability.

So when you're having conversations, you're negotiating, you're teaching, you're training, whatever it is you're doing, it makes a big difference because it is sending those messages to your brain. It's stimulating our hormones to have less stress, more confidence. So, you know, decreasing the cortisol, increasing the testosterone to make us better and appear more engaged with the person that we're connecting with online. And if there's several people, we've all been on those Zoom meetings where, you know, it feels like there's 20 different squares going on, we don't know where to look, we're kind of shift the idea, we're looking over here at Sally, we're over here at John, we're all over the place. A really simple strategy is you can either take a photograph of someone you really like, and place it near your webcam so that it encourages you to smile and you remember to

smile. Or if you don't have that, you can just take a little sticky note, put a smiley face on it. It reminds you to smile. Now, there are some reasons why smiling may be inappropriate in a particular meeting or it's not called for, but at least it will remind you not to have the RBF, that resting bitter face that we all have. And sometimes we don't even realize that we're listening to the person we're engaged, but our facial expression is indicating something completely different. So if we can remind ourselves to either have a neutral face or at least a slight smile, that goes a long way when we're connecting with someone online. All right. I love this. I love this. In fact,

I've been telling people a lot of these same things, but I've also been saying, we don't have this inclination to smile at a little plastic box that's in front of us. Got it. It's impersonal. People don't have this relationship with their webcam. Exactly. So why would you smile there? So start with a smile, smile when you're not talking and end with a smile on a video. I love these tips. Fantastic. Pamela, you've been like bombarding us with value here. This is incredible. I'm going to have to go back and listen to this thing three or four times. So obviously we're in the real estate space. Okay. And you've done a lot of work. You speak for different realtor organizations, just a great contributor to the real estate community. So thank you for that. Let's say we're negotiating a major part of

real estate deal. What's a big tip that you always give to real estate agents when it comes to negotiating? First, obviously listen so much more. The more intel you can gain, and that is so critically important. And so often, we're thinking, what are we going to say next? Or, you know, our client has told us this, and we've got to get to that. Listening so that the more intel you can get about what's happening, what's going on, the basis of the deal, that seems obvious. But we oftentimes don't listen enough. So I talk about active listening, but even more importantly is active observation. And if you can do both, and this comes from

techniques where you're interviewing people, you're connecting with people, negotiating with people. My number one tip for sure is to just pay so much attention because if they're telling you something about a property, for example, and there's something that you're thinking, you know, that just doesn't seem right. There are some cues that are happening there that that just doesn't add up. I would encourage you to ask, always ask, can you tell me more about that? And then as soon as you do, that's the stimulus. We call that the stimulus. Watch for the response. And if the response is out of alignment with how they're answering, that should be a clue that you need to investigate further because, of course, you're representing your client

to the best of your ability. You want to make sure you have everything. And I just want to provide one thing of caution. We talk about detecting deception, et cetera, and all of the different techniques. And you see people that call themselves experts and tell you if the arms are crossed or they look up to the left or they do all of these things. It's all nonsense. What we're looking for is a direct response to the stimulus. And if we see two or more cues that tell us that something's out of alignment, then we know we're on the right track to investigate further and to just keep asking questions. And again, remain open, try to

remain as neutral as possible. I know we talk about removing emotions. We can never do that, but be hyper aware of the emotions that the other person is demonstrating so that you know where to go next in your negotiations. So that's really important. I love this. This is good stuff. Pamela, we've gone through an entire show already. It seems like we just started this conversation. This is, there's a lot to process here and a lot of great consciousness that people need to implement into their conversations, obviously. And that seems to be one of the key things that you notice in society is people lose consciousness of how their communication is occurring. And I guess for the purposes of what you're describing a lot, that's a good thing when you have consciousness

and the other side doesn't necessarily because you get to see their authenticity in their conversation. Exactly. This is truly amazing. Pamela, we have one question and I know you have an amazing answer to this that we ask everybody on our show.

And that is, how do you start with a win? My answer, and I'm plagiarizing this completely from Admiral McRaven, who I think is an incredible speaker and has such great, great nuggets for everyone. But there's two things. One, for me, making your bed, I know it seems so silly,

but he talks about, you know, if you have that one win at the beginning of your day, you've got that one thing nailed. And if you can master the little things and you pay attention to the little things, that means that you're going to be a lot more successful because you're more open and aware of the bigger things. If you can't manage the little things,

managing those big things is gonna be really, really difficult. And he ends it by saying, at the end of the day, if everything goes wrong throughout the day, at least when get home you have that bed that's made that reminds you that tomorrow is going to be better and I really I've followed that forever in a day and it's it's so true and of course exercise is a big thing Adam and I know that's huge for you and you probably had a million of your guests talk about that I think it's important as well but something as something as simple and easy as making your bed, I think, starts the day with a win.

Awesome. I love it. Pamela, where can our guests find you? I mean, they want to go out and they want to hire you as a speaker. They want to learn some more from you about nonverbal communication, trust, authenticity. How to really perform at the highest level when you're speaking with your customers and really the rest of life. Where can we find you? Well, I work with a lot of speakers bureaus.

So if they work with one, of course, reach out to them. My website is just my name, pamelabarnum.com. So we can connect there. And I'm very honored to have been a part of your community. And I look forward to continuing to listen to your podcast and starting with a win. Awesome. Thank you, Pamela.

We appreciate all that you've done for our communities. And thank you for being on Start With A Win. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening to Start With A Win. We hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you'd like to ask Adam a question and potentially be on our next episode, give us a call and leave us a message at 888-581-4430

don't forget to go into iTunes and subscribe, write a review and rate the show for more great content head over to startwithawin.com, follow Adam on Instagram Facebook and Twitter and remember, start with a win