The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – How to Talk to Anybody: Learn the Secrets to Small Talk, Business, Management, Sales & Social Conversations & How to Make Real Friends (Communication Skills) by Derek Borthwick

Episode Date: October 13, 2025

How to Talk to Anybody: Learn the Secrets to Small Talk, Business, Management, Sales & Social Conversations & How to Make Real Friends (Communication Skills) by Derek Borthwick Power2mind.com https://www.amazon.com/How-Talk-Anybody-Conversations-Communication/dp/B09TWBJF8C The Hidden Communication System That Instantly Makes You More Persuasive, Likeable, and Confident—in Business and in Life NEWLY UPDATED – From Award-Winning, International Bestselling Author and Certified Communication Expert Derek Borthwick Includes a Bonus Audio Program to Accelerate Your Results Unlock the One Skill That Transforms Everything—Sales, Success, Relationships, and Confidence Whether you're leading a team, closing a deal, networking, or building better personal relationships, your ability to communicate effectively is the game-changer. This is not another list of surface-level tips. It’s a proven step-by-step communication system rooted in neuroscience, behavioural psychology, and Derek Borthwick’s proprietary ©POWER2MIND method—designed to rewire your communication style for confidence, influence, and connection. What You’ll Learn: ✅ Speak with confidence and clarity in sales, business, and management ✅ Build trust, connection, and instant likeability with anyone ✅ Lead conversations and influence outcomes—without force or manipulation ✅ Handle difficult people and high-pressure situations with calm control ✅ Attract better opportunities, friendships, and relationships ✅ Make small talk effortless—even if you're naturally reserved ✅ Develop magnetic charisma people are drawn to ✅ Shift how others respond to you—instantly Includes: The Rapid Learning Accelerator Audio to reinforce key strategies and deepen your transformation Two Books in One Part One: Discover how people are wired—what drives them, what builds trust, and how to connect authentically. Part Two: Apply these insights using powerful tools and practical steps to master communication in any area of your life. If you’re ready to improve every conversation, increase your influence, and finally feel in control when you speak... Scroll up and click “Buy Now with 1-Click” to get started instantly.About the author Derek is a mind, advanced communication and business expert. He is a multiple best selling author international trainer and coach. He has extensive experience in sales and marketing and has worked with some of the largest companies in the world including assisting FTSE 100 companies and has achieved well over $1 billion in sales. Derek has lectured at some of Scotland's top Universities on his methods. He has a diploma in Clinical Hypnotherapy and NLP and is a Master Practitioner of NLP (software for the mind.) He also has a diploma in Transformational Coaching from the Henka Institute. His approach is very different. He has combined and drawn from a wide variety of disciplines to create the Power2Mind method. Power2mind is a very powerful and highly effective method. Derek has also acted in a consultant role as a sales judge for a University Sales competition. He has worked with, coached, and trained some of the world's largest companies but also enjoys working with smaller firms. Together with coaching, training, reading and writing, he has a passion for public speaking being Area Director for Toastmasters International 2020/2021 and has spoken in front of thousands of people.

You wanted the best... You've got the best podcast. The hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready, get ready. Strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times.

Because you're about to go on a moment. monster education rollercoaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi, folks, Voss here from the Christfoss Show.com. On the early 6th, that makes official, welcome to the big show. As always, the Chris Voss shows and family loves you, but doesn't judge you. At least not as harshly as the rest of your family. So make sure you're for the show to your family, friends, and relatives.

Go to Goodreads.com, Fortress, Chris Voss. LinkedIn.com, Fortress, Chris Foss. Chris was one of the TikTok and he and all those crazy places in the internet. Terry amazing man on the show. We're talking about his book called How to Talk to Anybody, Learn the Secrets to Small Talk, Business Management, Sales, and Social Conversations, and how to make real friends. Basically, communication skills is aware. Out March 10th, 2022, Derek Borthwick is joining us in the show. We're going to get into him and learn a lot of cool stuff about how to improve the quality of your life.

He helps professionals eliminate fear, speak with confidence, and influence others, whether on stage and meetings or across the negotiating table. As a best-selling author of six books on communication, public speaking, sales, body language, and mindset, including the forementioned book, he's helped over 100,000 readers and professionals master the skills they need to thrive in business and life. He delivers live training across Europe, the Middle East, and U.S. for clients, including Informa, and Major Investors. firms. His sessions focus on real world results, helping professionals speak with authority, clear and lead with credibility, and convert influence into action. Welcome the show. How are you, Derek? I'm doing great. Thank you. Thank you so much for inviting me. Super excited to be here. And we're super excited to have you. Give us a dot com. How can people find you on the interwebs?

Yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn. You can also find me on the website, which is power and then the number two, and then mine.com. And of course, I'm all over Amazon as well. So just type in my name and my books will appear whichever country you're in. So give us a 30,000 over you. What's in this book? Yeah, this book, this all came about. I'll give you a little background. This came about because I realized that a lot of people were struggling with communication skills.

So what this does is it gives you the psychology of how people are wired. So once you understand that and also the mindset, which is really, really important. And there's also some formulas and some structures that if you follow, you can pretty much speak to anybody. It shows you how to speak through small talk, how to engage you with anyone, and how to really capture people's attention. And, you know, addressing some of the key psychological biases that people are hardwired to. They give you an example of one, if you like. Sure, please. So you imagine you get your iPhone or you're a Samson or whatever, and you're with a group of friends.

And you said to me, well, I tell you what, Derek, you take a picture of me and my friends. And I say, yeah, sure. So I take a picture of you, and then I give you the phone back. Who do you look at first in the picture? Me. Exactly, yeah. Even if you've got kids, right? You don't tell you'd rather have that, right?

But we do. So everybody is remarkably self-centered. So one of the key learning points is get people talking about their favorite topic, which is them. Exactly. So the sooner you do that, the sooner you'll start building rapport, you know. it's pretty easy the theory is anyway you know being interested in people i i don't know if it's an art form you know i i've always been a story collector my life so i've loved hearing people's stories collecting their stories maybe it's because i'm sick of my story you know i like how can

you enjoy podcasting chris i'm like i'm sick of hearing about me and my stories i like when people come on and tell me what they did with their lives and i'm like that should have maybe done that or that sounds really interesting you know you know i i mean i i i I suppose most of my life I was obsessed about me, but now I kind of enjoy being obsessed about other people because I don't know. Sometimes their stuff is more interesting. I'm like, yeah, I should have done that.

But being curious about people, I think, is really, I don't know if it's a developed skill. I mean, I grew up not liking people and being an introvert. So maybe it is. What do you think? Is it a developed skill to be interested in people and care other than yourself? Hey, listen, yeah, I think you can definitely learn this. I'll let you into a little secret.

When I was a child, I was very, very shy. You know, I was so shy when I was a young child, I wouldn't even go to nursery school. Wow. I was always too old to go, the cutoff date by the time I finally went. This is a skill you can learn. And a bit like what you said there, Chris, what I've done in the past is I've modeled people. So I've looked at people who are charismatic, people who are able to captivate people.

I thought, well, what is it? They do. And I've come up with various formulas and ways of analyzing people. And showing an interest, did you hit the nail right on the head? The key thing is, sure, you can read all the books and you can have all the step-by-step processes and ways to go about this. But the real secret is to develop an intense desire to get to know someone. Yeah, yeah. That's the secret.

And then what you find is the same principles of body languages, the outer expression is a reflection of the inner thought. So if you can start getting your mindset right that you want to get to know someone, guess what? all the non-verbals and your voice and everything else starts to mirror that and you become more interesting and the thing is chris you know if you want to be seen as more interesting more interested it's as simple as that yeah and you have to be sincere about it you know one of my favorite uh i always forget his name the great in comic uh who passed away recently but uh he you know he would insult people on stage, kind of troll them on stage, and he would even say, be able to get away of stuff that most people would consider racist now, but he would do it

in a way that would make people laugh, sometimes a little sharp, but he would also, you know, self, he would tell jokes about himself, and, but people would know, and he would talk about this. He goes, people know that it's a joke, that I'm having fun with them, that I care, that I still care, and it's not that I don't care, or that I'm being hateful. They know that that that's genuine. And people, like you say, they feel that through the way you approach them. You know, we do three shows a day, Monday through Thursday on the Chris Foss show. That's 12 shows a week, 48 a month, assuming everyone shows up.

Last week we had a couple reschedules. But, you know, people are like, the math doesn't work here, Chris. Well, people do reschedule folks every now and then. But so I make 12 new friends a week, three new friends a day. And, you know, usually I'm meeting people like yourself in the green room for the first time. And, you know, people catch on if you generally care about them or if you're just, you know, you're just like, whatever, another guest or some guy with a story, you know, I don't know one of these. You know, they're going to catch on to that, right? They do.

You know, I had a bizarre experience recently, actually, where somebody asked me to go on their podcast. And do you know what the intro was? Chris, you're going to love this. What? I don't know anything about you or what you do. That was my intro. So I politely declined to participate in the show because this is not going to really work very well at all. And you're absolutely right because when we look at the way the mind, the mind's got two parts.

You're the conscious mind and the unconscious mind. So the conscious mind reads the content. That's the PowerPoint presentation with the size six font and 500 slide deck. The unconscious mind reads the intent. And that's the key thing. And a big thing when I'm training people on public speaking, it's really quite. difficult at times. In fact, the smarter they are, sometimes the harder it is to get them to realize this, that people won't remember what you said, but they will remember how you made

them feel. And that's the key thing. That's why I always punch everyone in the face when I get in time. You know, well, that's one strategy, isn't it? It doesn't always wear that well. But if you can be playful, Chris, you know, the more playful you are, the more charismatic you are. You often see people who are very charismatic. They're playful. And that doesn't mean you have to be in a in a business meeting juggling balls and breathing fire. But hey, I don't remember any contract for any company I've worked for, Chris, where they said, look, you can't have fun. There's no smiling in here. I will admit some of the American banks did actually look like they had that in the 200 conditions, but it wasn't specifically laid out. So if you can have a bit of fun what you're doing, you'll come

across better and people will enjoy your company better. Yeah. And that's really important. You know, we live in a world where, you know, I run a huge dating group about 5,000 people, and it seems like COVID, really, and, you know, the alienation of COVID, the shock of it, I think has some, I think some people are still damaged by, you know, I mean, there was a moment there where we just thought it was all going to go to hell. And, you know, no one knew what was going on. That was the absurdity of, you know, the experience because no one knew it was going to happen. You know, and we'd all watched the movies, like one of my, there was that one movie. I watched with Dustin Hoff, and I think it was, where the monkeys got this disease, and it was just killing people. Like, it was just slaughter across the board. And, but what's interesting is that's come out of COVID, is it really, I really feel broke our society in a lot of ways, even in our politics and everything. And so I see people now that they really struggle, like we, we host this in my dating group in-person meetups.

and they're not forced ones like matchmaking or whatever. They just can come to a bar and they can mingle and, you know, if they find somebody they like, you know, get to know them better. And I have like 5,000 people in the group, but we can only get out of maybe 100 people out at a time because people are afraid. They let me tell this to me. They're afraid to meet people.

And I'm like, well, if you want a date and meet your partner, whatever it is you want for life and another person, you kind of have to eventually meet them in person. You kind of do, Chris. It's a bit tricky other ways. Tricky. Same thing with the jobs, you know. That's the other thing I tell them.

I go, they're like, well, I'm afraid of going to public places where there's a bunch of single people. And I'm like, you walk into 7-Eleven and a gas station every day like it's your home. And it's filled with fucking strangers. You go to a concert and you're with like 10,000 other strangers and you're fine with that. but God forbid you should go someplace where I don't know you might meet the person who changes your whole life

yeah well it's kind of strange you mean the whole small talk thing people really really struggle with it yeah you know there's a couple of things you can do I mean for the first thing is if you start asking a personal question you know if I came up to you and we've never met to say hey I like your hat

it's a little bit too personal too early on now with guys maybe it's okay but with you know women and the other opposite sex we need to be more careful with that so the best way to do it is you talk about the situation, the occasion or the location. That's the best way to do it. You know, for example, if you were at a networking event, it kind of goes like this, Chris. Hi, what's your name? And where are you from? And what do you do? And what's your job in the company? And then it kind of goes silent because people don't know how to do the dance,

the verbal dance. And it's quite simple, really. You just do this. You ask somebody a question. I'll give you the simple version first. There's a more advanced one. You ask a question, and then you make a small comment, and then you ask another question, which is an open question. So if I said to you, it was something like, Chris, how long have you been conducting podcast for? 16 years. Now, I would then make a comment. 16 years, that's a long time. You must have had some very interesting guests on the show, small comment.

Tell me, who was the most interesting you had on? A couple billionaires. It was interesting to have their perspective, yeah. Do you see how we're starting just to chat away? So I'm getting you talking to. And you're listening to what I'm saying. Yeah. Now, what I was doing there as well, people sharp reveal, they noticed I was actually echoing back. Yeah. So I said, billionaires. Now, when I've done this, I did this recently, actually. I was actually out in Dubai doing some training recently. And I was talking about this echo technique, which is what you basically echo back what somebody says.

Now, if they're very verbose and they use lots of long words and long sense, it can get tricky. And somebody said to me, they said, well, I don't think this echoing thing's going to work. And I said, oh, so you don't think the echoing thing's going to work? And they said, no, I think it's too obvious. And I went, oh, so you think it's too obvious? They went, yeah, I think I'll be spotted. And I said, oh, so you think you'd be spotted? And this went on.

And eventually people started laughing. And I said, and they went, what's so funny? I said, I've just been echoing you. And then the others were laughing. They said, well, it wouldn't happen to me. I said, well, I was echoing you five minutes ago. So it's a really, it sounds manipulative, but it's not really. What it does is it forces you to listen.

And also, they use it from therapy, Chris. This comes to the world of therapy. And it shows you're listening and it's a very good way to stop the Because we've got two worlds We've got the external world I'm looking out through my eyes at the moment But I've also got the internal world

Which is the little voice inside And the mental pictures And the challenge when you're speaking to somebody Is to make sure they're uptime And not thinking of what am I going to do at the weekend Or where shall I go for a beer Or you know what movie am I going to see So that's the trick

And by doing this It really makes sure you're an uptime People really feel listened to I'd urge you're listening to try it Try it with people Don't necessarily your biggest business meeting. You've got to convince yourself because, you know, don't believe a word I say. Just try it. It works. It works. Well, people, people, you know, there's a lot of

times where when you talk to people, like, especially if they ask you what job you do, they're more like sizing you up. Yeah. You know what I mean? They're trying to decide, eh, it should be friends of this person. Do they have enough social status, career status, money status that I should like them? You know, it's kind of a, is my dick bigger than your sort a whipout thing, you know, and there's people that do that. Like, you go to conferences and network, and it's like, what do you do? And then you're like, I just, I'm just a secretary. And they go this, they're like, oh, that's nice to see it, but they don't walk off, you know.

And it's kind of a, it's really, it can be really judgy. And you're like, what the fuck, dude, you don't care about me. You're, you're just trying to decide if I'm up to your, you know, your hierarchy of tier that you think you're on, you could probably be fired from. tomorrow where I can. But yeah, go ahead. And so that mirroring really helps people. I was going to tell the joke, too. The other way that I use mirroring is when people insult me. So they go, you're a jerk. And they go, you're a jerk. And they go, you're a jerk. And then that just happens 500 times. And they go, what are you doing? I'm like, mirroring you. Trying to get even a poor.

Yeah, and that kind of works as well. But there's something weird that was on in conferences, Chris. But, you know, when you're going to conferences and there's something weird that happens to people start behaving really weird in business environments, right? And this is one of them is when they go to these conferences and they start doing networking. And it doesn't matter who you're speaking to. They're always looking around at somebody else to see if there's somebody more interesting to speak to. Yeah.

It's kind of the stick is bigger questionnaire they do, right? I'm just trying to find the most important person in the room, maybe is there? Yeah. And then I'll tell you another one. in business, it's really strange, is, and again, trying to get this through to people when I'm training, because I do a lot of public speaking training,

which combines all the books, you know, all the material from all the different disciplines. And it's really quite difficult to get people away from facts and get to tell stories. Could you imagine, Chris, if you went for a drink,

and I said, you know, Chris, the average temperature in Los Angeles is so many degrees far high? Did you know, the average rainfall in Paris is so many inches? Did you know the tallest mountain in Scotland is this? You'd be like, hey, Derek,

what's wrong? you. What's in your sugar bowl? Some of what's going on here, you know? We tell stories. So why do we start behaving weird when we're in business? It doesn't mean because you're in business, you've got to start relaying fact after fact after fact after fact and using it like an encyclopedia. You've got to start telling stories. That's how we communicate. And I think, you know, I kind of realized I was a storyteller and collector with the gentleman on CNN who used to be the big radio interviewer, King. Don King? No, that's not Don King. I forget his name. King. People know who he is, I'm sure. He's on TV forever on CNN. But, you know, he said one time,

I remember watching it kind of just stuck an arrow on my brain, where he said, you have to generally really care about people. And he goes, anywhere I go, I talk to people, and I'm interested in them, and they sense that I'm interested in. And I am acutely aware, you know, I think of myself as a story collector. And so people really know if you're really interested in them, if you really are asking questions that you're sincerely care about being empathetic towards them. You know, and I get, I know, I've collected amazing stories from people all my life, whether it's on the podcast or in on an airplane, you know, I have this habit where if I sit down an airplane, there's, you know, two people sitting around me, I immediately say hello to them. Sometimes I'll shake their hand if I think I can get away

with that, but I break that ice right away. Yeah, yeah. Same thing with the elevator, I might pop a joke in the elevator right away. And like you say, you just use location, like, ah, flight travel, it's wild, huh? Yeah, yeah. And people even, they'll make the small talk,

they'll go, yeah, yeah, it is. And they kind of like that someone's breaking the ice, and a lot of times, I can have, like, I've had the whole back of the plane laughing at my idiot, stupid jokes. I'm the one entertaining. And they're so uncomfortable. like you know it's you're in that little box in the elevator you know and it's kind of a weird silence

and i think people hate that so anytime you can like break that up anytime you can enlighten their lives and you know and sometimes just telling stories and hear other people's stories you know i i remember i remember seeing a guy on the plane and he had this weird it clearly some sort of prosthetic for a human being i think it was like a knee or something it was really weird it wasn't like an arm or leg And I was like, what is that thing? That was like some kind of bionic $6 million a man thing you got there. What is that? Because he was holding it in the seat.

And then the whole two rows, we were all laughing. You know, he tells us this is interesting story about this thing. And so for me, it makes life so much more richer. Because, I mean, all I'm going to do in my city is sit there and stew about how poor there was treated TSA, how long lines were, how long we're sitting, how long we're sitting, how uncomfortable it is, how the air conditioning. he's not working on the fucking plane right all those things that you can be miserable about your own head or you know thinking about your stupid problems and shit and so for me talking other people you know

it makes everyone else feel better it makes me feel better so you know the genuineness is really important you really have to care because people are you do Chris and I think if you can develop it all comes to the mindset if you can have the mindset of curiosity so you have this genuine desire to get to know someone but a curiosity now give you a couple of examples where this is kind of some kind of weird stories really outside um normally we're in because i'm in europe and it's pretty dark here at the moment so i've got a screen up normally you're looking at a nice window and

you see trees and everything well at the back there there would be or at the front there would be a few years ago there was guys digging the road now i went over most people ignore them but i went over and i started chatting to the work guys because i was curious i said you know when you're chasing, changing the gas main. How does it work? Because where does the gas go and what are the, what are the houses you do that haven't got it? So he started explaining all this. Now at that time, my youngest son was obsessed with diggers. Or you would call them backhoe, I think, in the US. So my son was, he was obsessed with going at these things that dig the road. Anyway, an excavator. The language barrier is going to fall in down here. Anyway, my, so my son was fascinated with this.

Now, because I'd shown interest in this, the guy let him go. up, sit in the digger and play about with it. All because I'd shown an interest. There was another time, a bizarre one where I went to a hotel in Luxembourg and I was checking in. And the guy came out and he had quite a long beard.

It was a bit longer than yours, Chris. You know, it was a kind of heading towards Zizi Top style. Oh, Zizi Tom. Yeah, well, not quite, but it was a longish one. He was obviously, so I knew having a long beard like that, that takes effort. And he would be proud of it. So I just mentioned, I said, I'm curious how long does it take you go to beer? Before you knew it, he was out the back. He got his

phone. He was showing me pictures of all his beard style. He then started showing me pictures of his family. He then upgraded me to a room and said, and said, oh, and then he saw me the next day. He said, oh, I've just seen your website. You can come and do some training for us. And then when I was checking out, the guy went in and the normal checkout guy went out the way. And the manager comes out. I'll deal with Mr. Borthwick. And I was given, you know, upgraded. It was fantastic. just because I'd actually shown an interest in somebody else. Now, here's the key thing. If you can really find out what somebody's real passion is,

and you ask them about that, you watch how quickly you build a report. Now, I sometimes go, I call it fishing, Chris, for fun, right? So what I'll do is I'll find people who've got poor communication skills, and I'll say something like, I'm just writing a new book, and they'll go, all right. so I'll go so I've been fishing I'll go I'll get my rod out and I'll have another go so I think this one's going to be a really good seller it'll be really popular and they'll go all right so it's actually I do it for fun

but what and what you should be doing is saying oh really Derek that sounds interesting tell me what's the book about and ask a few questions before you don't have to be you know right into my books or me particularly but just asking a few questions because anyone's written a book knows it takes a lot of work. It's not a lot of people can complete it. And that's, I think that's why it's so highly valued. Yeah, yeah. So as soon as you can press that hot button, you know, you're pretty much away. And the key thing is, here's the other thing. If you can find out they've got an unusual hobby and you can talk a bit about that, you're away. Now, you can talk about a hobby. I had a conversation with somebody over lunch years ago about rowing. Now, I know

nothing about rowing. It was one of the, you know, this advanced rowing like they do in the Olympics. I need nothing about it, but at the end of it, the guy thought I did because I was just asking intelligent questions. Things like, what's the, you know, what's the boat made of? Or how do they, how do they allocate the weight? Do you have, is there a power to weight ratio? And how do you, you know, what's the

difference in a good rowing team and a bad rowing team? And so I was just asking, I was genuinely interested. What I did was, got the mindset that I wanted to, which I did actually, I wanted to learn about rowing because I knew nothing about it. So it's a great conversation. And the guy, said to me because oh you're a great conversation with i'm really said anything i'm just asking a lot of questions yeah i mean asking questions being interested uh you know i always

you know a way i find out about people's hobbies like you said is i just ask what's their uh sexual kink it doesn't work so well especially just when it's right off the cuff and the small talking hi how you doing i'm chris voss the chris voss show so let me ask you what's your sexual kink and then they're all offended and i'm like well i'm just trying to get to know you i read uh derrick's book and i'm just trying to you know ask questions about any habit you yeah yeah you should like maybe you like swinging i don't know it's you know i'm trying to build a rapport damn it yeah maybe i shouldn't have put that chapter in christmas there are some things maybe you should take your time into like at least

five minutes in the conversation before you pull the you know what's what's your only fans URL. That always works out good at business conferences, too. That's always great. HR says I can't do that anymore or else. Now, if you're in Vegas going to a business convention, but after you're going to Spearmintrero, you can ask people that question. Anyway, I don't know what that means.

I don't even know what Spearmatio means. I just made up a name. Anyway, let's talk about some of the offerings you have on your website at power to mind.com. Yeah, some of that, well, what have gone? Chris, you see, people are, we're all just that bit lazy, right? So we don't, we like to have an easy route. You know, as Henry Ford once said, one of my favorite quotes is thinking is one of the hardest things that anyone can do, which is why so few people do it.

And if you look around the world, you'll probably see that. So if there's an easy way to do something and a hard way, people would like the easy way. So what I've done is I've recorded these special audio programs that program your mind. So they've got ones for conference, one for fear of public speaking, ones for charisma on demand, one's for motivation. There's about 10 of them, I think. Yeah, about 10, and the one for sleeping as well. And the great thing about these is you do absolutely nothing.

You just put your headphones on, you chill out, close your eyes, relax, and this will help program your mind. So I've had some fantastic results in these from clients. I've got a nice testimonial on the website there. Somebody used it. He said they've been using your programs. You've gone from an introvert to actually being interviewed live on TV. It was something I couldn't have done a few months ago.

So these are some of the products. I've got I'm working on other things, all courses, and also I've got a new YouTube channel coming out. So these products are very, very useful. And you actually get a free one that comes with the books. So that helps you learn the information in the book better. And then if you want to buy some more, that's cool. You know, if you want to focus on specific ones like confidence,

I say, are public speaking or present like a pro. They're all available for you. Ah. And people can take a look at the website. They can hire you. So you've got Transformational Audio, Books, Training, coaching. And then can people work with you directly? Yeah, absolutely. I've just been doing actually one-to-one coaching this week with somebody out in Abu Dhabi who has a big presentation coming up.

So I help execs do their pitches. I help them do town halls. I work with anybody really who wants to improve the presentation and communication skills. There's a few knacks online as well, a few tricks you can do because we're all on Zoom these days or teams. So, you know, there's a few things you can do to bring that alive. Because if you've, I'm sure your viewers will have heard this this week. It's that sentence, Chris, that just kills any presentation. I'm just going to share my screen. And up comes the usual slide with size six font that's so confusing, even Einstein can't understand it, the double axis chart, and they go on and on. These people are what I call PowerPoint hypnotists. There was a, there was a hypnotist that actually followed, and he came out with a

great line. He actually said, he said, the problem is, he said, it's not getting people into trance. It's getting them out of the trance they're in at the moment. And that's the issue. Now, when you have these PowerPoint presenters, they literally, it's like holidays. Imagine Chris, have you been on holiday recently? Oh, no, they don't allow me out of the cage when I'm on on the podcast. When was the last holiday you were on? I kind of take weekend holidays all the time. Weekend holiday. I go on shooting joints and where they're kind of holidays where I just go wander and shoot for a whole day. Go on.

Do you take any pictures when you're there? Oh, yeah. I'm a photographer, so I go out and I just shoot for a whole day. Okay. Well, so imagine that we go around and I pop around your house. And I said, where you've been crazy? You say, I've been out shooting. That sounds really interesting.

Yeah. Because if you popped around my house without shooting, you know, it would set off the alarms. So you show me, you then show me, I said, if you got any pictures, so you get your phone out, and you show me the first picture. That's fabulous, Chris. What is that? You tell me. Then you get the second one.

That's great. And then we get to the third one. And then the fourth one. And then the fifth one. So you get what I'm going, holiday snaps. Now, if that's for somebody's holiday snaps, why do people think it's going to be any different when you're doing a PowerPoint presentation?

You've got to break it up. Ideally, about every six minutes, you need to do something different. Yeah. That makes sense. That makes sense. So you help them do these presentations and know how to do stuff. Yeah, I can see how that can be, the PowerPoint stuff can be a little. You know, half the time it gets lost, too, if they struggle with the technology

or the technology's not working right, you know, like, how can the buttons not work in? You know, that sort of, that's sort of gear. And if you would, and so, yeah, that's kind of crazy how that whole thing can work. Well, it's far better if you can do it without slides. I mean, because I'm old enough to have done it before we had all these technology, but it's a kind of strange thing, Chris. As soon as you say to somebody, I'd like you to do a presentation, You can see fire tracks running out the room as they scurry off to get PowerPoint done.

People are going to remember, PowerPoint is not the presentation. I'll say that again. PowerPoint is not the presentation. It is an aid to the presentation. You are the presentation. Now, the best speakers that I've witnessed use hardly any slides, and they've managed to keep my attention for three days. I get quite a lot of feedback that's very favorable

and people say, how can you manage to keep our attention for two, three days? I do these three days training. And it's simple. I don't use PowerPoint slides. I speak like a human. Speak from the heart and get them doing stuff

because people want to do stuff. They don't want to sit and listen to me. And you don't learn communication skills and presenting or public speaking, but from an armchair. You get it from getting up. In fact, there's something I heard of years ago, Chris. I like this.

It's just come to mind. it was a guy who was one of these motivational type speakers and he said right he goes I'm going to teach you all how to be really successful and he said everyone went right okay so you could everybody stand up he said then he took the chair and he said take your chairs and turn them upside down

and on the bottom of the chair was an envelope and inside was I think it was a $10 bill or something like that and the guy said there's the first rule of life If you want to be successful, get up off your ass. So the same with public speaking and presenting. You don't learn it from an armchair. Sure, my audience is going to help you with a mind state, but you've still got to do some of the exercises,

and that's what I do when I'm training. You have to do the work. I mean, I can't just buy the book and not read it and expect to learn by osmosis, just being near it. That's what I want. Well, the thing is, some people actually do, people, but all the materials in the books, some people do, the diligent ones,

or they highlight it. I get emails all the time, said it was great, they enjoyed it, it's really helped and transformed. They'll highlight bits and then they'll practice a bit. What a lot of people do is they read the whole book quickly

and expect then to be this brilliant presenter. All the techniques are in there, but what to do is take one at a time, practice it and then get better. Even just doing the echo technique, as we talked about earlier, it seems simple, but you'd be surprised how difficult people find it

when I'm training them. I say, no, no, you've got to echo the exact words. Yeah, you've got to echo the exact words. See, one of the issues is when you're doing, getting back to what we talk about,

you're on the communication side with the comment, but the way not to do it is this, Chris, if I said to you something like, so I ask you, so what's your favourite hobby? Let's just say you say, you're out and shooting in the country. I say, oh, shooting, that's interesting.

I went shooting once. Did you know, I once went up to the north of Scotland. We went away and we were in this little lodge we were there for four days and the weather. It's not about me. It's a short comment. Something like, shooting, that sounds interesting. I once went shooting.

It was great. Tell me, what is it? you like about shooting. That's the way we do it. Yeah. So anything more you want to pitch out before we go? Yeah, well, just, I've got a number of books. They'll just run through the ones for people that are interested. We've got the how to talk to anybody. We've got the public speaking one, how to speak effectively without fear. There's the sales book, which has actually got some neat mind stuff in that, some really good stories in that inside the mind of sales. That's the first one. The mindset book, how to eliminate negative thinking. There's a body language book,

how to read anybody, a negotiation book, the art of negotiation, how to master getting to yes. And public speaking, how to speak effectively without fear. So those are the six ones. And they sell very well all over the world. Yeah, you're doing, you're doing excellent with them. Any future books maybe you're working on or projects you're planning on to tease out? Yeah, at the moment, I'm having a little pause in the writing.

I've got a couple of topics of mine, Chris. But the main thing for me to work on is I'm looking at doing a mastermind group. So that's a subscription service. so people can then get live coaching from me and also to do some training material as well. So people can actually get a course. I'm a big fan of online courses. I spend a lot of money of my own money on courses

to learn various different skills, sub-ecetary because I quite like that stuff, you know, as well. And it's a great way to learn because you can play it, stop it, rewind it, do it, onto the next bit. So that's what I'm working on at the moment. And then I've got a new YouTube channel coming out, which is going to be featuring YouTube shorts.

So they're going to be no more than a minute long with lots of tips on communication to get to the point quickly because people don't want to listen to me for hours and hours, do they? That's what they tell me on the podcast. You know, it's funny sometimes if a guest isn't carrying the show

or presenting well, I have to jump in and fill, right? Because on a very rare case, I'll get a guest who's like just giving one word answers. You know, like, tell me about your book or give us a $30,000 review about your book and they're like,

it's a book about business. And you're like, dude, we got a half an hour here, man. we got some time to kill you got to help me out man and you know and then later and so usually i'll end up filling in with the story or something with more stories than i normally do sometimes i'll just dominate because i'm just like well if you're not going to do this then fuck you i'm just going to roll because i don't want my audience to fall asleep and uh and then they'll still write me on youtube and they're like you need to let the guests talk more and and i'm like that was one

where the guest wasn't talking for shit yeah it's quite it's quite tricky Some people are naturally good at it. The problem is getting to shut up. I'd probably fall in that category. It's getting a shut up. No, you're talking more. Some people that they're struggling a bit, you know, and it's really, it's hard work.

You've got to use a lot of open questions. And then, you know, you've really got to keep digging. It's just a matter of digging. It's in there somewhere. Once you find the hot button, everybody's got a hot button, Chris. Even the desire, everybody has a desire. Even the desire not to have a desire is a desire. Right?

So, you know, everybody has that. It's just a matter of. poking around and prodding and trying to find what it is that makes them tick. But once you press it, you'll be off. Yeah. And I mean, this, this works in so many different things. Like, I, I use it for business. I use it for social. I've been seeing all my life, so I use it for dating. Being able to impress someone in conversation and, you know, carry a conversation. She don't look like an anthithal moron, because I kind of look like a nun to throw a moron with my resting bitch face, can really help. And it just helps you with that.

interpersonal relationships. And I mean, some of the best stories I've ever collected, best people ever met, sometimes they changed my life with their stories or their interactions in my life from me just being opening them up to their stories and then later finding out that this sounds like a person I love to have a good friendship with. You know, it's changed my life in so many ways. And like I say, with you, I was the same way. I was an introvert. I was a people watcher. You couldn't get me to talk to anybody. And so, you know, And people tell me, well, I'm an introvert, so I can't do what you do, Chris. Like, no, you can.

You just have to train yourself. So, you can. And there's actually somebody that I went on a course with. And it was quite a strange thing that happened, Chris, because the guy was hugely charismatic on stage, and he had this presence. And you hold your attention for two, three days. But yet when you met him in the evening, you looked at him and thought, is this the same guy? It was almost like, I thought, have you got a double ganger?

Have you swapped this? Your twin brother? Because he kind of lost this. So it's really, I mean, I was saying to the guys I was in trading last week, people have got to realize it's a show when you're doing presenting or even when you're going out and you're doing small talk. It's a bit of a show. You have to get the energy levels up.

You've got to get the excitement and the enthusiasm up. If you don't, if you just end up with the monotone voice that goes like that and after a while, people just eventually fall asleep because you become a bit boring with the monotone voice going on and on. You've got to put a bit of excitement into it, you know? Yeah. I listen to a lot of podcasts and I've been on podcasts like that where you're just, you're wondering if the host is dead,

and he's just as long as I'm going to sign. None in recent memory, folks. But yeah, you've got to make exciting. And timing is important too. You know, the show runs kind of on a metronome and being able to hop with energy and fill it. Because, you know,

if you're pulling across boring, like, well, tell me about, I guess you, you know, that doesn't sound very interesting or energetic. Like, no one's going to, people are like, well, you don't seem very interested, right? So energy and stuff is important, I think, too. Yeah, you absolutely, you've got to be interested.

I mean, there's a few other techniques as well. I'll share a couple others if you want, just for fun, for people. One of the things to be aware of is this is hopefully help people in the business communication. I'd really need any form of communication. And that is, people tend to resist what they're told, but the extent. accept what they conclude. So something you have to give people a reason for it. So if I said to you, Chris, get us a coffee, will you? The little voice inside your head goes, F you, get your own coffee, right? What am I, your bitch? But exactly, you're not my bitch. But if I turned

around and said to you, Chris, could you get me a coffee? Because I'm just about to jump on an important client for a $50 million deal. Oh. It sounds plausible. Yeah. Possibly we don't want to cut of that action. Yeah. And what I've done as well, Chris, is I've also given you an escape route there. But I've changed the waiting so that it's more of my favour because if you said no, it would appear a bit unreasonable. So always try and give people, you know, give them some context. People will tend to do things if you give them. And actually the research bears this out. If you were, if I was walking along the street and let's just say it was the neighborhood you live in Chris and there was a lot of litter around. And I said, Chris, we fill in this survey on

litter, you probably say no. But if I said you look, we're looking at investing and cleaning up the area, so it's nice for everywhere, make it nice and safe for you, your family, the kids and all this, would you like to help us with this by filling in the survey? It's more likely that you will do that because I've given you a reason to do it, yeah? So that's one of the key things. The other thing as well is if you think about when you've got to be a little bit different, you say, I've got my waistcoat on today. So I've got my, this is actually the Borthick tar waistcoat. Now, there is actually a village Borthwick, not far from Edinburgh. where I live in Scotland.

And there's also Borthwick Castle. Now, there's not many Borthwick's around, Chris. So we either weren't very good with the ladies or we were terrible in battle because there's not many of us around. But this is the, this is the box. So I wear this because it's a little bit different. You know, and you go, well, what's that guy wearing?

It's, you know, it's multi-colour of what's going on here. So that's what you call a pattern interrupt. Now, you have to, when you're in business or anything for that matter, if you think about the people, when you're walking down the street, Chris, the only people that you will remember are the very attractive looking people, okay, let's not go there, someone who looks unusual and someone who's behaving unusually. Everything else goes why, and that's because the brain operates as a pattern recognition device, and it predicts, it's a predictive mechanism. So the world is pretty much as you predicted. Now, if somebody was walking along to you along the street dressed as Batman, then,

that's going to stand out. You're going to go, what happens is you come out of your little trance and you go, oh, what's going on here? And the reptile brain comes in. You go, do I want to fight, flight, or there is another F, but we'll leave that one out as well. And then what happens is you get an emotional response,

so you may think, hey, I've always wanted to be Batman. Wouldn't it be cool to be dressed Batman? You may be jealous. You may actually be annoyed. You may be angry. You think it's silly. And then you have that moment where you walk down the street, Chris. You know that moment afterwards you go, why would someone be dressed as Batman at 9 a.m. On a Monday morning in the middle of town.

Why would they do that? It's weird. Maybe it's the real Batman. Well, it could be. You know, you'd be good if it was, wouldn't it? So this is what, this is, this is an example of how you want to be a little bit different. Now, what do a lot of people do in, if you think about it in, let's use a dating term as well. Imagine you saw somebody you like. Let's say I saw an attractive woman.

I'm quite safe. I've got three kids and a partner. Let's just say I spotted a lady at the bus stop. And I thought, you know what, I want to get married to her. So what I'll do is I'll wander over and give her a list of 10 very logical reasons as to why we should get married. It's not going to work very well. There's no emotional connection. So if that's the way the brain works when we're in a social environment, it's not any different business either.

You've still got to go away. What are we doing business? We try and logic somebody into decision. We then hope they're interested. And then latterly, we're not seen as a threat. That's not the way the brain works. It's the other way around. So we need to build an emotional connection, whether it's in business or dating or whether

your family, your kids, your friends, that's the secret. And I can't emphasize that enough. It's all very well. You know what it's like? It's an artist. I can give you all the steps, but it's paint by numbers. If you can get the emotional content involved and a desire to connect and a curiosity, develop curiosity, you'll find that you'll become a lot more interesting.

and communicate a lot better as well. It will change your life, people. It's changed mine. My favorite thing I love more than anything is podcasting, talking to people and collecting stories. And I think a lot of people, I think that's the reason a lot of podcasters aren't fully successful is because they just want to go through the motions.

Oh, I'm going to talk to people. And I've seen some hosts that the show really is always about them, no matter who the author, prove the person is they have on. And they tend to dominate. And you're like, you know, I get it when my, sometimes I get that YouTube thing. But usually it's a failure of the guest to be interesting. So I'm just like, I'm filling the show, you know. The worst thing you can have a radio is dead air.

Yeah. And people tend to watch all our shows all the way through. Like 96% of our shows are watched all the way through. And I think at the end, they go, oh, Chris wrapping the show, skip to the next one. So we know the consumption is there. And so a lot of times, even if I have a bad guest, I can kind of save it with jokes or I can save it with my stories. But, yeah, I'll still get hate every now.

And then you, why don't you just talk more? We tried. It's when he wouldn't talk. We kept asking over there, like, you know, so tell us about what you do for work. Well, like, show up on Monday. Okay. It's really tough.

There's nothing worse when you're in that ever that before. Sometimes you just have to admit defeat, you know, you can try everything. And sometimes, because guess what, Chris, people don't follow the script. Yeah. And you know what, life would be so much easier if everyone was just a bit more like us. Yeah, to tell another joke, we had one poor gentleman on the show, a wonderful guy, great book. But he just blanked, and I think maybe it was stage fright, but he blanked on what, there was like five steps or something to success in his book or something. And so I asked him, you know, what are the five steps if you can touch on him?

Well, you know, we've all written books. So, you know, we've spent 50 million hours in editing and then talking about the thing. So you should know it's in your book, but I think he just got stage fright, we all do. And he blanked. And I was like, so I had to film it. I'm like, he goes, I don't know what they are at the top of my head. And I'm like, you wrote the book. You wrote the book?

Sometimes I get confused with what's in what book, because I've got six of them. Yeah, you're losing track of who's wearing. Yeah, but it's sometimes you go, was it in that book or that book? But it's, I mean, all my books, the first half is how the mind works. and it's the psychological biases. And then after that, there's a step-by-step part. But the key part, whether you're negotiating, whether you're speaking in public,

whether you're talking to somebody, even reading and learning body language, some people, if you're not careful, it can become a bit paint by numbers. You know, when you're doing the mirroring, you end up like this, it's kind of very jagged and like a sort of old-fashioned movie. You know, the old ones where they used to look very sort of jerky.

So you want to try and flow with it. You'll actually find that if you have rapport with something, but you will actually mirror them naturally. Your body language will mirror. And it's very, very powerful. This is not manipulative. It's something we do as human beings. Next time you do that, just watch that with somebody.

And I'll give you a view as a little tip as well. This is a great one. If you want to show you're listening, all you do is you tilt your head slightly to one side, about 15 to 20 degrees and just nod occasionally. Now, when you're presenting or if you're speaking and you see or you're dating, the body language and dating is a bit different. So you'll start to see the head tilt. If it's a female you're speaking to, you'll see the head tilt back.

You'll actually see neck exposure, so the head goes back as well. So it's an asymmetric body language. There's a chapter in my book on the whole dating thing. It's different to the business side. But we'll leave that aside for one minute. Just in regular conversation, you'll see people's heads will tilt to the side and nod if they're interested. Now, as soon as you see that, you know you've got rapport with them.

Now, a little trick, I'll share you a little secret. Perhaps I shouldn't do this. I don't know. that when I was in boring business meeting years ago, right? I won't mention the company. I used to get a bit bored, Chris. So what I'd do is I just tilt my head to onsite and I would just nod occasionally. The only problem was they said, well, what do you think, Derek?

And I would then have to turn around and say, well, I'm pretty much with everybody else on this way. I'm pretty much with everyone else. I like that. You know, they aren't a vague language. It's always very, very useful. You know, so these are body language tricks that you can use. I'll share another one. I think this will be fun for your viewers, okay?

They're going to love this one. and I'd urge him to try it. And I'll give you a little story about this how it came about. I'd actually heard about this. It was from a famous hypnotist called Dave Dobson, and I've learned it from another trainer. And it's called the eyebrow flash. Okay, now, it's something that mammalians do

when they meet each other, when it's a sign of friendships. So it's a quick flick up and down of the eyebrows. Now, I'd read about this, and I'd been taking my son when he was younger and he's buggy or stroller, as you say, in the US, along to the nursery or kindergarten. So I was walking along with him,

Every day, a couple would appear at the same time. And I would try and engage with them. Because I live in Edinburgh, Edinburgh's not the most friendly places. Sorry to people from Edinburgh, but it's not, you know. So these people were, I'll be in trouble now with my Scots colleagues. They were, so they were coming the other side of the road. And I would try engage them, Chris. And this was going on for months and I couldn't.

And all of a sudden one day I flashed my eyebrows at it. The guy immediately jumped out, like jumped out, his trance. And you know, from that moment on, when he saw me, he started waving. Really? I taught this to one of my executive clients, and he was a little bit wary. He thought, I'm not sure about this. He was in the gym, and he just flashed his eyebrows when he met somebody. And this guy came over and said, do we know each other?

I'm sure we've met before. So it's incredibly powerful. You will actually see that in a dating context. Now, I don't know if they're able to see me on this, to see the actually see the camera here, but it's not the eyebrows going up and down like this in a creepy sort of way. It's just a natural up and down flash. Now, which is a raising and lowering the eyebrows. Try it.

I must be what I'm doing wrong. Now, you don't always get it between male and female because sometimes it can be seen as an attractive signal depending on who it is and if they don't want to catch your eye. But generally, if males, you'll see with another male, you'll often do this. And females do it. Females will do it as well. Just not if they want to give out signals of attraction. Yeah. It's fun as well.

You love it. It depends on if she's attracted to you or not, basically. Well, yeah, there's all sorts of things that are the pupil dilating and all about. You know, I'm a bit old for that, Chris, you know. See, people, people, you know, you. Usually when I'm on dates, you know, I get that head-turning thing, but usually it's like a nod-off and a yawn. Falling asleep. Listen to this. Is that mean, you give them Cocoa, Chris, and read them a bed-throat story.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So as we go out, pitch people on how to reach out to you, get to know you better, and order up your books. Yeah, sure, please link in with me. You'll find me on LinkedIn. It's Derek Borkwick. You find me all the books on Amazon as well. The website is Power, and then the number two, and then mind.com, and you'll find the books on there, the audio, the audio books, links to Amazon. and to get them.

And I say I'll have some online training courses come up soon. And I'll have a membership area where I'll be doing live coaching and sharing information with people so they can actually get to interact with me and learn these skills. Awesome, sauce. Well, this has been fun. Thank you very much, Derek, for coming to show. We really appreciate it.

Thank you for making it. Great. Thank you. And thanks for tuning in. Order of the book where Refine Books are sold by Derek. You can read the book, How to Talk to Anybody. Learn the Secrets to Small Talk Business. management, sales and social conversations, and how to make real friends, because God knows

you can get fake friends pretty easy in this world. I've seen them on Twitter. Anyway, guys, thanks for tuning in. Go to Goodrease.com, Fortezs, Chris Foss, LinkedIn.com, Fortess, Chris Foss, won the TikTokity and all those crazy places of the internet. Be good to each other. Stay safe, and I'll see you guys next time. And that should have us out.