THE ED MYLETT SHOW - How to Negotiate the RIGHT Way with Chris Voss

Episode Date: August 6, 2024

Master the Art of Negotiation with FBI Hostage Negotiator, Chris Voss! This week, I’m incredibly excited to bring you an episode that’s all about mastering one of the most crucial skills you can have – negotiation. And who better to learn from than the legendary Chris Voss, a former FBI hostage negotiator and the brilliant mind behind "Never Split the Difference." Chris takes us on an eye-opening journey from his high-stakes negotiations with terrorists and criminals to applying those same powerful techniques in business and everyday life. This episode is packed with insights that will change the way you approach every interaction. We get REAL about the art of negotiation teaching you expert tactics including: Tactical Empathy: Discover how to connect deeply with anyone you’re negotiating with by truly understanding their perspective. Mirroring and Labeling: Learn these simple yet powerful techniques to build rapport and influence outcomes. The Power of ‘No’: Understand why getting a ‘No’ can be just as valuable as a ‘Yes’ and how to use it to your advantage. Creating the Illusion of Control: Find out how to guide conversations so the other party feels in control while you steer towards your goals. Calibrated Questions: Master the art of asking the right questions to uncover hidden truths and navigate complex situations. Chris shares some of his most intense negotiation stories, like dealing with a bank robber and talking down a hostage-taker. These real-life examples illustrate the principles he’s developed and how you can apply them to achieve success in your own negotiations. This episode isn’t just for business leaders or salespeople – it’s for anyone who wants to improve their ability to communicate, persuade, and achieve their goals. Whether you’re negotiating a deal, asking for a raise, or resolving a conflict at home, these strategies will give you the edge. Join us for this transformative conversation and equip yourself with the tools to become a master negotiator. Don’t miss out on these invaluable lessons from one of the best in the field! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So hey guys, listen, we're all trying to get more productive and the question is, how do you find a way to get an edge? I'm a big believer that if you're getting mentoring or you're in an environment that causes growth, a growth based environment, that you're much more likely to grow and you're going to grow faster. And that's why I love Growth Day. Growth Day is an app that my friend Brendan Burchard has created that I'm a big fan of. Write this down, growthday.com forward slash ed. So if you want to be more productive, by the way the way he's asked me I post videos in there every single Monday that gets your day off to the right start he's got about five thousand ten thousand dollars worth of courses that are in there that come with the app also some of the top influencers in the world are all posting content and they're

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So go to growthday.com forward slash ed. That's growthday.com forward slash ed. This show is sponsored by Airbnb. My next door neighbor in Florida, every time they leave, they've been turning their house into an Airbnb head. I love doing it and I'm excited about the start of it. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.ca slash host. This year Dell Technologies back to school event is delivering impressive tech with an inspiring purpose. Learn how Dell is helping computer aid

whose work is helping equip solar community hubs with tech and AI literacy skills to empower remote, displaced, or disconnected communities around the world. Help Dell make a difference and shop AI-ready PCs powered by Snapdragon X-series processors at dell.com slash deals. That's dell.com slash deals. Welcome back to the show everybody. So I wanted to have this man on for a couple years. I'm really big fan of his work, not just from a negotiation standpoint, but from a communication standpoint. And he spent 24 years in the FBI crisis negotiation unit.

He's done over 150 different international hostage type negotiations. I think he's probably the foremost expert on the planet in communication, not just negotiation. His work is unique. He obviously brings an experience and a perspective that really nobody else on the planet has, based on what I just told you. And I'm just a big fan of his work. So by the way, I got a book too. It's been out for a while but I read it when it came out called Never Split the Difference. I highly recommend you guys all get that. We're gonna break that stuff down today with Chris Voss. So Chris welcome to the show finally. Thanks Ed, thanks for having me on. I appreciate it. Well I don't even know where to begin with you because there's so much to it but when I introduced you I said it the way I meant it that I think most everything in life is probably negotiation but I know

most everything in life involves communication. Right, there you go. Yeah and you've communicated with all types of different people but the first thing I wanted to ask you is I saw a clip of you recently which surprised me because I've been in I just kind of got I thought I was a great reader of people. You know, I thought I was. And as I've gotten older, I think I realized maybe not quite as good as I thought. And this guy that kind of hammered me, actually kind of almost, I'd call it,

almost scammed me at something. He kept saying, man, I want to make this a win-win when he kept opening up. I want to make it a win-win. And I heard you say, that's like a red flag for you anytime somebody says win win. So I know it's an odd place to start, but why? I just got to know why personally.

Yeah, because the person who's going to manipulate us has learned that people really drop their guard when they hear that. I mean, it's one of those things. Win-win and also you got to watch out for the F word fair. Fair. And you can get people to drop their guard and somebody who's really desirous of collaboration. I mean, the people that that'll take advantage of you, they learn that like,

if I say win, win enough, I mean, they're going to like, Oh, wow. Okay. That'd be hypnotized. And so the, you know, mutual win, mutual benefit is definitely the goal. And so it's a difference between, are you willing to collaborate or are you just using that, you know, are you weaponizing the phrase? And there's a few things out there that disguises collaboration, but the people have a tendency to weaponize against you.

And win-win is one of those phrases and without fail, the sooner somebody uses it as a specific phrase and the more often they use it, they're bad news. But yet you recommend Chris in your work to use the word fair as much as you possibly can, don't you? Well, no, be cautious of it. Okay. And because fair is really lacking in criteria. Okay. Fair is like beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And so if somebody's accusing me of being unfair, I'll say, Alright,

so let's rewind, I want I want to, I want you to be treated fairly at all times. And so anytime that you get the sense that I'm not, let's go back to it. Now that's a different characterization of somebody saying like, look, I just want one. I just want what's fair. Now that's a highly manipulative thing to say, you're probably going to drop your guard, you're going to question yourself. Because the vast majority of human beings think of themselves as fair. So anytime it's implied that we're being unfair, we'll have a tendency to give in. So there's a lot, there's more nuance to that. Anytime you hear the F word, it should prick up your ears and understand what it really means. And mostly there's no criteria to fair.

Okay, that's fascinating to me because those are two of the things that's particular individual used with me was win win and fair fair fair. And you know, you're very much right. And by the way, today, guys, when we're talking, we're going to talk, we're not going to talk a lot about FBI releases, we're going to talk about communication, being able to build rapport with people, persuasion, connection. And I think a good place to start, I know you've done this a lot, but for my audience, I think it's so, I like concepts and then you fill it in with specificity. And in the book, never split the difference. You talk about there really being like three types of personalities in negotiation. And you can correct me if I'm wrong, because I read the book, you know, know quite a while ago and then I reviewed it for here but there's the accommodator the assertive and the analyst right okay what are those and is that true of just humans in general like is my son one of those three is my wife one of those three are you one of those three does everybody sort of come prepackaged when you're communicating them forget negotiating even though that's sort of what it is is Is everyone one of those?

Yes. Now, does that define and constrain you? No, depends upon how much you learn. But your default innate conflict type is fight, flight, make friends. And of the wiring that we've inherited from the cavemen, cavemen that survived, fought, ran, or made friends. And those that didn't either died and have no ancestors. Now this is cut across a globe. You know, it really does. And it's based on something called the Thomas Killman Conflict Mode Instrument, TKI. I first got introduced to that at Harvard.

And TKI divided I first got introduced to that at Harvard and TKI divided people into five types. And my Harvard brethren threw out two of the three, two of the five. And Bob Lanoukin principally led this. I'm a big fan of Bob's book, Beyond Winning, by the way. And so one day I said, okay, I buy in, but I want to know why you threw out the two types and are left with those three. And he said, because the other two are learned, they're combinations of the three and these are the three basic types. Now TKI uses slightly different terms.

And we've changed the terms, the questions a little bit to come up with our own model. Like for example, the accommodate or the assertive was known as the competitive type. And I thought that meant, all right, so the other types are competitive. And I found all three types to be very competitive. So that, you know, that was, that was a bit of a red herring.

So fight, flight, make friends. And then there's words, world split evenly into thirds. Is it rule of thumb? Chinese, Indian, we have given this test to literally 10,000 people globally. I saw it split up evenly into thirds when they were doing it at Harvard. A global audience. Harvard students are drawn from all over the world. In the business schools that we taught in, a global audience. American business schools draw from all over the world. The US is the place to get an MBA, whether you're in China, whether you're in India.

And then one time we were, we were doing some training a number of years ago, all Chinese, Chinese development bank executives, we're training them in Germany. It sounds like the U.N. of training, right? Yeah. But we were told in advance, Chinese this, Chinese that,

and we saw all three types manifested. you went of training, right? Yeah. But we're told in advance, you know, Chinese this, Chinese that, and we saw all three types manifested in the Chinese. So what does that mean? Typically, it means your impasse is usually type mismatch and a misinterpretation of a dynamic. Most common one is silence. I go dead silent on you. I'm an analyst. I'm thinking. And Lex Friedman, very analytical dude, he's talking about silence on his podcast one time and he says to him, silence is a shared intimacy.

You go silent with Lex, the analyst, he feels more bonded to you. You're both comfortable in the silence. He shares. Accommodator, relationship, hope, focused, all communication. The meanest thing they could do is to go silent. An accommodator signals fury an accommodator signals fury by withdrawing from communication. So imagine a accommodator and an analyst, you know, the analyst is going like, would you just shut up? I'm trying to think. And the accommodator is going, Oh, the analyst Lex is furious at me. That's why he's not talking.

And so it's that, that dynamic that's usually a problem with impasse. How do you, and I know it's more complicated than one question, but let's just take one type. The assertive. Yeah. How do you deduce that you're dealing with an assertive, you know, in a relatively quick period of time? I know there's the questions, but is there a way that I'm, okay, I'm dealing with an assertive right now? The only person that's going to sound like an assertive is an assertive, you know, talking to, I'm a natural born assertive.

Donald Trump's great poster child, not taking a position good or bad. He's a great example of the assertive. Somebody once told me when I was being my natural default assertive self, that talking to me was like getting hit in the face with a brick. I mean, we are blunt, we are direct.

We see ourselves simply as direct and honest. You feel like you're getting hit in the face with a brick. Now the accommodator, neither the accommodator nor the analyst will ever come off that way. Where you might get confused. The analysts, analytical by nature, they see the accommodators as smiling, happy, go lucky type making more deals. Now the deals always with accommodators always have implementation problems because they're hope focused, not detail focused. Hope is not a strategy.

Hope is a principal strategy to accommodate. So the analyst goes, how does this guy just by smiling make more deals than I make? And they go like, how this person smiles a lot and it seems to help. And so, you know, the analyst will often be mistaken for an accommodator because they're smart enough to change their demeanor. So that's sometimes you could get confused between those two types. So the assertive, so everybody it's a commonator, assertive and analyst. The assertive is the easiest to see coming is basically what you're saying. Yeah, you're gonna, yeah they're an elephant coming through the jungle. You know they're on their way. Well what's interesting, I guarantee you for me it just happened too, when you began to

describe the assertive I immediately flashed to two or three friends of mine immediately. I'm like yep assertive the assertive, I immediately flashed it to two or three friends of mine immediately. I'm like, yep, assertive, assertive. And I guarantee you everybody did in that moment as well. So, hey guys, I want to jump in here for a second and talk about change and growth. And you know, by the way, it's no secret how people get ahead in life or how they grow. And also taking a look at the future. If you want to change your future, you got to change the things you're doing. If you continue to do the same things, you're probably going to produce the same results. But if you get into

a new environment where you're learning new things and you're around other people that are growth oriented, you're much more likely to do that yourself. And that's why I love Growth Day. Write this down for a second, growthday.com forward slash ed. My friend Brendal Bruchard has created the most incredible personal development and business app that I've ever seen in my life. Everything from goal-setting software to personal accountability, journaling, courses, thousands of dollars worth of courses in there as well. I create content in there on Mondays where I contribute as do a whole bunch of other influences like the Avengers of influencers and business minds in there.

It's the Netflix for high achievers or people that want to be high achievers so go check it out. My friend Brennan's made it very affordable, very easy to get involved. Go to growthday.com forward slash ed. That's growthday.com forward slash ed. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp everybody and I'm so grateful that we are because you know, I really believe in therapy and so many people ask me, what have all the people on your show have in common? Because I've had athletes, entertainers, you know, scientists, political figures, business leaders, self-improvement folks, and what do they all have in common? The vast majority of them have been to therapy and it's

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gonna last a long time that you're proud to wear and getting it half to better off is awesome. So go to quince.com slash ed for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns if you don't like it. That's Quince. Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash ed to get free shipping and a 365 day return policy. Quince.com slash ed. The thing I've learned most from your work though, and this is where I want to pull apart, so everybody forget negotiation, this is just life skills right here. And I think I have been by and large terrible at this most of my life, what I'm about to ask you about. And I think I'm been by and large terrible at this most of my life, what I'm about to ask you about. And I think I'm an assertive number one, probably.

And although I don't have a lot of abilities, I really don't. One of them is the ability to speak and to communicate. And I think oftentimes I rely on that as opposed to what I've really worked on the last decade is my listening skills. And I have found like I'll do a retreat with a bunch of people that'll come in, for example, for business, right? And I'll talk for three days, give them the best information, engage them, train them up, motivate them, inspire them. And they leave and I think they think it's good. This is back in the day. And then another buddy of mine would come in. He's

not even really that prepared. They sit around and BS for three days and they ask them a bunch of questions. They all talk and they leave and it gets back to me. That was the greatest retreat they've ever been to in their lives. And it felt to me like it's probably because they were listened to more. So it's just a concept as a negotiator, as a communicator, as a man, as a human, how important is active listening and listening in general to persuasion and connection with people? Because I think it's a lost art. It's an advanced skill.

And in many cases, like, isn't assertive, and you sound very much like an assertive, your description for a variety of reasons. Assertives are time is money, people. And so if you're given instructions, like, I'm going to jam, you know, time is money people. And so if you're given instructions, like I'm gonna jam, you know, time is money every moment, no moment can be wasted. I'm gonna download as much value as I possibly can. And I'm not gonna waste a moment

not giving these people value for each and every minute they're here. And so that becomes a bit of a day luge to start with. And it's hard to keep up with it's it's everybody on my team. We got that problem on our instruction was so want to give you nothing but valuable content. And so then listening like the tiniest little things, how much time do you have for somebody who's not listening to you?

Like zero. And you're going to notice it right away. And so in these tiny moments being listened to actually increases analysis on both sides. It gives people an opportunity to do a little bit more processing. And so there's a, there's a whole variety of subtle nuances, invisible nuances that affect the proactive, not just active, proactive listening starts to kick into gear. And so I'll get, it seems

less efficient. And then suddenly you're in a, you've accelerated 15 steps, you don't even know how it happened. And that's, you know, and to me, and it's one of the, I, I possess, that's the magic. I know the magic's coming by just these subtle little tweaks. So what are a couple of tweaks you use? What do you, there's some active listening skills you'll use to let someone know you are. Right? So it's one thing to be listening. It's another thing for them to get the message and feeling that you're listening as well. Right?

Well, the secret easiest one, simplest is the mirror, repeating the last one to three words of what somebody has just said. Um, and this is the best one to open up your teenager. Like there have been so many moms who suddenly open up their daughters because you know the kid comes home from school how was your day? Fine. What'd you do? I don't remember. You didn't indicate to them that you even listened to the answer to the first question. So you say how was your day? They go fine. The parent's response should be fine. was your day? They go, fine. The parents response should be, fine. Which is, I,

even though you only gave me one word, I just proved that I listened to it. Now that tiny moment tends to open people up very quickly. Because normally you got a list of questions, billions, and you're checking them off the list. Mom, dad, I'm going to say, how was your day? What did you do? Boom, boom. You feel like your intention to do a job as a parent to display interest is there. Yes, it is. But your method was poor because by following up immediately with your next question, you made them think you weren't listening to the first answer. And so the mirror is like the first way to get your foot in the door, to open the communication up. Yeah, this is why you should be following Chris's work,

why you should bring him in to speak, why you should get never split the difference. That alone is simple. And I don't do it. I don't do it. Here's what I do do. That's, I just learned from you recently. I was in, I am in the middle of a rather intense negotiation on something right now. And I allowed it to escalate to where it got heated. And the advantage to that though is I got to use one of your techniques and I want everyone to have you elaborate on

this because I think the foundation of what I've learned is just allowing someone to feel heard or be heard is so critical We'll talk about that in the negotiations hostage wise next but I want to ask you this So anyway, it got elevated. This was just like a week ago, even though I learned this from you a little while ago and uh The guy said something to me about what he wouldn't do. And then sort of a statement about me that wasn't flattering. Yeah. And the normal me would have been just to annihilate him, right?

Verbal, which I would have made me feel good in the moment and gotten us further away. And I, not kidding you, I was sitting about 30 feet from where I am right now and I knew I was having you on the show in a few weeks. And so I was even more familiar with your work. And I actually said to him, I said, I won't say his name. I said to him, I said, listen, you must have a great reason for feeling that way and saying that. What is it? And he just opened up and it allowed him to talk. And basically what it did is it bought me time to think about other things. But it also, I got so much more information in the next seven minutes from him

than I'd gotten in three, two hour full sessions previously. And we connected pretty deeply during that moment. So can you talk about the question to ask when someone says that? Because I probably phrased it wrong, and why it matters so much? Yeah, that is like the universal magic label. Like no matter if somebody's arguing with you, somebody's agreeing with you, like there's never going to be an instance when you can't say it, you know, you said you must have a great reason for saying that, you know, version of that is, it seems like you have a reason

for saying that, seems like you have a reason for saying that, seems like you have a reason for doing it. Like somebody just calls you the worst name they could possibly call you. Seems like you got a great reason for saying it and they open up. Somebody completely agrees with what you just said. Seems like you got a reason, a great reason for saying and they open up like that is like if I could, if I could teach people just that one label and say, here's what I want you to do for the rest of today. Nothing else comes out of your mouth. Just today. Just today. It seems like you got a great reason for saying that. You start that tomorrow morning first, saying at the end of the day, you got to say it 15 times, post on my Instagram what happened. At the FBI negotiate. Tell me what kind of day you had. I guarantee you, you're going to have a

cooler day than you ever could have imagined. And what first of all, well done. And that's a great example. Like, and it bought you time. Yeah., and it stopped you from, uh, you know, counter-launching your nuclear missiles and mutually assured destruction, right? Right. So the Americans, can I tell you the other thing it did, it not only connected us, I'm working on some content I'm creating right now that I just stumbled into in my life, the last five years, where I talk about changing the lens in your life. When you're engaging with people of switching it, cause you're, we all see

them in our relationship with them through our lens, our filter, our lens. And so I'm creating work right now that talks about creating an ability just to be a better human about switch the lens and have your mom see you through how your mom sees you, you know, how does she react to your last and change the lens is the bottom line. And what it actually did in that moment for me. So, so angry is it changed the lens and I actually saw me from him. And when I started to see what he sees in me, it helped me better understand

his position, but also how to respond and react and connect with him, to be honest with you. Yeah. Someone, Dr. Phil told me this and I, I, I, I, I wouldn't know. I want to know the validity of it or how valid it is. He told me that in hostage negotiation, that the number one criteria, so correct if it's wrong and then tell us how important it is.

Okay. But I think it's a bold state that in hostage negotiation, maybe he heard this from you, I don't know. That in hostage negotiation, the number one criteria of getting the hostages back, if everything were ranked is not that the needs or the demands were met of the person or anything like that, but that the actual hostage taker felt listened to for why they did it, true or false. And if it's not true, how important is that anyway? true. How important is that anyway? True and true. And, um, I love that he caught that he and I've had, you know, a conversation in the past. Uh, he'd been generous to me and he's mentioned my name a couple of times, which I'm grateful for. And that said a thousand percent.

And while it sounds crazy, if you consider human human beings, how do we make decisions? We escalate. And the first thing that we, if we're not heard, then the first time we talk normally, you know, we try to get listened to. All right. So we were, it proved to us that that didn't work. So now we're going to, we're going to escalate our tone of voice. We're going to escalate our rhetoric.

We're going to escalate our adjectives. That doesn't work. Then we either give up or then that's when we start to get violent. But it all started from a need to be heard to begin with. And like that translates. I mean, that's why, like my team, we make more deals because our focus is on hearing the other side out

to start with. And it's a universal need of human banks. That's just striking and we'll just step back from a second everybody and hear that. The number one thing in getting a hostage back in a negotiation is that that person feels you've heard why they took the hostages. Do you think by and large, I was just thinking about this people in my life just right now occurred to me. I don't believe there's these huge differences and all this other stuff, but do you think by and large women are better at this than men just intuitively? Have you had any work with that? Like I'm just thinking like in my life my female friends certainly listen better to me. There's

this great bit right now that uh Brian Regan has this comedy bit where his buddy's going through a divorce and he goes and plays five hours of golf with his buddy and he gets home Regan gets home and his wife says to him so how's Dave doing and Regan goes I don't know she goes didn't you just spend five hours with him in the golf cart yeah and she says well is he dating anybody he goes I don't know you didn't ask him he's dating buddy he goes no goes, I know he's got a new driver, but you know, but yet I would think if, if two ladies were together for five hours on the golf course, they might listen to each other a little bit better.

Maybe that's not gender specific at all, but what are your thoughts? I'm just curious your thoughts on that. Yeah. All right. So let me, let me, uh, three parts of the answer. Okay. Nature versus nurture. I haven't seen hard science that says that nature gives them a head start. Now, nurture does.

Women are conditioned very early on, like little girl gets into trouble and the females in her life, the female mentors are gonna be like, look, you gotta learn your soft skills. You know, a little girl gets into a fight with a little boy, whoops his ass. Because pre-adolescents, they're kind of even physically. But the women mentors know eventually a little boy is going to pass you by and you're going to have to have soft power to win.

So tremendous amount of nurturing to begin with. Little boy gets into a fight, goes home and the male mentors are like, you know, go back there and don't ever come home here again crying and complaining. You go back there and you stand up and you fight. So it's a different kind of nurture. Now the Black Swan skills, women pick them up faster than men do. And at the top end, we see no difference in gender performance. But I do know consistently

that women pick this methodology faster than men. So my hypothesis is, the pre-work, they got more pre-work in the nurturing to begin with. And then, like I said, at the top end, if you're coachable, man or woman, it doesn't make any difference. eBay Motors is here for the ride. Remember when you first saw the potential, then through some elbow grease, fresh installs,

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seen you say that just as fascinating to me is a way to accelerate a negotiation or a conversation with somebody. I was surprised by this. And it could be a friendly negotiation like, hey, where are we going to dinner tonight? Or it could be a hostage negotiation, but is to actually state a hypothesis early in the conversation about what you believe they're feeling or thinking in order to get them to open up. That surprised me because I thought you would just want somebody to talk. So talk about the hypothesis theory of accelerating a negotiation or a connection. You know,

the emphasis on that word originally came from my son Brandon. And he said, like, look, we've got to get people to test their thinking. And if you make an assumption, you might be, you know, you kind of scared the test. I mean, it's the reason why there's phrases criticizing assumptions is because our lack of testing our assumptions. So he said, let, if we, we can help people, if you say hypothesis to begin with that requires some testing and it, it accepts that you could be wrong and your, your ego's not going to get blown apart. If you are wrong, that's, that's's not gonna get blown apart if you are wrong.

That's part of the scientific method, if you will. So then you throw out a hypothesis and intention has a smell. Your intent is to collaborate with somebody. And I'm not saying for sure that this is where you're coming from, but kind of seems that way. And then if I'm dead wrong and I want somebody wants jumped down my throat. I said, you sound angry. They were, they were angry, but the guy jumped down my throat. I'm not angry. And I said, well, I didn't say you were angry. I said, you sound. And how we seemed, how we sound, how he was coming off was inarguable. I was just making an observation. And that actually dialed them down completely to

begin with. So if your thinking starts with, I got a hypothesis I want to test, the other side gets a feel that you're willing to be corrected and you're not trying to be judgmental. So you're saying it's okay to say, hey, correct me if I'm wrong, but what I think you're saying is this, or what I think you're feeling is this. That's opening doors, not closing them. Yeah, the intent by that is 1000% right. Now, you know, there's a couple of sort of nuances in the wording that I would change. Okay. The I is a self-centering word. know, there's, there's a couple of sort of nuances in the wording that I would change.

The I is a self centering word. So it's a little more effective to say, you know, you see, you seem upset versus I'm guessing you're upset. You know, I, they're tiny little, each word hits people emotionally different. And there's some context to it. And I tends to be self-centering and as a general rule, you want to avoid it when you're trying to make it all about the other person. And then, but then there are times when you drop the word, I, and there's, there's, it's, there's no word that in and of itself is good or bad. Yes isn't good or bad, no isn't good or bad. It's all context and I is one of those words. Just understand it tends to

be self-centering. There are moments when you want to self-center, but when you're demonstrating, listening, you're trying to put all the emphasis on the other person, the more you can eliminate the word I, the better off you're going to be Very good. I noticed when, in your hypothetical there, when the guy came back at you angry, it sounded to me even now you modulated your language differently because you're such a pro, but it sounded to me that you went to a more, maybe potentially slower or soothing tone in your voice, just even right now when you role played by yourself. Was that just coincidental or did I pick up on something there? No, no, you're picking up on it. I mean, the secret magic skill... Like if your tone is great, it's shocking what you can get away with saying.

And it's, you know, slowing down, it's pacing at different points in time. You know, it's whether you're upward inflecting or downward inflecting. And there's so much you could do like it just it is the magic secret jedi mind frame because there's neurological reactions to the tone and I know what the neurobiology is so I practice it all the time I love I love making it happen. all the time. I love, I love, I love making it happen. Very good. This is so deep. Okay. So those are technical things. Conceptually, you talk a lot about empathy, which surprised me candidly. Um, you know, you're, you have a presence about you. You have a command presence about you. I think just maybe that's natural.

You've obviously worked on it. And one of my biggest criticisms in the world today of all leaders that I see, I wish I saw more empathy. All the way to the top. I mean, I think some of these folks have just tremendous skill sets, yet I don't see a lot of empathy. We didn't see any last Thursday night. We did not. You're reading my mind. So, we're recording this about a week after the debate

that you all have talked about it for sure. This will come out a few weeks after that, but that you're reading my mind. And so, and I've actually had reps from both those guys and both those guys in my life and told both those guys, man, if you showed a little empathy, I think you'd connect a lot deeper with people. That aside, just in general,

that concept I've thrilled is almost like the center of your work almost. Yeah, it is. It is. So can you just talk about it, please? And that because I think a lot of the stuff people hear, I got to modulate my tone. I don't know if I can do that. But when you say intention matters and empathy matters, now I think a lot of people go, now that that I got some of that that I possess as a good human being. So go ahead.

Yeah, well, and I love the phrase you looked earlier Seeing things through a different lens and empathy is effectively having a clear understanding of the lens Now define it very narrow Don't equate it to sympathy Don't equate it to agreement, you know, I mentioned Bob Minookin before his book Beyond Winning best chapter on empathy I've ever written. I mean, better than anything we wrote, never split the difference.

Everybody that comes auditions for my team, I have them read several things, Minookin's chapter, the tension between empathy and assertiveness. And I say, you explain this to me. You tell me what you got out of it. Cause I gotta, I gotta know how far off of empathy you are and how confused you are.

And Manoukhan says, empathy is not agreeing with the other side. You don't even gotta like them to be able to articulate what their perspective is. Articulating the other person's perspective, not just knowing it, not just knowing, not just understanding what it is, but you got to say it out loud. And the emphasis has to be on their negative thoughts against you.

Now, if you can articulate the other person's negative thoughts against you without following up with a, but here's why you're wrong or any explanation. You will trigger their bonding with you faster than anything else you could do. And it is nearly, it's the lowest maintenance bond. It's just darn near unbreakable when someone feels completely hurt and it'll dissolve arguments in ways that you will be astonished by. Like, I'm astonished. And if you can't, it's just, Stephen Kava said, empathy is the transmission of information. Compassion is the reaction to that transmission. So you got to really sort it out and separate it from the other, from compassion, from sympathy, from agreement, from liking. If you can do that, you got a superpower that works globally.

This is so good. So good. Rule I was taught since I was young. Start getting people to say yes to things. Small yeses will lead to the big yes. And I'm reading your stuff, you're like, no doesn't. So is that accurate that you don't need to get small agreements to build to a big agreement or is it the actual word yes in a conversation with somebody? Yeah and that's unfortunately then again I'll use the term weaponized. Yes has been weaponized against us.

And everybody on earth has had that done to them. And I think there was a point in time when that was really effective, but everybody did it. They like, salespeople for, since that idea first came up, at least a hundred years. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, bang. And the timeshare sales people are doing that. You know, the subs, you know, the guy, the guy, when I was 18, sold me the coupon book for $25, supposed to

give me $5,000 in discounts that I still haven't figured out. So then then the word is an instant trigger. You've been battered. Now there's a difference between yes and agreement because you understand what the difference between yes and agreement is and what real agreement, like when somebody agrees all in, they say that's right. And they don't say yes. So the stupid part of this is, if you could just switch from yes to no,

instead of saying, do you disagree? You say, do you disagree? Instead of saying, have you got a few minutes to talk? You say, is now a bad time to talk. Yeah. Yeah. If I, if I get you to do that and you know, my company, we've actually developed a list of the top 10 yes oriented questions, switch to no, cause you get, you get the scripting down and you get your repetitions in and pretty soon

you never try to get anybody to say yes and suddenly your life is accelerated. Like I don't, nothing that matters. We are out of the yes business. I'm constantly going for no. I got less friction in my life across the board. If I could tell my favorite story, Walter O'Brien, the guy that the TV show, The Scorpion,

Walter O'Brien, one of the smartest guys on planet earth is IQ has been tested like second or third highest IQ ever recorded. I know Walter personally, I like him. And he's as smart as he's built to be. So we're both beginning a conference. We roll into this restaurant. It's crowded. We're trying to get, you know, five, six of us trying to get a drink at just for happy hour.

And there's a roped off section with, uh, uh, empty tables. They're not letting anybody sit there. I see Walter walk over and he's talking to the waitress and I just see the waitress going, and he comes back and he goes, yeah, we can't sit down. This is a perfect follow-up for me. I wanna beat the guy with the highest IQ on the planet Earth. Yeah, right.

I walk up to the waitress and I go, would it ruin your entire evening if we sat down at these empty chairs? And she goes, no, you just gotta be out here by 6.30. We've got reservations at 6.30. It's 4.30 in the afternoon. I'm like, I guarantee you we're gonna be out here. 6 30. We've got reservations at 6 30. It's 4 30 in the afternoon. I'm like, I guarantee you we're going to be out here. We sit right down.

It's so good, man. I gotta tell you, I got off of this thing on saying yes years ago myself too. I always default to the no. And in terms like is it like, would it be a total disaster if we sat here for a while? You know, like and almost reduce it to the ridiculous but also it's what i love about your work i'm gonna tell everybody this if you want to be more connected to people forget persuasion just connected to people or if you do want to be more persuasive better communicator better speaker the reason i like chris's work is it feels like less work and it feels like more things you would say anyway in your life and you don't feel manipulative when you're doing it. Like that is what I would say to somebody, would it ruin your night if we sat here for

a couple hours before everybody? Like that is how I would say it naturally, not knowing any of these skills yet we've all been programmed to somehow think we've got to come in with some overt covert game plan all the time. Yet these are skills that and I think the other thing you said is right, like some things work. They're just played out now. Like, wouldn't you agree Thursday or Friday, six or eight PM, all these things, you hear them now from people are like, oh, you're doing that thing to me, right? The biggest thing I wanted to ask you, since I've known you existed, is there a hack to know if someone's telling you the truth or they're lying? Are there things you read, verbal and

non-verbal cues, that this person is not being truthful with me? Or the contrary, this person is being truthful with me? Short answer is yes, and everybody, it's contextual. How does a polygraph work? It's not whether or not somebody's lying, it's what they look like when they're telling the truth. And so I need to talk to you long enough to get a draw on you because when you tell the truth you pretty much tell the truth one way, period. It's how a good polygrapher is going to ask you a bunch of baseline questions. A good polygraph examinationinations got to be at least 30 questions. A bunch of baseline questions. What's your name?

What day is it? Where are you? What do you have for breakfast? Draw a beat on what somebody looks like when they tell the truth. If they ever tell the truth, a good proligrapher will come back and say, this guy's deceptive across the board. Not, I can't tell you where he's lying or where he's telling the truth. He's always deceiving.

So if you tell the truth, you got to lay down a baseline. Now, when they come out of it, it doesn't matter. Do they look up? Do they look down? Did they hold their breath? All they, all they know, all you know is they came out. So it's not a quick hack. Yeah. It's getting the context, which then to some degree

you talked about playing golf before. Reason why a lot of business relationships are solidified on a golf course, because you spend eight hours with somebody, you begin to develop a feel for, are they constantly kicking their ball out of the tall grass? And are they, you know, is it give me always when they're four feet from the hole? Is, is it give me, it ain't two inches from the hole. You get a solid look at somebody over eight hours,

your gut instinct is lining up. Are they honest ever? And what do they look like when you're being honest? And that's the value of most people, why they want to play golf with people. And you know, how are they going to, how are they going to, how are they going to be a team player? I'm, you know, I'm a horrible golfer. These guys make me go out on a golf course with them about a year and a half ago. I run out of golf balls, I'm losing so many golf balls.

So what am I doing? I'm picking up my ball so I'm not slowing everybody down. I'm like, I don't want to ruin the afternoon for you guys. I'm not hiding the fact that I'm all over the place and I'm not complaining. I'm not kicking my ball out of the rough. I'm all over the place and I'm not complaining. I'm not kicking my ball out of the rough. Half the time I can't find it in the rough. But I think what I showed those guys also is like, I'm not going to slow the team down based on me doing a lousy job. So, you know, that's a long answer to your question.

It's your gut, you're feeding your gut and what's your gut looking for? What does somebody look like when they're telling the truth? That's so good. I played golf with a guy I was going to do a deal with. If you're just so right, by the way, the guy who kicks his ball and all that, but this dude, it was just you're right, he had a normal pattern of phraseology, physically but also his phraseology and then when you'd ask him his score, like three or four times in the round, instead of saying I had a five or I had a seven he would say this to me when you get in the golf cart put me down for a six you know what I mean and there's two things about that one

what am I putting you down for something what did you and by the way you had a nine right we both know you had a nine but put me down for a six and the and two things occurred to me one you're you're deceptive, right? And two, you think I'm pretty stupid. You like and he's the guy at the end of the round. I love this to engulf at the end of the round. When you're all sitting around having a drink afterwards, you go, what did you shoot?

You go, I shot 82 or I shot 93. He actually honestly would tell you, oh, I shot what was ever on that scorecard. I shot 86 and Mike bro, that's because you put down for a six on 11 different holes, you took a nine. But you're right, you do learn a lot and I think the takeaway for me there is seeing if there's a pattern interrupt after you see somebody's patterns of how they speak, their eye contact, how they move, phraseology, looking for the eye contact. This is like a master class for me and it's again guys why I recommend Chris's work across the board.

a master class for me. And it's again, guys, why I recommend Chris's work across the board. My dad works in B2B marketing. He came by my school for career day and said he was a big ROAS man. Then he told everyone how much he loved calculating his return on ad spend. My friend's still laughing me to this day.

Not everyone gets B2B. But with LinkedIn, you'll be able to reach people who do. Get $100 credit on your next ad campaign. Go to LinkedIn.com slash results to claim your credit. That's LinkedIn.com slash results. Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn, the place to be, to be. When you're, I wore a goofy looking shirt today.

My show's mainly audio, but I wanted to ask you this as well. I'm wearing a color shirt. I wear black and blue about every day. Like it's just what I wear. Black t-shirt, jeans every day. And I've got different content I got to do today. I'm speaking to some different types of groups, so I've got this like pinky peach shirt on everybody if you're listening to audio. I'm wondering, I'm wondering if part of connecting with people, if it's going to be in person, is also mirroring them physically and or how you look and dress.

Is there any element of that and walking into a negotiation or a persuasive environment? Because for me, sometimes it's disarming if someone's dressed completely differently than everybody else in the room. And I feel a disconnection when that happens, but I'm curious if that's any part of your work at all. So weaponizing again. All right, so if you and I are really getting in sync, we're gonna find our body language is gonna start to line up

because we're gonna feel really comfortable with each other. Now there are a lot of people that go like, oh, but you, the sooner I could seduce you into what I want, I want a win-win deal that's gonna be fair. You know, I guess it's gonna start merely body language right away.

What really matters is are you actually interested in the other side? So you come in with a clown suit, nothing matches. And the minute you're actually interested in the other person, all the social stuff goes away. So it matters, but it doesn't, if there's a real connection. Yeah, go for a real connection. And that's why you'll find people that, you know, they dress crazy or none of

the demographics seem to line up. or none of the demographics seemed to line up. But suddenly they're great friends and they get along great and they make great deals to you. And you say, like, you guys, guys, gender agnostic come, you guys got like nothing in common on the surface. But you're wired similarly underneath and that's what people are really hoping for. The surface stuff is, is ideally,

it's an indicator of what's underneath the tip of the iceberg. And when you get into what's underneath, that's when people really resonate. What's the, I got a couple more things for you. What's the, um, could you share, was there a negotiation that didn't go the right way that you'll never. listening. What's the, I got a couple more things for you. What's the, um, could you share, was there a negotiation that didn't go the right way that you'll never. Oh yeah. Of course. I mean, hostage negotiators got a batting average of about 93% success rate. So you start climbing over double digits at some point in time, something's going to go bad. It's just the way it is. And the first one,

that the first real, really, really bad tough one that happened was in the Philippines after a huge success. The Schilling case was a monumental success. Left the bad guys in the shambles. Their organization was, their hierarchy was out of shape. They didn't get any, they got no ransom. Their hierarchy was out of shape. They didn't get any, they got no ransom. Nobody got killed and the hostage walked away. And it's like a Super Bowl team. They win a championship,

then they don't wanna play together the following year. Because everybody's resentful that they didn't get enough credit for the championship. So roll back into the Philippines, another subsequent case and like nobody's cooperating. Like they're, and unfortunately it was the anniversary into the Philippines, another subsequent case and like nobody's cooperating. Like there, and unfortunately it was the anniversary of the ending of that case, Burnham-Sabaro case. A lot of people got killed, Mark Burnham got killed and my family fired at the end. His wife Grace is still alive. Got two phenomenal books out about her experience. One is in the presence

of my enemies and the other is to fly again. And I happened to be reviewing that and it was the anniversary of the end of that recently. And that was a mess. And when it finally ended with a botched rescue attempt, two of the three remaining hostages getting shot by friendly fire, Gracia got shot through the leg. I mean, to me that was,

I had not lost anybody that I was responsible for up to that period of time. I remember thinking my boss mentored Gary Nessner's words, best chance of success, highest batting average, communication skills that work more than anything else still don't work all the time. The acceptance that you can't make every deal. The acceptance that some people, it's not a sin to not get the time. And the acceptance that you can't make every deal. Acceptance that some people, it's not a sin to not get the deal,

it's a sin to take a long time to not get the deal. Just through acceptance of that reality and then getting crushed by it. And I, you know, how I was harmed by it professionally, matched up in no way, shape or form to what the families went through. Yeah. And I actually was, when I finally realized, you know, what do you got to complain about? It wasn't your father, wasn't your brother that got killed.

So yeah, there are failures and post-traumatic stress growth is what you're looking for after you get crushed. Wow! What a great answer! All right, I guess last question. I'd go three hours with you. I wish the show was three hour show because I feel like I've asked you like three things that I, of the 300 I've always wanted to ask you, so maybe we'll do this again as well. But just a simple thing that I've always wondered, and take your time on this, can you make a good deal with a bad person? In other words, they just got bad intent. Is there, should more people just, I'm thinking about things that,

I'm thinking about this thing I was describing to you with me, right? This situation I'm going through. I'm like, should I just walk? Because I'm trying to deal in integrity and honesty and, you know, above board to some extent. I know not to say that to him because you know you've talked about these different phrases but and I just kind of know they're not yet I'm sitting here and I think a lot of people relate to this I'm like yeah but I can still find middle ground. I played baseball with guys on my team who had a lot of home runs who weren't great dudes and we didn't get along, but they helped the team and we made good things happen together.

But the more and more I see people trying to bond and connect with a person in their relationship who's just not in it like they are, or they're trying to make a business deal with somebody who's just, their intent is to do, to win and you lose. Should, can you still make deals with those people once you know that? And if you can, how? So my definition of a great deal requires a great long-term relationship of trust. So can you have a great marriage with a cheating spouse?

Now you may have some great crazy wild nights with a cheating spouse, and it's eminently satisfying. And it ain't going to last. So my answer is no, no matter how lucrative the deal is in a moment, it's going to cost you long-term. It's going to be blood money. It's going to hurt. You're going to regret it. You're going to wish you'd never done, no matter how much you made in any area. In the early days of Black Swan, we had a business relationship with a company where I knew the president of the company was lying and deceiving to me. At that point in time, the short-term upside, we got some development of my people, we got some training development, we learned a lot in a year and a half, two years, we were together and I knew it was going to come to an

end. And I stayed in it only because I made that business decision at the time. But I wasn't kidding myself to it coming to an end. And it came to an end badly. And it was resentment that probably still exists to this day. Now, that's the only time. Don't kid yourself, there's an old metaphor, the frog and the scorpion crossing a river. The scorpion wants a ride and says to the frog, like, look, if I stab you while we're going across a river, we both die, that would be a bad thing for me to do.

Frog buys into the malarkey and halfway across the river, the scorpion stings them and they both drown. And the frog says, you know why this was this is hurting you is as much hurting me. The scorpion says, cut down the scorpion and that's what we do. The scorpion is always going to be a scorpion. You know, the whatever that creature is, no matter what they say to you, don't ever don't expect them to turn into anything different. Don't kid yourself about it. Don't expect it to be a long term relationship.

Everybody, I ask questions sometimes that I already feel strongly about the answer for, and I can tell you at 53 years old, what this man just said is 25 billion percent correct. Scorpion will eventually be a scorpion and it's better to pull out earlier than it is too late because usually those stings become more and more deadly and terminal the longer term and bigger your relationship becomes with them. That's been my experience. So you're right Chris this is such a good ride today brother. It was so good and I'm grateful for it. And I want, you know, I've obviously, I do a lot of podcasts. I don't usually promote the person's work four or five times throughout,

but it's just made such an impact on me. So I do want people to go get Never Split the Difference. You should go do that. And what is your Instagram? Because that's where you want them to find you socially, right? That's usually where I see them. Yeah. At the FBI Negotiate. The FBI Negotiate, we post a lot of stuff on there, putting a lot of content, stuff you could use and we'll tell you about stuff we're doing. You know, we're gonna want you to jump into our training with us, so that's a good place to go. So good you guys. Chris, thank you for today. Hey everyone, I don't have to ask you to do it. You're gonna share this one all over the place. This was a great

conversation. I'm very grateful for it. Chris Voss, thank you so much. God bless you everybody. Max out! This is the Ed Myron Show.