The School of Greatness - Why No Is More Powerful Than Yes | Chris Voss

Episode Date: August 14, 2026

You've been taught that YES means you won. Chris Voss says it's usually the moment you get played. The former lead FBI international kidnapping negotiator built a career proving the opposite of what most of us believe about persuasion. NO isn't rejection. It's the moment the real conversation starts. YES, more often than not, is a counterfeit answer people give just to get you off the phone. Voss is the founder of The Black Swan Group and the author of Never Split the Difference, and in this conversation he breaks down the exact language that turns a stuck negotiation into a done deal. You'll hear the calibrated questions he used to save hostages, and the same questions people are now using in boardrooms and car dealerships. He also gets specific. What to say when someone dismisses your price. How to ask for an upgrade without ever demanding one. Why the words you choose in the first nine minutes of any conversation decide how the rest of it goes. This one will change how you hear the word NO for the rest of your life. Chris’ Books: The Full Fee Agent Empathy and Understanding In Business Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It In this episode you will: Learn why a fast YES is usually a fake yes and how to spot it in real time Discover the calibrated question format Chris used in real FBI hostage negotiations Overcome the instinct to fear a NO and use it to move the conversation forward Recognize the accusations audit and how naming objections before they're raised disarms them Build a simple script for getting upgrades, discounts, and better deals anywhere For more information go to https://lewishowes.com/1967 More SOG episodes we think you’ll love! Get More From Lewis! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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Again, thank you so much for being here and listening to the School of Greatness. Make sure to follow right now to stay up to date on the latest and greatest. Where do you think the confidence comes from in negotiation? How can we gain more confidence when we're mastering some of the strategies from your book and from your workshops and trainings that you guys do? How does someone develop that confidence? I'll someone break that on two parts. It's the type of confidence in developing the confidence.

Because there's a lot of empty, vacuous confidence out there. Like I am, like... False confidence. The false confidence. And I, you know, this one guy, we talked to about a possible investment in a company. You know, I pointed out, you know, how I thought their numbers were flawed. And then the guy said, well, I'm confident I can make these numbers anyway. And I'm like, all right, so we're walking away from you right now.

because you just told me you have confidence in the things that I just pointed out to you that were flawed, instead of actually listen to what I said. Now, the confidence that you spoke about a moment ago, the way you lived it, and what you said, it wasn't confidence, it was confidence in connecting. And that's the critical point. With people. With people. Connecting with somebody and the desire to connect with them,

which is also the whole point of the negotiation, the Black Swan Method is about succeeding with people, not at their expense. You know, getting better at negotiation, not necessarily at the expense of other people. In point of fact, making the other person's position better also. Not a zero-sum game. Not hurting. But them succeeding and you succeed. Right, because you want to repeat business.

And if you heard them, they're not going to repeat. Right. So connecting with people, negotiating with people. Your confidence is a desire for. for that and a genuine sincerity and enthusiasm for it. How does someone do that when they know what they want is not what the other person wants? Well, and that's only if it's short term. Gotcha.

And then if it really gets at the risk of that, you make what you want the path to what they want. Like, you know, I love seeing a black swan method showing up in the real world. So, of course, somebody sends me a clip from Shark Tank. Uh-huh. And Kevin O'Leary got Black Swan. Okay, tell me. So one of our go-to lines, when somebody's giving you an unacceptable offer or something you can't deal with or something very difficult for you,

I used to say to kidnappers, how are we supposed to pay you if we don't know the hostage is alive? They want to get paid, I got to know that your hostage is alive. How are we supposed to pay you if we don't know you're going to let them go? They want to get paid, I want to get the hostage out. I'm making my goals their sequence. So how am I supposed to do that as some form of how is a great leveling the playing field question when someone's coming at you hard. So what happened with Kevin? Kevin O'Leary did classic.

All right. So this is my offer. Take her to leave it. No discussion. Yes or no. You got to answer me right away. This is what I want. Can't talk to anybody else.

And the guy looks at him and says, how am I supposed to do that? And then he says, how am I supposed to agree to those terms and pay you back your money? Now, O'Leary, initially this started with a literally saying like, yes or no, or get out of my face. You got five seconds, make a decision. I'm out. Or I'm out. Instead, they hit him with a couple of how questions and then there's a sequencing. O'Leary wants his money back.

So how am I supposed to do that and protect your investment? And so suddenly now all of a sudden, now he's not angry, but now he's not, he's back on his heels. He's trying to think. He's seeing him thinking. And at that point in time, since they've created so much space in a negotiation, now Barbara Corkin jumps in. Right. Now there's some time. Some people are listening.

There's a 10-second window. And a better deal is opening. And Kevin looks at it and says, hey, are you in? Are you out? You know, I thought you were out. And so then, but now he's engaged in a full-on negotiation. It's back and forth exchange. And these guys are still hitting them with, like, how am we supposed to protect your investment and give you those kind of terms?

And then finally, they get a great deal teased out that O'Leary is still not ready to jump on. And Barbara says, you know what, I'll take that deal. And she jumps in and she gets it. Wow. So great negotiations about succeeding with people and creating the opportunity for good things to happen. Because until they did that, Barbara Corcoran was out. But they created some space. They asked some legitimate questions.

And suddenly Barbara says, there's a great deal in front of me. I'm going to jump back in. Right. what would you say is the most important word to use any negotiation? Wow. Not used, but come to grips with. No. The word no.

No is a great word to hear. If you're trying to make the negotiation. When I'm trying to make the negotiation. Because empathy is about what it is for the other side, not what it is for you. It's not about you. So when you say no, you feel safe. I'm protecting myself. I'm guarding my deal or whatever the side of that I have.

I'm not giving into something I don't want. Right. And as soon as you do that, you're more willing to explore options. Okay, no for this, but maybe what about this, this, this or this. Right, right. Or I may say, look, does this look like a bad idea? And you might say, no, it doesn't look like a bad idea, but I need these things. Which you, having felt safe, will now tell me, honestly, because you don't feel obligated.

If I'd have said, does this look like a good deal to you? You might say, yes, it looks like a good deal, but the erasing word, I need these things. But you're afraid if you had said yes in the first place, you're now on the hook. So you're not going to be as honest with me about those things. So coming to grips with what yes and no really means is one of the main. First turning points in anybody's negotiation journey as a great negotiator. Say that one more time. Coming to grips with what yes and no really mean is the first major turning point in anybody's negotiation journey.

Because you think yes is success and it's not. And you think no is failure and it's not. Why is yes not a success? Yes at best is aspiration only. You know, the phrase hope is not a strategy. Yes, it's hope alone. Hope is inadequate alone. And at best, it's an aspiration.

Most commonly, it's counterfeit. It's fake. It's a fake, yes. Someone says, hey, I want to do this deal with you. And you say, yeah, I'm open to that. Or yeah, that works for me. You're saying it's not 100% until the deal terms are laid out over paper and people are going back and forth. Or what do you mean?

Well, about 80% of it. of the time, I want to know what your deal terms are so I can shop them. Oh. And if I've said yes, you're going to lay those terms out to me. Now I'm free to shop them and start playing you off somebody else. Interesting. And that is such a problem in the business world, recognize that a lot of salespeople are now taught to say, are we the vendor of choice? Well, you're going for yes there. Now, if you're being played, no, Nobody's ever, if they're playing you, then they're going to tell you the truth. No, yeah, yeah.

They're not going to say, well, thank God you ask because as a matter of fact, you're not. We're just pumping you for information. Right. We want free consulting. Yeah. Like, nobody's ever going to say that. If they were already lying to you, they're going to lie to you about that question too. Mm-hmm.

So this whole, the seduction of yes, because we love to hear it. Like, yes, the heavens part, the angels sing, the sunshine. And that is such a seduction. that people exploit us regularly by telling us yes. Yeah, it's interesting. So when you hear a no or when someone hears a no, what is the first thing they should think in a negotiation? Well, it depends upon how the no came up.

Like, you know, and never split the difference, we point out no could mean not yet. Or no is no to these circumstances, which doesn't eliminate other circumstances. Like, no could be I need time to think. Like, no is almost never rejection. If it's come up unexpectedly, it's really, it's a signal that there's another path. Versus, I got to quit and go home.

No is failure. I'm horrified with no. That ain't the case. So we intentionally try to get it all the time. Like if getting someone to say no as a result of a, calibrated question is so powerful. You intentionally try to get people to say no. Intentionally try to get people to say no,

that that may be the only thing that some people learn. Because I get emails on LinkedIn all the time. Like, hey, I use the phrase, have you given up on this project? And my close rate is so exceeding everybody else that I, on my company, that I should come work for you and teach this. And my thought is like,

I'm glad you're making a lot of. more money right now, but you're just scratching the surface. And you think because you're comparing yourself to your peers who are in the middle of the bell curve, that if you just moved up the bell curve one notch, you know, I see all these people way behind you. You don't have any idea how much more upside you have. Right. Wow. What is the, when you hear a no, what do you think next in a negotiation? Well, I always hear no. I was hearing those. I want to hear. You set it up.

Yeah. So is it asking for something so extreme first? Well, for example, there's a lot of stuff, let's say, about the particular deal that I know you don't know. Okay. I mean, Ron Reagan says if you're explaining, you're losing. But I got to give you some information at some point at time. Which evident is explanation. So I'll say something like, all right, here's what I think you're up against.

is what I think the challenges are that you face. Are you against me sharing some ideas with you? No. Right. Now, I've just teed up. You've just, you got no problem with that. Now, I can't, if I got 15 things I got to share with you, I'd probably only get away with three.

Because each one is a lot. It's good information. You've got to absorb it. I got to let you think about it. We've got to go in small doses. But I will always, we are CDA, call to action, call to next step. However, we close out, we always close out with a no. You know, me, the Black Swan team, everybody that we coach, always close out. Are you against doing

this? Are you against me sharing some ideas? Does this look stupid to you? Is this a ridiculous idea? Like, you can turn any one of your yes questions into a no question, which is 10 times more valuable. Really? Because I've heard in the past from people that says, you know, you want to get people saying yes, yes, yes, leading into the clothes, to a sale, to whatever. Right. Right. It's like getting them saying yes. Right. But I'm hearing you say, get them to say no. Right. Why is no more powerful than yes? I think that what you're referring to is called the yes momentum. Uh-huh. And I think that has been so overused. Yeah. And not only overused, but it's also been everybody's been, they've been flimflamed, they've been bamboozled. You know, they've been conned by that two or three times.

they're yes battered and then your problem is they feel like it's a trick or something or some strapped you're not a trickster but you're engaging in the same methodology that the trickster used you know the African phrase when you're bitten by a snake you're afraid of ropes

there are a lot of really legitimate people that are not trying to flimflam somebody but the flam flam artists use that on you know the time sharing industry has a very bad reputation. And some of the timeshares are clearly very valuable because I know people that have them and I love them. Simultaneously, there are a lot of people out there that are hustling and economy people

and there's a whole industry that we've coached some of these people and getting people out of timeshares because they got them on a yes momentum. Now they got a time share that's going to bankrupt them. And they don't remember exactly how that happened. but it was probably this yes momentum. So they weren't conscious of it, but as soon as they hear it again, even from a close trusted friend,

they got burned and they got an instinctively negative reaction to the yes momentum. Interesting. So what's the no, is it no momentum? What's the, like, what is this process of getting the no? Well, you know, you're getting a no

and you're getting the information. You know, no typically triggers implementation next steps. Got it. But a no is really a yes. It sounds like, would you be against me sharing some interesting ideas for you?

No, I'm not against it. Exactly. Okay, cool. Here's the next step. And probably, if I'd have said, are you against me sharing some interesting ideas for you, you're more likely answers.

No, I'm not against it, but I only got 15 minutes. Yeah. Awesome. If I stick to the 15 minutes or less, I get your undivided attention. If I go over 15, you're going to start to get anxious because you're worried about your clock.

Yeah. And, you know, that's the secondary thing. Like if we set up an appointment, it's a ridiculous idea for me to take up 13 minutes of your time. Right. Not 10, not five, but something in between. Right. Now, I know I want nine minutes. I got it timed out.

You know, I call this BDA lines. They're always showing a plate. Then I can kill for that anymore. Are they more efficient? No, they just changed the time They said they were going to show up. You know, I'm sitting on a Tomac in LAX. Plane get to get to the gate.

We're there 20 minutes early. The airline is, hey, we're here 20 minutes early. We promised an on-time ride, but we're here 20 minutes early. They won't let us get to the gate. And you're sitting there thinking like, this airport is so stupid. This plane is big.

They saw it coming. They got radar. We're not a surprise. We're important of fact, the airport said you guys said you were showing up a three. We ain't opening up this gate till three. Now, you're sitting there on the airplane. You're not mad at the airline.

You're mad at the airport. But in fact, the airline knew how long they were going to be early. Right. But who gave you back time in your life? I call you on a phone. I say, Louis, I need 13 minutes. You give me 15 because you ain't got 13 on your calendar. I get done at 9.

And I'm like, okay. And you're sitting there like, holy cow. You just gave me back time in my day. Everybody else is taking it away. Now you love me. Next time I call, you're picking that phone right up. He's not going to waste my time. Exactly.

So I like these questions to get, would you be against me doing this? What's another way you could say a no question? It's usually like, is it a ridiculous idea? Are you against? Our phone call start with is now bad time to talk. Instead of have you got a few minutes. Right.

Because, you know, people feel safe when they say no. They feel safe. Why is that? Yeah, that's, you know, I get, probably because we get flim flammed over yes. And we've been flim flammed so many times that no gives an automatic feeling of protection. You know, and I talk about this because I told you I want to talk about how you interview in some of your other interviews. Yeah. Andrew Huberman.

Yes, he's great. Like, I've become acquainted with Andrew. Fascinating dude. Like, first interview of him, I heard on with you. Uh-huh. And I'm like, this is a great interview. I got to listen to everything this guy says. Fascinating.

And so then I catch him on another podcast. And I'm falling asleep. I'm like, oh, Jesus. Andrew was awesome when he was in Lewis. Now I can't. It's a cure for insomnia. And I actually went back and I compared the interviewing Stein. Really? Interesting.

And there's a very difficult skill in the Black Swan method also. And you were really good at. You were really good at several. But you paraphrase really well. And paraphrasing is a sound simple dictionary definition. But it keeps the conversation going in more digestible. bites. And I went back and I listened to your interview of Huberman several times. For I realized when you interviewed, you were genuinely connecting and interested in him. Right. And you paraphrase

frequently. Because it's very complex ideas. I'm like, okay, well, let me simplify this so I can understand and other people can understand. That's exactly right. And it also helps you stay focused. Yeah. You're a much better listener if you're focused on doing that. Now, the other dude that's interview in Andrew. He's trying to show Andrew how smart he is. So he wanted to use all the scientific vernacular, which

Andrew likes to speak in very plain terms, and he wanted to show how smart he was. And then consequently, I think Andrews's having trouble keeping up with the questions. Because they were so complicated. That interviewer was trying to show off.

For the audience, I'm as smart as Andrew Huberman. You don't bother with that at all. And you were genuinely interested in. You're very conscious that your audience as well. Your audience sort of losing track and falling asleep like this other guy. Right, right. If I'm falling asleep, then I need to reset the interview.

I need to paraphrase it so I can stay focused and present too. Something I learned early on, thanks for the compliment. I appreciate it. And I think it's stem from an insecurity and a lack of confidence early in my 20s. once I was kind of getting into the... So you're saying you're a flawed human being? Very flawed human being, yes. After I got done playing arena football

and lost my identity, I was like, what am I going to do with the rest of my life? Like, this was my whole goal, was playing professional football. Now I got injured, I can't play anymore. What do I do? Do I really have skills?

Am I talented? Does anyone got to hire me? I didn't know. Right. And I started going to these networking events in Columbus, Ohio, to try to meet people, kind of these business networking events.

And I remember I was like, wow, everyone's, you know, five, ten, twenty years older than me. They're all wearing suits. You know, I have one sport jacket and a T-shirt, right? Everything about this environment is designed to make you feel inadequate. Exactly. Everything. And I didn't have a job and all these different things. And I was like, okay, what value can I bring to this networking event?

Right. I'm not as smart or talented or successful as these professionals. And I remember being very intimidated. And I said, you know what, I'm just going to go here and have fun and ask interesting questions and listen. And I'm not going to try to ask like that. Actually listen. I'm just going to listen to whoever's in front of me. I'm not going to look around and see who else is here.

Who's more powerful? Who's more interesting? Who's coming in the door? I'm just going to stare into someone's eyes. Not in a creepy way, but I'm going to connect. Connect. And really ask interesting, genuine questions and shut my mouth. And I started doing this, this first night.

And I did it with like a joyful energy, right? like a childlike curiosity. I was just like really curious. I was like, wow. And I would do a follow-up question. Tell me more about that. Tell me more. That's interesting.

How did this happen with this? And at the end of the night, people came up to me like, you got to meet Lewis. He's such an interesting guy. He's so cool. He's so interesting. But they didn't know anything about me. I never shared anything about me. I was so curious about them.

And I realized right then, I was like, oh, to be interesting, you have to be interested in other people. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you can build incredible relationships by showing how much you care, how interested you are in people, and make it about them as opposed to making it about you. And that was essentially what I started doing. I said, okay, I'm just going to use this insecurity of not feeling like I'm smart enough. Lean into it. Use the things I am good at, which is curiosity, joy, passionate, I'm playful. I'll joke with people.

And just try to make people feel connected and feel like their story is really inspiring, which it is to me. And that is kind of what I did with the podcast. It's just like, okay, you're way smarter than me, right? You've got these skills, this experience that I don't have. Let me be fascinated. Now, I've interrupted you and I'm talking right now, but in general, it's like, well, tell me more. That's interesting. Well, how can I use that in my life, you know?

Yeah, and you threw out inadvertently like a couple of different like superpowers. Curiosity. Uh-huh. Like, you know, we got a block of instruction we teach called Caviar. the scene care of yours curiosity. It's about getting yourself in the right headspace. Nassim Nicholas Talib wrote a book, Anti-Fragile. He says curiosity is an anti-fragile characteristic.

Curiosity is a highly positive frame of mind. I cite this guy's TED talk so many times. The happiness advantage, Sean Acker. He says you're 31% smarter and a positive frame of mind. Curiosity is highly positive. Everybody, all these different places, talk about curiosity. is an avenue to success for a variety of reasons. You pick up more, you're interested, you pay attention.

The other person feels very connected with when you're genuinely curious. Playful. Another highly positive frame of mind. Kotler talks about flow, Stephen Kotler, says flow is highly positive, even playful. Pre-adolescence walk around essentially in borderline flow all the time. They're playful. jumping around, you know, climbing on people. You're just singing, dancing.

You're just playing. Yeah. Yeah. And so you take that attitude into a business environment. And suddenly everybody else, everybody there is going like, hey, this kid over here with this old sport coat in the tennis shoes. Yeah. Is it most interesting character here?

Right. Come over and meet this guy. Uh-huh. Anybody can do that. Yes. If they, yeah, if they go like, all right, so I'm an idiot. And I don't have any credentials. and I don't know anything

and I'm unemployable because I have no skills let me go out and see what happens. I mean, how are you going to go down from there? Yeah, you can't. How are you going to embarrass yourself? You're going to be like, all right, so I am a goofball.

Let me go in here and I'll be a goofball, I'll be happy. And figure out of a way to bring value in your unique way. I'm curious, what is the most frequent question word that you use? Who, what, when, where, why? Ah, all right.

All right, so we only use questions. to create, calibrate thinking in the other person's brain. To start with. Like, I'm not going to ask you a question and get information. I'm going to ask you a question to put a thought in your head.

For example, when I'm working on a free upgrade to a suite in a hotel, which I work on every time I don't get every time. What's your success rate? Success rate is probably in excess of,

90%. Really? Which is also going to be, it's going to be impacted by inventory. Right. If there's no inventory and there's really no inventory, it's... They can't give you a suite they don't have. But maybe they can give you something else. Or, you know, they're going to look at their inventory.

The first thing, do they have any sweets? The second, how many nights are no or do I want a suite? Like, if I'm rolling in there and I'm almost always late because I'd traveling. Sure. If they only got one suite, I'm staying one night and it's after six. they could give me that one suite they can use up their inventory because I'm out in the morning.

And at 6 o'clock at night, they're willing to gamble that nobody's coming in and taking it. Now, if I'm there for three nights, I'm not getting that suite. If that's the only one they have, because they've got to leave it open. So, but I got to ask in a way

that doesn't limit me to the suite. Right. Because I can actually get it. I want them to feel good about the interaction. so throw other stuff on the table. Like I'm in a hotel in Dallas probably about a year ago.

I didn't think about it until I walked on the door. Parking on a full of range rovers. I walk inside. There are no shortage of women that are dressed to the nines. Almost all of them accompanied. But I mean dress to impress.

I get up to the counter and I do the sweet thing and the guy's like, yeah, we got a wedding. party here. Range Rovers, expensive, expensive outfits. Are they out of suites? More than likely.

Right. So I do the pitch. He's like, man, you know, we've got a wedding party here. They've taken all the sweets. So I asked them to know why with the question, is it a ridiculous idea for you to make it up to me at the bar? I think about the absurdity of that question. Yeah.

Like, I'm asking for something for free that I never should have had the first place. and if you don't give it to me, now you've got to make it up to me. That's good. That's hysterical. That's great. And so a guy goes, no, no, no, no.

As a matter of fact, and he comes around a county and he gives me like five, six free drink tickets at the bar. And I'm like, you know, I'm going to leave myself in a position and get other stuff. What's the go-to approach for anyone trying to get an upgrade? Well, so first of all.

For a car upgrade, a hotel upgrade. You got to understand, since it's not about you, how do they see it? And so, And then, like, it's an emotional journey. Uh-huh.

And the journey is how it ends, not how it begins. Mm. You know, the last impression is the last impression. I got to take them to this great place. That's going to be three steps. Give it to me. Now, in a hotel, I'm going to be like, look, man, I'm getting ready to ruin your whole day. That's the first thing you say.

Well, you got to give me your ID. Right, right, right. They got to find your reservation. Right. Because they're going to be distracted. They're going to be multitasking. So they say, hey, you're checking in? Yeah, I'm checking in.

Find a reservation. If you got a points number, you give them a points number. You got to wait for the moment and you go like, I'm getting ready to ruin your day. Now, and you got to stop and you got to wait, they tell you to go on. Now, from a hotel's perspective, like they have seen every horrible thing you could imagine. Oh, I'm sure. You know, do you have a goat in your bag and you want to do a satanic ritual sacrifice in a room? Right.

Which we are never going to be able to get that out of the walls. Yeah, exactly. Like, they've seen every horrible thing. Crazy parties, you know, animal feces, whatever. Yeah, everything. So when you say that, they immediately go to all this horrible stuff. No. Because you're going to take them to a better place.

So you say first, are you ready for me to... I'm getting ready to ruin your day. Oh, man. And you let that sink it. And then they go... And then, so now you got to start bringing them out of it. How are you going to say... How are you going to seem to them if you're somebody who's asking for stuff for free?

Uh-huh. You're cheap. Right. You're another cheap entitled self-centered traveler who's demanding. And so I'm like, I'm sure. Again, it's not a denial. It's an admission of prediction. I'm sure I'm going to seem like another self-centered, unappreciative,

demanding traveler who thinks the sun rises and sets on them who wants something for nothing. Now you no longer have a goat in your suitcase. No, ritual sacrifice is not involved. You want some for free. Yes. They immediately start to feel better in belief. Yes.

Now, because you ask me about questions. So now we get to the question to create a state of mind. the last obstacle is going to be how much trouble they're going to get into if they give me a free sweet upgrade. Now, there's a colleague standing there. I've done this while the boss was standing there. The manager, yeah. I've done this literally where the manager was standing next listening to this whole thing.

They may need to go find a manager. So how much trouble am I going to get you in if I ask for a free upgrade to a suite because the last thing that's going to go through their mind that they have to reconcile before they make the move is whether or not they're going to get in any trouble. I lay this out in one hotel in New York. And as a woman's standing next

because you're almost always going to get it in front of somebody. It works in front of other employees, it works in front of customers. You don't get to be in a vacuum. And the boss jumps in and says, because you ask nicely, let me see what I could do. She starts checking the inventory. I want to be there for four nights.

And she says, look, if you can guarantee me that when you check out on Friday, you're out of here before 10 o'clock in the morning, I got an upgrade for you, but I got late checkout prom. So on Friday morning, you cannot have a late checkout. Wow. And I'm like, you got it. I'll come down in my pajamas if I got to get out of their time. Wow. Okay. So the three steps is I'm getting ready to ruin your day, some type of approach of

because what are you getting ready to do? You're getting ready to give them something negative. Yes. And the second one is acknowledging that you're coming across is another greedy, demanding customer that expects the world to open up for them and have something for free. And then the third one is tell me the third step again. The high question, how much trouble am I going to get you in if I ask you a free? upgrade to a suite. Now, and this, like this emotional journey, and really, the point is always leaving people better than you found them.

And, you know, they've been through a lot. Like, they want to help you. If they would love to help you, the first thing is, do you appreciate what it is for them? Like, this poor schmuck behind the count, you can yell that by everybody. Everyone. You know, and everybody's going to be. for a free upgrade and you know I had a friend of mine who had this really entertaining one but the success rate was really low you know he's telling me he says you mean to tell me if the

president of the United States wasn't coming in here tonight you wouldn't have a suite and that clerk says of course it were so well president ain't coming give it to me right that's really entertaining but it left the guy resentful like one hotel I'm in where I get the upgrade for several nights an hour after I check into the room my plan changed dramatically, I got to check out the following morning. I'm not staying two nights. Now, by and large, they are completely entitled based on the terms of the contract to charge me for the second night. Right. You know, I've agreed to that. I go down the next morning and I said, look, I am so sorry. This is my problem. This is not your problem. Because it was my problem.

And if I asked to check out without getting charged, their first reaction is like, look, dude, that's your problem. Bad planning on your part is not constituted an emergency for me. Yeah, we're a business. We got stuff to do too. You screwed up.

Why should we pay? So that's what they're going to think. So they're going to think it's my problem. So I've left them with a really positive residue from the day before because they felt great about helping me out. And I said, look, I'm sorry, it's my problem. I go, what is it?

What is it? What is it? I go, my planes have changed. I got to check out. I got to go home. And I'm like, oh, no worries, no worries. We'll get chaghy. What can we do?

I mean, leaving, because even after the deal, you always need some sort of collaboration from somebody. You're going to need something. It doesn't matter what it is. And even if you don't need something, you want them to feel like they helped you. They felt good about helping you. Right.

You know, the hotel staff, they realized that you could give them a great, social media review as a result, which is going to be really good for their business. They don't want to get clobbered over the head. They don't want to say, well, I'm an influencer. And if you give me a free upgrade, I will broadcast it to all of my 75 followers on Instagram that this is a great hotel. Like everybody thinks they're an influencer.

Well, they want that. They just don't want to get clubbed with it. So if they liked helping you just because something about the interaction, instead of making it feel uneasy, you know, and it feel like they're collaborated with another human being that saw their challenges, then all that other stuff that you want to use as primaries, now great French benefits, social media, commentary. I'm going to put a video on my Instagram about how cool the room is

or how great the view is or I'm in downtown Detroit and how revitalized downtown Detroit is. And this phenomenal hotel suite that I'm in, then I'm like, I'll move in here. This is so nice. You know, so I'll put that out there. But, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to use it against them. I don't want to leverage it against them.

I want them to feel like I did it because I wanted to and because it was mutual game. Yeah. What would you say then are the three biggest mistakes you see a lot of people doing in negotiations? Trying to club somebody with their leverage. Yeah. Explaining. You know, I got to go first. You know, I got to say.

set an anchor out. Anchoring on price or terms is just such a bad idea, and so many people love to do it. Can you give an example? What that means? Like if I know I want to pay $100, and I'm saying, look, the best I can do is like $25. You know, and you go to the side on the open market,

I want to pay $100, and I want you to work me up there. The real problem with extreme anchoring from the beginning, I think all season negotiators have learned, it drives deals from the table. Like, I don't want to miss out a deal because my extreme anchor on the price of the terms at the beginning was so extreme that you're like, I can never come close to this. When we should have made the deal, we should have figured out a way to work it out. Price doesn't break deals, doesn't make deals, it breaks them. You don't make a great deal based on price. You can break a deal on price. If you try to undercut extremes.

Somebody's going to get mad, they're going to walk away. You're going to get a heck with you. You insult me with that offer, and they just don't realize how many deals they drive away from the table. Interesting. If someone wants to get a better price on something. So that was, I think, first of all, before I asked that question, that was the second, I think, mistake. Was there another big mistake people make in negotiations The extreme price anchoring using too much leverage to try to club someone

Was there another big one? What a lot of people do that's actually taught out there a lot Which is really bad is continue to ask for stuff after you made a deal Like ask for free stuff That's the worst right We've made a good deal Here's a win-win And now you're asking more and more

It's gonna leave a sour taste in some of the mouth Every time And that's taught out there regular Really? It was, you know, there was a negotiation guru from the 80s, and I can't remember what he called it, but he gave the example, you go out and you get a custom-made suit.

And you've made the deal for the suit, and one of the guys measuring you, you say, so how many free ties do I get with that? And he said, that's a great way to get free things, free little things, after they made the deal. Throw out a pocket square, throwing a couple ties.

Right. Throw on a couple legs. Whatever, whatever it is. you know, what, and what that does is make the person you did it to hate you, which they're going to resent it, and if they have the opportunity to fail to comply with any term, they will do that. Now, unfortunately, that's taught really extensively,

and it's done a business all the time. People call it scope creep, feature creep. Interesting. Like, it drives every single business person crazy because they don't know how to deal with it. Now, the Black Swan method, you know, you might say, if you were good at how questions, you might say, how can I give you free ties and continue to want to do business with you? Hmm.

You know, how can I be a great tailor for you if you ask me for free stuff and it cuts my margin? Right. You know, make their, what they ask for, the obstacle to what they want. either what you want as a path or if what they want is bad, it's the obstacle. You know, how can I serve the needs of your family

if you're kind of getting into my profit margins? You know, there's got to be a way to wake somebody up to it because a lot of people have been taught that they don't know any better. Like if I had stuck to that training that I learned from this guy back in the 1980s, I'd have thought it was okay

because I'm getting free ties all over the place. Like a lot of people, if they don't know any better, how do you wake them up so that if they only knew they'd change now there's some people that are doing it on purpose if you do something like that to me because you didn't know any better let me see if I could wake you up if I can wake you up awesome we've got a great long-term relationship if I can't wake you up I now know and I'm probably like okay cool it's the last deal I make with this one and done yeah this is a one and done I'm out but I need to know

If you just did it by accident, I got job negotiation, recently brought somebody on to my company, thought we had the deal settled. And the new employee. New employee. Because employment contracts like an email. And this person brings up a bunch of other stuff after we've laid out the terms,

we've written the offer letter, we sent the offer letter. Offer letter doesn't get signed. Silence. Not a good sign. My director of operations, who knows no oriented questions, she's just person in email, have you given up on signing the offer letter? Immediately comes back with a bunch of, you know,

not ridiculous benefits. More asks. More asks, which are not on a plate. Some of them are like, wow, that was interesting. I never thought of that one. Now we can't do that. not in a million years. This is stuff I aspire to.

But not you now. We can't do it now. But no, I like this one. It's just not in the package now. But my director of operation is like, I never had somebody come back. And I'm like, okay, first thing I got to do is I got to find out, did this person just not know any better? So I engaged in the conversation and I said, all right, so however this goes, I want you to understand two things. First of all, I'm glad it came up now as opposed to six months from now.

But secondly, this is a bad habit to bring stuff up after the deal has been cut. So I'm guessing you just didn't know any better and you were uncomfortable bringing it up. Right. But if you come on board first, you've got to understand we don't do this to people. And you're going to learn we work all the little stuff out before we think we have an agreement instead of going for little stuff after the agreement. Right. And this person was like, hey, you know, I didn't know. And my intention is to help build the company.

And I appreciate you let me know. And I understand where you're coming from. They were genuine about it. They were very genuine. I needed to know that. Yeah. Like was this person advised to do this? Did they do it by accident?

Or did they do that because this is going to be the predictor of future behavior, which now we have a real problem. Right. because if this is a habit that you're born with, you are not going to last and you can't represent me. No. Because the people that work on my team are also my ambassadors. I got to find out what's the one of it is.

And I go back and we talk it through and we settle everything out. And I got a list of things to aspire to for employee benefits because these are great things. Sure. So to finish that up, one of the worst things you can do is ask for more and more and more things after the negotiation has been agreed on. Right. Do that before the final agreement is what I'm hearing you say.

Yep. Yes. If someone's looking to buy. Nice paraphrase, by the way. You want to make sure I capture that. If someone is looking to buy, wanting to buy something, acquire something, whether they're buying a business, a car, a house, some potential expensive item, a jewelry, something of more value than $1,000. and they might be able to negotiate a lower price. You mentioned the extreme price anchoring how that is a mistake.

There's a house for a million dollars. I'll give you a $200 grand for it. Right. But you want to get a better deal. Right. Maybe it's a Rolex. Maybe it's a car. Maybe it's a house.

Maybe you want to acquire business, whatever it is. Something has higher value. A ring, an engagement ring. You're going to marry someone. Right, right, right. Let them make their profit off somebody else. what should be the lower percentage on a higher item of value? What should the initial offer be?

You want to get a better deal. So you don't want to pay a million dollars for a home, but you really want the home. You don't want to pay $3,000 for the diamond ring, the engaged ring, but you really want that ring. Right. How low of a percentage should you go to anchor in order for you to feel like,

oh, I got a great deal, and I got the thing I wanted, and they didn't get screwed over. You know what I mean? Well, depending upon the context. I mean, like 30% is a good rule of thumb. Just start at. Well, for a target.

Like, if you, and very, very context-driven. Sure. Like, for example, I'm in Macy's one time, and picking out this jacket, girl I'm with really likes it, she searches the thing extensively. She finds, like, a threat out of place. And she goes, like,

watch me get 10% off on it. on this jack. And I'm like, I can get 30% by being nice. No way. Tell me more. Well, like in every transaction, you know, I look at it as an aggravation tax. Now the person you're dealing with has already built in the aggravation tax because of all the aggravating people that have come through the door ahead of them. So there's an aggravation penalty. There's an an annoyance tax, there's an aggravation tax that's already there on a price. Now, if you're not aggravating, you don't need to pay the aggravation tax. Interesting.

Let somebody else pay that aggravation tax. And you benefit from them actually paying that tax. Yeah, let's somebody else pay it. If I'm not aggravating, why should I pay the aggravating tax? So, you know, this young lady, she'd gotten 10% off on a regular basis. I will be demanding 10% of the annoyance tax when there's another 20% to be gained. Interesting.

Like you don't, so many people don't realize how much money they're leaving on the table. Really? Like massive amounts of money. On any given, the difference between 10% off and 30% off. Right. Like, they got a way to give you a better deal

if they feel like it. So how do you get them to feel like it? Well, yeah, great. There you go. Exactly. Again, the approach, very similar to the hotel thing. You know, there's a, there's a strategy where we sort of bundle the skills in a black swan method. We call it the accusations audit.

The accusations audit. Accusations audit. Let me do an audit of all the names you would call me if I'm going to do this. Uh-huh. You say this. You say it to yourself. Okay, not to that. Because I need to come up with a list.

So, again, it's like, look, you get annoying people coming through here all day long, every day, want something for nothing. I'm going to look like another one of these annoying jerks. It's really demanding and rugby the wrong way. Don't appreciate how hard it is for you to work in this jewelry store, this car dealership, this wherever you are. You are knocking yourself out, that tough sales job. You're trying to feed your family. People are coming here trying to take food out of your mouth. because how do they see it?

You know, it's not about you. And it's not about, it's really not sympathy. You know, the difference between sympathy and empathy. You know, I feel your pain. Right. Like, I've been there too. You know, like, I'm a regular guy like you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, don't give you that regular guy stuff. So, but you look at people like me, he wants something for nothing who come walking in all the time. You know, you look at us as wanting discounts and, you know, and you're trying to feed your family. Now suddenly this person is like, oh, wow. They get it. This is not the other annoying jerk that came in here.

Now they're starting to open up. And then, you know, you talked before about being playful. Being playful about this can be a really big deal. My friend, I hope you're enjoying this episode. And the School of Greatness drops new conversations every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday around money, mindset, healing, manifestation, and relationships. And if you're not yet following the show, then you're, you're missing all of them. Please tap the follow button right now, and you'll get notified the moment

every new episode drops because the next one might be exactly what you need. Now, let's get back to the conversation. I've gotten so many things for free for being playful, or upgrades or discounts just by, let me just say a friendly joke or just something funny. Right. You know, let me just be goofy and dance in front of them and be like, what is this guy doing, you know? Yeah, you've just got, you don't got to pay the aggravation tax. Yeah. And then plus, see, Sean says you're 31% smart in a positive frame of mind. Not only if you put the person in a better mood,

you now got them thinking about options. What can they do? How can they help you? What can they get away with? How can they shortcut the TSA line? How can they, what's the code for the employee discount? Like I, you know, in the same place where I'm trying to get this 30% or so off.

And I'm joking around with this guy. Sure. You know, and one of the things, get him to see as a human being, I'm like, well, I'm Chris. Is there a Chris discount? What kind of Chris discounted at him? And they laugh at that.

And so, and I'm still not getting enough of a discount. And finally I go, like, look, give me the employee discount. Now, I've been joking around. I smile when I say this. This guy goes like, if I give you the employee discount, I'm going to pay for this thing myself. And I go, I'll pay you back. And I'm laughing, and he laughs.

And so he looks at the machine, and he says, wait right here. And he walks around. And I see him and I walks up to a person and I perceived to be the manager. And he's whispering to the manager's ear. And I see this manager's standard going like, no. No, really? No.

And he comes walking back and another employee intercepts him, whispers in his ear. And I see his eyes light up and he walks over and he plugs in a discount for me. And we get the 30% off. Wow. But I was joking with him. I was showing I knew what it looked like from his perspective. I'm getting myself out of this aggravation tax thing. You know, let somebody else pay the demanding, aggressive, annoying tax.

You go in there and you brighten somebody else's day up, you leave the world a better place, you get some practice in, because you want that confidence for the big negotiation. Right. and all these things work for you. And you end up feeling better about the day yourself.

Yes. You had a fun interaction. Yeah. You got a discount. Exactly. Do you practice every day? Any financial transaction, are you practicing?

Even if it's a cup of coffee, if it's a gas station, if it's a hotel, it's a plane. Are you always practicing? It's a perishable skill. And me and everybody on my team, if we let ourselves get out of practice, we get rusty.

Interesting. I'm really used to my knowing-oriented questions. That's pretty much all I ask. What questions? No-oriented, where I'm trying to get you to say no. That's what you're a ridiculous idea. You're practicing that constantly. Yeah, I keep that teed-up console.

Is it a ridiculous idea is kind of your go-to? Yeah. Is it a ridiculous idea for me to get a employee discount today? Yeah. And so depending upon my daily interactions, I get so caught up in my world that I don't get my practice in. And so, like when we started traveling in right after a pandemic, I'm getting ready to go into a hotel. I am done a hotel upgrade in a while.

And I almost talked myself out of it. Really? I am, oh, this, you know, amygdala is kicking in. It's not going to work. I'm embarrassed myself. I'm tired. I can see this guy turning me down. I mean, they literally stand outside the hotel and kind of go,

all right, all right, you can do this. Come on, come on, you can do it. You can do it. I've got to sack myself up because I'm out of practice. Yeah. But you're the guy. That's right. Everybody, it's perishable for everybody.

It is not riding a bike. Yeah. And then you also got to be willing, like, if it works nine times out of ten, sometimes you don't get anything. Hotel is in recently. You know, my read of the guy is you run across deceptive people that are not there to help you. that it's not going to give you anything. And through the course of the interaction,

I got several very strong reads that this person was that minority that we're all afraid of as the majority. They're minority and they're there. And so that interaction was, so my read is this, this and this. Now I'm smarter. I see this guy coming farther away.

Like Connor McGregor, you know, I win or I learn. Sure, sure. You know, you win or you learn. Now, I'm curious, when you go into a store, a hotel, you know, airport, is it, and there's multiple options of people to talk to who you would buy from or get upgraded from. You know, there's two people at the counter. There's three people at the store.

Are you assessing first who I should approach based on body language, based on if they smile, if they're, you know, in a more positive state? Or is it, depending on male-female? Is it, are you, you have a success rate? based on, is it just more an intuitive feeling who you walk up to? You know, I hadn't thought about that before. What I'm really more worried about

is what kind of vibe I'm putting off. Like, I don't have a lot of control over who I'm going to get. In point of fact, they're reading me before I start reading them. Because, you know, they got a revolving door to picking up this energy. I think there's actual energy there.

It's one of the things I bounced off Andrew Hewerman. You know, is the energy actually there? Interesting. And he's like the data doesn't support it. I suspect it's possible. And he's a very data-driven guy. Very.

He's solid, solid science. Solid science. Pure-reviewed journals. Yes. He's like the data ain't there yet. But I think it exists. That's Chris Vos saying that, not Andrew Huber. Andrew didn't say that.

He didn't say, I think it exists. Chris Voss says, I think it exists. These people behind a counter, they're picking up on my vibe. So what I got to do instead of sitting there like, I want this guy, I want this guy, I want this guy. I might be put off a bad vibe. I need to put off a relaxed vibe.

Yeah, just go walk right off. I'm not in any hurry. Like I'm cool. If I'm looking at them, I got to make sure I'm looking at them and my inner voice is saying like, take your time. I know you guys are busy.

I can't look at them like, do your job. I'm standing here. I'm a customer. You should be waiting. They're going to pick up on that if that's my inner voice. So I got to get my inner voice

In a place where I'm giving off a positive vibe Relaxed positive And then I'm gonna roll up And I'm gonna do a read on a person in a moment You know if they look like they're having a bad day I'm gonna say tough day I'm hitting the reads on the TSA people all the time Really?

For practice I do I do a misread on a TSA guy Don't remember what airport I was in I ended up in an unexpected the negotiation on the phone 15 minutes later because of the misread. I looked at this TSA guy and he just looked kind of blank and I said tough day and he kind of went. And then I went just another day, right?

He goes, yeah, yeah, just another day. But that little read is like stretching before going in the game. And the conversation I had 15 minutes later, which caught me off guard, because I did the read earlier it was a really successful conversation. What was that conversation? I needed a favor from somebody when I did.

I said, am I offending you if I ask you for this favor? Because I needed him to go out of my way from me. And I did the no-oriented question and I did sort of, you know, what am I going to do if I ask? I might offend him. I'm doing an emotional read.

I throw the two of them together on the spur of the moment, which is really kind of where you want to get. Interesting. You know, you play the same notes over and over and over and suddenly you combine them in the moment. That's pretty cool. And that's why I work on my no-or-intu questions all the time and I'll do a random cold read,

the TSA guy. My favorite one, I always got a bottle of water in my bag. I forget to pour out the water. TSA in New Jersey. I got a New Jersey TSA guy. You don't put up with nothing. Exactly. So they get the water and they're taking my bag off to the side.

Now, they could almost walk me back out to the curb because the line is so long they're too security. And the guy's got the bag. And I realize I don't want to spend another 20 minutes in line. So I go, bless me, Father, for I have sin. And he walks, he looks at me and he walks. He looks at me and he goes,

how long since your last confession was saying? Yeah, that's funny. I'm like, you know what, an hour ago? I'm screwing up all the time. Yeah. And he took the wall. water, we poured it out. He's not supposed to pour it out. You poured it out for me. He turned around and walked me back. Cut me in line in front of everybody else. Put me right back

of the thing. It's just, yeah, I'm taking care of this guy. It's okay. And it put me through. Wow. That's great. That's amazing. Someone taught me this like 12 years ago. And he said, use this. Say, what are the chances that you can do this? What are the chances you can get me an upgrade? What are the chances you'd be able to do this. After you've created the rapport and the connection and all those things, what's the chance? And that has worked really well for me. And I'm wondering why do you think using that has also worked. Okay. So, and I'm glad you brought that up because you asked me about questions before. If you're going to ask the question, they should only start with either

the words, how or what. Because they feel very deferential to the other side. People loved to be asked what somebody should do or how somebody should do something. It's extremely appealing to the other side. There's great power and deference. It feels deferential. So it's a lot more impactful than just saying it's an open-ended question. The who what, when, we're, why, and how should really just be narrowed down to what and how. Okay. Now, How is primarily, but not exclusively, to map implementation? How am I supposed to do that? Is actually, how am I supposed to implement that?

How do we get this done? It's implementation. What, primarily, but not exclusively, to uncover obstacles? What stands in a way? What are the chances? So when you put it like that, you got a what question. It feels deferential. It's open-ended.

It triggers deep thinking. Danny Connolly talks about deep, slow thinking. Your demeanor is very genuine and curious and connective. You want to talk with people. And then what are the chances triggers people to immediately begin to assess where the obstacles in the environment are? And they're really going to probably, if you look back on all your answers, because one of the chances, most of the time, if I were to technically answer that question,

the answer would be 50%, 75%. In point of fact, people probably say like, well, here's what we got to overcome. Here's what we got to do. Here's what that would look like. They would be answering you in regards to the things to be overcome in order to make it happen. in order to make it happen. And then you can negotiate more. And then they would think about chances

or how hard each of those obstacles would be to overcome. So those are the things I love about that question. That's interesting. When you were practicing, again, you're practicing all the time. I feel like this is something I've been doing as just a game in my life.

Just like a fun challenge. Can I get this from this person? Can I do this? Can I get an upgrade? It's just like a fun thing that I've been doing for a while. But when I started reading your book and having you on,

I was like, okay, I need to do this even more. more. The question I'm curious about is, with every interaction, is there always something we can get? Even if they say no. Like, for example, if they say, no, we can't upgrade you. I try to say, well, can I have a free mint? And if they say, oh, we don't have any mints. Then I say, can I get a fist bump? You know, can I get a smile? I'm always trying to like get something, even if it's a little something. What's your thoughts on that? Like, even if they say no to everything that you want, but can you smile from me? Can you give me a bottle of water? Can you give me something,

you know? Yeah. Yeah, no, I love it. There's energy. There's measurable energy. So it's always, if you're a complete mercenary, it's the advantage to be increasing your positive karma. Right. It's going to constantly increase your chances of success.

Right. And the more karma you leave around you, you know, whether it's real, whether, you know, who knows what it is. But you're going to, you're going to increase your chances of success. And so, or, you know, you increase the chance of success of a guy behind you. And the guy behind you ends up sitting next to you on a plane. Or, you know, whoever's in line alongside you as you're increasing that karma is probably

there because, yeah, if it's on the airplane, they're going to be on a plane next day. It might be a dude next to you. You know, they might be the guy who either rubs the flight attendants or all. way or he makes you feel good and consequently when she walks up to you she has a different I mean there's you know that sort of the domino effect mm-hmm domino effect's always there so I love that I love that approach yeah yeah and then on the point of fact it you're doing in a positive fashion which keeps you smart mm-hmm so you're probably more prepared for your next interaction right

and there's nothing that fuels all momentum like success yes So if all Uganda, it was a fish bump, you're walking forward with a success. Something, yeah. Yeah. Okay, good to know. Can you share your, for you, your greatest negotiation, both when you were working, FBI. It could be not in a hostage situation, but just the greatest negotiation you had during your time there. And also your greatest negotiation in life outside of that.

This could be something small. This could have been for like the biggest deal ever. This could have been an intimate relationship. This could have been buying a car. This could be, you know, rescuing a hostage. I'm curious if we can give one example, personal life and professional life. Wow. Yeah.

I mean, there was some different victories in hostage negotiation. After a really bad debacle, second case I worked in the Philippines, second major case. the burn-ups-a-barrel case, two to three hostages would die in friendly fire at the end. That whole case, 13 months from beginning of then, a lot of people died. It was a train wreck. It was ugly from start to finish. An American citizen was executed early on. I mean, everything about that was ugly.

Everything. And we had somebody got proof of life in the middle of that case, and I don't know who it was or how they got. And we find out one of our hostages on the phone. He's only ever on the phone for proof of life, and he ain't on the phone with us. And we're thinking, like, who the heck is out there? Is there a competing bidder for the hostages?

Like, it was insane. So I struggled with that for a long time. Finally got the revelation of Howe was done, which was, in my view, somebody on the other side and another player asked the how question. So that was when we first got on to How questions. Drug dealer in Pittsburgh.

Really? Drug dealer on drug dealer kidnapping. Drug dealer goes to the FBI because who do you go to when somebody in Porteague get kidnapped? The FBI, no matter who you are. Even if you're a drug dealer. His girlfriend gets grabbed by another drug dealer. Hostage negotiators is riding around with this guy.

On his own, he says to the other bad guy, hey dog, it's my favorite phrase of all time. Hey dog, how do I know she's alive? How a question. Everything changes in that moment. Who really had the upper hand shifted? from the guy with the quote leverage who had the hostage

total shift in upper hand when he asked that how question so I'm like this is it this is it this is it we got to change start doing how questions we got to do how questions but what if someone the

the person who has the hostage is like well you have to trust me or those person's going to die you know you just have to believe you know that's a possibility right and then what would the follow up how question

be if someone's being unreasonable and not giving you a little bit. How are we supposed to pay if we don't know their line? Right. You know, we got we got a couple lined up for the bad scenario. Now, there's a possibility that they may still go because that's a way it is. Right. But you've got to go that path to find out. You can't be afraid of going that path.

So we decided to do the how questions. And we do a shift. We got another kidnapping in Ecuador. It's a guy named Pepe, who I'm still friends with. The kidnapper? The hostage. Oh, I was like, you got you.

I was like, the kidnapper? I got some bizarre friends. I'm sure you do. I got former prison gang members that are friends. I'm sure you do, yeah. But none of them were hostage takers. Okay, yeah. So this was the hostage.

Hostage. Pepe, still a friend, he and his family. So we asked her, how, quite. Now that it's in Ecuador and the Gala, which is the local police in Ecuador, they're like, we don't do it like that down here. We ask a different proof of life question. Pepe's wife afterwards says she knew there was tension between the FBI and Agaula, and she knew it was there. But she appreciated professionalism that nobody would argue in front of her. Well, they were arguing about this change I wanted them to make.

So we're doing a higher question and halfway through this thing. They start referring to Pepe as don't. Don Pepe. And we were like, what? Don't. That's a sign of respect. What? And God's name is going on

on the other side of the table. And about 28 days in, Don Pepe makes as good as escape. Escapes. Goes out, 2 o'clock in the morning, driving a rainstorm, middle of the jungle, goes out a window. He's a jungle guy.

He was a jungle guide ahead of time. 28 days he'd been there. He figured out where the nearest town was how to get there. He knew if he goes out in the rain. All he needs a 20 minute head start, they're not going to be able to track him. He's going to be able to get the town. He's going to be out of there. Interesting. Twenty-eight days in, I get a call from the same negotiator that had called me a year earlier and said, I got bad news. Martin Burnham is dead. This same guy happens to be in Ecuador on my behalf. And he says, hey, Pepe's out. He escaped. He hasn't got out of

guerrilla territory yet. He's on a bus. We're going to meet him. Wow. And so I'm, this is all this how thing. So we never got proof of life. I can't wait to interview Pepe. He's actually a New York state resident. He's an American citizen, dual national. I'm sent down with him in upstate New York. And I'm like, hey, you know, we never, we never, we never got proof of life. We're asking us how question. And he said, you know, it's crazy. whole time, they talked about taking me to town to put me on the phone. And they kept talking with me about that. And that was one of the major factors that he went from being a commodity, a piece of property that they were housing in a house waiting to be sold to this forced interaction

on the other side of the table where they had to talk to him regularly. Kind of build a relationship with them. And he happened to be very good at relationship building. Wow. So we triggered the interaction and then he capitalized on it with his natural gut instincts. Wow. Creating the opportunity, they relaxed his security so much because they got to know him as a person. They were less worried about him running away.

They got very relaxed around him. They gave him the run of the camp. He sees the opportunity at 2 a.m. rainstorm. He's gone. Wow. And that, to me, that was like great negotiations. gives the opportunity for good things to happen. You don't get so focused on your outcome

that you wouldn't take something better. And just engage in a process and let great things happen. Wow. And he escaped, and that was not part of the game plan. And I realized if we've got a great process, if good things are going to happen, you've got to let them happen.

Yes, that's powerful. And what about personal, personal life outside of the FBI. Best, most memorable negotiation. Again, it could be some big deal or something that was small but really meaningful to you. Wow.

Director of Operations Black Swan Group. Chelsea loves working with us. And we initially brought her in as one of the you know, the virtual assistance. Yes.

You know, not an employee. and you get a virtual assistant because if they don't work out and you don't got to fire them you say hey this person was the right fit we learned about fit Chelsea's phenomenal

and just loves working with us and the most satisfying one was when we hired her the virtual company wanted to continue with us as a customer

and we were good customer And so they let, you know, the deal that you sign in advance is if you hire an assistant, you've got to pay them a penalty. You got to pay them like 30 or 50% of that year's salary or whatever you got. Right. Like they waived that. We brought Chelsea on. We got a waiver because we continue to do business with them. And we're a good customer.

And we're not demanding jerks. No aggravation tax. Mm-hmm. But we took one of their top people. So that negotiation went well. And when we brought Chelsea on board, we gave her a substantial raise. and she almost worked out of tears. Wow.

That was cool. That's cool. And she's, to this day, like, I joke around that she's, like, I'm a toddler and she's, she's a minor. She keeps tracking me. Right, right. And if I'm not where I'm supposed to be, you know, I'm getting a buzzing on my phone. Yeah, that's great.

Her husband plays a banjo, so her ringtone is a banjo. Wow. That's great. In a world that has now shifted to, what seems like my people, for a while half virtual, half in person. This kind of flexible style of communication. What have you noticed over the last couple of years about the challenges of virtual negotiations

versus in-person negotiations? See, that's another reason why I think this energy thing that you feel is real. Because people get on Zoom and they're like, I got to see them, I got to see them, I got to be in person. Like you got almost all the same data visually that you had before.

Yes. Like if you and I are meeting in person and we're at a table, I don't see you from the waist down. Right. If we're on Zoom, I don't see you from the waist down. The amount of visual data is all there. And everybody feels more uncomfortable on Zoom. And more uncomfortable? Uncomfortable?

Uncomfortable. Everybody complains about the comfort feeling on Zoom. And they attribute it to the visual data and the visual data hasn't changed. And it's my belief that there is a feel, there's an actual. actual feel that we get from people when we're in the room. And I think it's one more indicator of why, you know, this, whether you call them, you know, oras or the energy that you exude is an actual thing. And we just don't have the ability to measure it yet. Yes. I mean, like if we were all deaf, sound would seem mystical, right? Right. So I think, I think that's what we've learned

in terms of human communication. And then I think the hybrid model is actually better for everybody. I think it's created a better work environment. I think we have learned that we can be more effective at home and we need to get out of our houses. Right. And we need to be in person. You need both.

Yeah. And so how do we blend the two so that not only you're happier and more productive and you're happier because you're more productive? And then you find a right job and your employer's happier with you because you're doing a better job and you're happier. Yeah. So I think energy is real. In-person energy is real. I love the evolution of how we're creating a better work environment.

I don't think you have to have an office. I think we need to be in person frequently just to feel there's something about matching the energies that makes us all better off. That's cool. Have you ever gone up against, not like gone up against, but worked with another master negotiator in deals? Everybody on my team. Yeah. I mean, but maybe a complete stranger that you're like, oh, this person, oh, they know what they're doing.

Like, they're another level of they're using your strategies or they have their own that are really effective. And is it harder to negotiate with someone who's actually really powerful communicator, confident, using great negotiation strategies, not manipulative? Or is it easier because you kind of both speak the same language? Well, it really depends upon whether or not they're trying to be collaborative. Yeah. And so it's easier.

A Black Swan train negotiators trying to be collaborative. That's a great negotiation. I mean, and we're engaged in it all the time. Like our clients, we're making a better negotiators. Like we're always trying to scare out a better deal. We're always trying to figure out what's better for them, what's better for us. Sure. And so welcome it.

It's really what the other person's trying to do. And we've run across some old style people. You know, you're in Los Angeles. Entertainment industry is famous for being purely exploitive. Yes. So you could have a great resume in the entertainment industry and be a really offensive human being. Now, because of your resume, your employer might think they're hiring a great person. When in fact, you're running around offended people regularly and had a negotiation like this

where it started going off the rails early. And I looked this person up and had an extensive entertainment industry background. And I thought, all right, here's a problem. Their resume looks great. But it's from an industry where if you cannot, get every get all the chips then you don't want to do that deal and and then I which I also think the top level of the entertainment industry you know these guys and gals get together at a social function and they say look stop messing around

what do you need how do we make this deal right right right right but they're very quiet about that yes because they don't want to be seen as pushovers right Because it takes a month or two to negotiate, then they're back doing like, what do we need to do? Let's figure us up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, we see, when I see those types adopting our skills, if somebody's using Black Swan against me, but I'll figure that out really fast.

Really? And, you know, it's not a sin to not get the deal. It's a sin to take a long time to not get the deal. Because you're wasting time. You're wasting time. It's also a sin to take a long time to get a bad deal. Yeah. So if I know the deal is going to be a bad deal, then we quit and we move on.

What are you doing something you feel like is dragging off? You're going back and forth, back and forth. And it's been weeks, a month. We don't go back and forth. Really? No. Look, there's a good reason it's going back and forth. We're going to figure that out and we're going to make a decision.

We're going to move on. And we started, you know, our internal terminology, which I borrowed from a guy Joe Polish, Gene's artwork. calls them hafes and elves, easy lucrative fun, heart annoying, lame, and frustrating. What some people would call it, Peter, pain in the neck. Peter does not obviously finish with an end. But everybody's got their term for that person. So I tell my team, who negotiates on my behalf all the time, look, let's walk away from

the half sooner rather than later. Let's develop a profile of what a half says, so we figured them out earlier. Now, in the meantime, let's pull our own data. How long does it take to make a deal with a good customer? How long does it take to make a deal with an annoying customer? And we found out two things. Number one, it can take five times as long to make the deal with an annoying customer. Wow.

So now we're working at 20% of our pay. We just took an 80% pay cut. Interesting. And the annoying customers, are not repeats. Right. They're one-offs. Yeah.

And if they're annoying for us, we're probably annoying for them. So here's the proposition. Do you want repeat customers that pay you full value or do you want one-offs, they want an 80% discount

and you're never going to see them again? So as soon as you drop the one-offs, then the repeaters accelerate. And how do you put yourself in that? in a position where your business accelerates. Right. You let go of those types of people. Let go with the friction.

It's learning to profile and learning to understand what are the cues of those types of individuals. Yeah. We did the same thing in hostage negotiation. They realized that there were some bad guys

that were not going to come out. Suicide by cop. And once we recognize suicide by cop, which is, you know, the harsh nature of the reality is, if a guy went there to die and he has hostages, What we had to accept was that he's going to kill hostages until we kill him.

And it was always a him. Wow. And so then if this is going to be the case, are there telltale signs at the beginning? And my old boss Gary Nessner came up with a block of instruction called high risk indicators. What are the indicators of high risk? What are you going to see in a first hour? And so I went back to my team and I, well, we're going to do. high risk indicators for bad customers.

That's good. What are they going to say in the first hour? Interesting. And then let's, before we know for sure, let's make a list of the things that they say that we suspect, and then let's just track how long it took to make the deal and whether or not they made another deal. And you will be shocked.

It doesn't matter who you are. The behavior is going to be repeated in your world, over and over and over. Mm-hmm. And you were gonna be able to spot them in the first 20 minutes. If I look back at all the relationships, intimate relationships that didn't work,

I could go back and spot the first, you know, interaction, the second one and realize, well, that was all because of me. I didn't spot it correctly. And I kept repeating the wrong relationships. So, but that's good. It's having those indicators, tracking it, and then adjusting moving going forward when you have a new potential customer, potential girlfriend, whatever it might be,

having that indicator. I give you one of the big ones in business of somebody who's going to be a problem. Yes. I've got a great opportunity for you. That's a bad indicator. That's a bad indicator. And what that means is this is a great opportunity for me if you do all the work. Yeah.

A lot of people are seduced by the enormity of the opportunity. There's a lot of money there. I got a bunch of billionaires in a room. This is a great opportunity for you. No, it's not. No, you're doing all the word, yeah. You want to put me in front of those billionaires because it's going to make you look good.

And so then my question will be back to you like, all right, so as it's played out in the past, who that looks like me did you put in this position and how did it work out for them? Because now that's implementation. Like, all right, so you got me worried by offering me this great opportunity. I suspect it means if I do all the work,

something will come of this. So maybe what's that work look like? Have you done this in the past? How did it work out? Sure. I'm asking how questions. Because I'm suspicious, but I got to worry about how's this going to go. Yeah.

So that's been a real consistent thing across the board. It's a big indicator. Yeah. It's powerful stuff, Chris. Look, I got a great opportunity for you. You know what, if you would just go to Dubai and move your whole operation to Dubai and set up there, like, I think Dubai is a great opportunity. And you're going to be sitting there like, are you kidding me?

Do you have any idea the time zone and how many people I have? Yeah. But I actually, when we were talking earlier, I asked you about setting up shop in other countries. And your immediate reaction was how hard that was going to be. Yes. Because in throwing it out there, I want to get a feel for, is this a layup for you? Is this a slam dunk? Mm-hmm.

Am I, do I think it's a slam dunk? and you think it's a three-point shot, or it's a half-court shot. Yeah. Now I'm teasing this out. Like, there are things like that that could be good opportunities for some people,

but is your team set up and ready to move for it? Right. That's really where all that comes in. So if somebody has a great opportunity, I've got to know what the journey looks like. My team is set up or it's not. Right.

But I can't jump at that opportunity, and there are a number of places out there that are glittering jewels in a distance. like Dubai, which I'm thinking seriously about setting up shop there. Really? But it doesn't work for everybody.

Right, right. So I get, somebody's saying to me, Dubai's an opportunity, that ain't good enough. Right. I've been there twice. It's actually pretty fascinating

in what they built. I mean, it's pretty impressive. But again, you're on the other side of the world, you know, and if you do a lot of business in the U.S., and it's just a different,

you've got to see if that, that could be a bigger benefit over there. What's the journey to the opportunity and what are the obstacles in a route? Absolutely. And very few people think about that because a great idea looks like a great opportunity and they don't have an appreciation for the landscape on the way. Chris, you're the master, master negotiator. I want people to follow you. I want them to get your book. I want them to check you out. Black Swanltd.com slash newsletter. Is that right? slash the dash edge.

The newsletter is the edge. Gotcha. But the website is a gold line. Yes. There's a lot of free stuff. So much good stuff there. I mean, they got to get your book. You know, if you're watching this or listening,

you've got to get your book. That's step one. Go through that. Never split the difference. It's incredible. So I don't know how many copies have you sold now. You sold so many. Do you know?

Worldwide, we're over three million. Three million. It's incredible, man. That's the other good thing about it. This works in every country. Yes. Like, I'm in Dubai. Young female, Asian female, walks up to me.

I don't know until I assess. She tells me she's Chinese. She says, I negotiate with your book all the time. I go, let me get this straight. You are in China, right? She's like, yeah, I'm Chinese. Like, okay, so you're never split the difference to negotiate with Chinese people in China. And she's like, yeah, just want to make sure.

That's cool. Yeah, 3 million copies. So if you guys don't have the book yet, get the book, Black Swan,ltD.com. So many good resources, articles, all this different stuff you got on there. I love all your stuff there. Thanks. We've got a couple previous interviews with you. We'll make sure to link those up.

But I think this was a good refresher and some more stories you shared here, which was really cool. Always a pleasure having you on. I've got a question for you. How else can we be of support and service to you today? besides people getting the newsletter, getting the book, following you on social media. You know, what we're trying to do, and you and I talked about this a little bit before,

so I mentioned again, we're trying to slowly back into the space of improving police community, minority community relations. And so neither side realizes how traumatized their counterparts are. So the cops, most, many street cops,

are suffering from traumatic stress. Yes. the communities that they're serving are suffering from worse traumatic stress. So it's not surprising that there's problems. So what we're trying to do is gently, quietly, figure out ways to increase understanding with the other side. So if you're law enforcement, spend some time in a community where you're not on the job.

If you're in a community that needs cops but it's not getting along with them, whatever you could do to give a cop a break, to take it a little bit easier on them. To not honk on them when they're blocking traffic, to realize they're not intentionally trying to screw up my day. We're just gently trying to get into the space ever so gently because these are two communities that need.

each other. Yeah. How are you guys doing that? Or how can people support that? One of our trainers, Troy Smith, has got an organization called Walk a Mile on My Shoes. And he's developing relationships between the police and disadvantaged communities, which is really euphemism for black.

By and large, the communities that struggle the most on a regular basis for whatever reasons, there's no shortage of blind. across a board. Nobody is any, no group is it more, is without sin. And, but,

but what Troy's doing with Walk a Mile on my shoes is making a difference. That's cool. Okay. Where can they check that out or learn more? They Google Walk a Mile on my shoes.

I'll probably find it or? Yeah. Yeah. He should, I think they've got it set up on, on his website. But, or email us.

Okay. Email info at black swanltd. say you want to be supportive of walk a mile on my shoes nice and we'll turn you on to okay cool I want to acknowledge you Chris for your constant you're constantly showing up and giving people tools strategies resources to become better communicators to become better negotiators in ethical win-win situations not manipulative situations for giving people strategies to have a more enriched life yeah and it's really cool that you continue to show up this way So appreciate you for all that you're doing and the consistent effort you add to the world.

I've asked you this question before, but I'll see if it's different. Three truths questions. So it's imagine it's your last day on earth. And you've accomplished everything you want, but for every reason you've got to take all of your work with you. So no one has access to your books or your messages or this interview. It's gone. But you get to leave behind three lessons to the world.

And this is all we would have of your wisdom, your life experience that you would share behind. What would be those three truths for you? You know, before you disagree with anybody, see if you can lay out what their position is, how they see it. You're free to disagree all you want, but you've got to lay out before I disagree, as there's as I can tell, this is how you feel about this. And lay it out in a way that they would say, that's right. Then you can disagree all you want. Yeah. Like if people would just do that, the amount of stress and anxiety in the world would decrease. Because they would feel seen and heard and understood. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. That's one. That's one. And how many more do I got to do?

Two more. Don't quit. Because your competition's going through. You know, the McDonald's movie, the founder, you know, depend upon how, how, what you thought of that movie, Michael Keaton in that role. You know, early on, he's listening to motivational speaker, you know, persistence. persistence, persistence. And then after he's a big success, he's given the same speech. And it's cliche in order to be persistent.

But the reality is your competition is going to quit. Like the Black Swan team, we're not going to quit. And we're not in a hurry. But by and large, all of our competition in our space is slowly falling by the wayside. because they're going to quit. They're going to stop learning. They're going to lay back on our laurels.

And that's just not our competition. Like your competition's going to quit. So all you've got to do, Molly Bloom says you never lose. If you don't quit, you can't lose. Your competition's going to quit. If you just don't give up. Keep showing up. All you got to do, you know, there is no finish line looking at all the different ways

you hear from other directions. Like, there's no finish line. Like, what am I going to be done? Your competition is going to quit. So if you don't quit, you're going to ask outlasts of people that you're competing against. And then finally, just learn slowly.

There's a phrase out there, you know, the only sustainable competitive advantage is to learn faster than your competition. Don't pressure yourself to learn fast. Because if you don't quit and you just learn slow, then those two things are going to build. But if you pressure yourself to learn fast,

like you have a bad day, somebody takes you out and you have a great night out. Like, you know, I'm old enough these days. Like, I can drink as much as I used to, but it takes me two days to get over instead of a half a day. But if I got heavy pressure on myself to learn a lot every day and I lose a day, now I'm kicking myself because I feel like I lost a lot.

But if I only want to learn a little bit each day, and I got a day where I'm in the tank and I didn't do any good and I didn't get out of bed or I didn't eat right. Like I haven't lost a lot. I can recover from a lost day very easily if I don't pressure myself for each day to be big.

So just learn just a little bit each day and don't quit. And you're gonna be, you're gonna get to meet interesting, cool people like Lewis Hines. There you go, there you go. I love it. Final question, what's your definition of greatness?

for man to be a gentleman. And I realize that, you know, some people want to say these are chauvinistic terms, the equivalent term for a woman who would be the lady. But somebody close to me once pointed out, the highest compliment you could ever pay a man is referred to him as a gentleman. You know, so integrity, polite, hardworking,

look out for other people, you know, do this. You know, I stand when a woman walks in a room. I pull out a chair. my girlfriend cannot get into a vehicle that I don't open a door for. You know, that to me, to be a gentleman is to be a success. And there's an equivalent term, whatever that term might be, regardless of your gender or your gender orientation, whatever it is to be a good human being and whatever that label is,

that doesn't restrict you, but, you know, calls you to be your highest self. Chris, appreciate it, man. Thank you, Bill. Appreciate it. My friend, I hope you're enjoying this episode right now because we are on a mission to impact 100 million lives every single week. And every follow here on this podcast helps us reach more people. Make sure to hit the follow at the top of this show's page right now.

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