267: Heather Hansen — The Art of Asking for What You Want

How to get what you want, how to ask for and get what you want is the subject of today's show. So listen in. In addition to getting what you want, there are other things that are important as well. And one of the things, one of the things that companies face, a big challenge they face right now is finding the right technology partner. So if you're looking for a technology partner, some important things to look for are beyond the expertise in technology itself. Is, is their delivery model tailored specifically for business like yours? Are they cost right? Have they balanced between the quality of the work and agile development processes? At right price, right size, does that process work for you? Can they ramp up or down the to support you as you go through the introduction of a new tool or piece of technology, maintaining it over time, that kind of thing. And are they highly process driven so that you get consistent, repeatable results? I've come across a lot of people doing this kind of work. But one of our own scaling up companies, a scaling up venture based incubator in India, has a recipe for great execution in technology. And their model is tailored for companies just like ours, small medium sized companies who are scaling and growing so they can provide considerable benefit over a lot of others. I suggest you check out Clarion Technologies and see if maybe they could be the technology partner for you. You'll find it. We'll throw up a link here on the screen, but go to Bit Ly bit ly clariantechnology and there's more information. They'll collect your stuff, talk to you and see if it's a partner for you. Hi everyone, my name is Bill Gallagher, host of the Scaling up business podcast, Scaling Coach. All around friendly happy guy. We've got shows like this every week, hundreds and hundreds of shows now on everything to do with the world of scaling up, getting your people right, strategy execution and developing yourself as a leader to grow and scale along with your business. I'm joined today by Heather Hansen, who is, and really, I don't know, we're careful about the word expert, but she's definitely got some expertise in this area. She brings a background of law, being a lawyer in the world combined with a degree in psychology. So law plus psychology, negotiating for and representing clients. Now she helps people in growing and getting what they want and she's founder and CEO of a company called Advocate to Win. She's, she's an author, she's got a book out recently, Advocate to Win Tools for Asking what yout Want and Get It. And we're gonna talk all about that. So welcome to the show, Heather.

Thanks so much, Bill. Happy to be here.

Thanks. So before we get into kind of this core topic, which I think folks will probably be pretty excited about, you know, learning new approaches to getting what you want, we all wanna get more of what we want, right? Whether it be in funding, in customers, in our romantic relationships, in. In every realm, in our family situations, we all want to get more of what we want. And. And there are some common things there. So I'm. I'm looking forward to doing it. Talk to us a little bit about your background. How do you come to doing this kind of work, writing this book, that kind of thing? I'm sure it probably started when you were seven years old or something like.

That, but not quite seven. Not quite seven. When I was.

That whole story there.

When I was in college, I majored in psychology, and I thought I'd become a psychologist. And then I worked for a summer for my uncle who was a lawyer, and he happened to be a medical malpractice lawyer. And I fell in love with it. I loved speaking to an audience, but I also loved learning more about the body. You know, every case was something I could relate to. And so I went to law school, started working at my firm while I was in law school. And I'm still at that firm, though not as active as I used to be trying cases. And so for all of those years.

Still a practicing lawyer.

Yes. Yes, indeed I am. Indeed I am. All that time I have been defending doctors, hospitals, nurses, and medical malpractice cases, and I have been very successful in that role. I've been named one of the top female attorneys in Pennsylvania. All kinds of nice things. And I always say that the reason for that is not because I'm an extraordinary advocate, though I am good at it. But the reason I've been so successful is because my superpower is teaching my clients how to advocate for themselves. Because the jury doesn't want to hear from me. They want to hear from the doctor, the nurse, the tech who touched the patient, who had a conversation with the patient. And so I gave them the tools to turn to the jury and ask for what they wanted, which was a win, and get it. And what they found a lot of times is the doctors I had worked with through trial went back to their patients and were getting better patient satisfaction scores and reduced readmissions and were more happy in their jobs, less burnout. And so I recognized that these tools really worked. But then I also had to apply them to myself. So one of the problems, especially for your women listeners, is we tend to be really good at advocating for others and maybe less so at advocating for ourselves. And that was definitely a problem for me. So I had to use these tools to start advocating for myself. And when I did, everything clicked. And now my legacy is going to be teaching people that everyone is advocating. If you're selling, you're advocating. If you're marketing, you're advocating. If you're leading, you're advocating. And how to do it a little bit better.

Yeah, it's really great. I should be careful when I say you're a lawyer.

Not that careful. I only do a very small area of the law. It's funny how many people come to me with questions outside my expertise, but.

I think that the best lawyers are the ones who keep you out of court. Unless you're a litigator and you're used to. And you want to do that. But even then, litigation is very expensive. You get repeat clients because you figure out how not to go to court, how to stay out or settle it quick.

Well, I think that that's true. It's an interesting thing with doctors, though, because they take it so personally, which is another reason that I love this area of the law, because they don't oftentimes want to stay out of court if they've been sued, they often want to fight it. And that's one of the tools of an advocate in the book is negotiation. And you need to figure out what are your negotiables and what are your non negotiables. And you really need to understand what going to. We call it war. My first book was the Elegant Warrior what going to Trial Looks Like. Because to your point, Bill, there are studies that show that litigation is actually more str than the underlying event that caused the litigation. So it's no small thing to go to court for everyone involved. I've seen two heart attacks in the courtroom. It is definitely, yes, tough.

You know, that's a really. That's a really useful point. That notion that there's a toll, and I don't think it's exclusive to doctors. People have very emotional responses to being sued or suing, to being accused of. I didn't do that, you know, and that isn't. You don't understand me. And being right, being made wrong, that's a fundamental thing that we struggle with and taking it really personally.

Absolutely right. Absolutely right. And I do think that it's worth talking about that. So the last tool in the book is argument. And I always say that's the last resort. The hope is not to get to that point. You know, in my cases, there's really no choice, but cases, you know, trials are very different in a lot of ways. In trials, winning and losing is a zero. Some game, one person wins and one person loses. Every one of my cases, the definition of win that I use in the book and that I use with my clients is to receive something positive because you have earned it. And hopefully everyone can receive something positive. But you never want to get to that point, Bill, where you're right, I'm wrong, or vice versa, and those are the only options. And so hopefully, when you learn to advocate, you sort of learn to avoid getting to that point altogether.

Yeah. So we're gonna. Like I like to do is talk about some of the stories and the ideas that you have in the book and bring them to life with that. Let's. Let's focus in on those before we. Before we try to distill out the principles. Why don't you begin? You shared several stories in our preparation for the show, but why don't you talk about, like, I don't know, you talked about somebody who wanted to get a raise or a promotion. And I think for many of our rising leaders, this might apply. For our CEOs think about, you know, you might discount this kind of a story, but I think that getting a raiser promotion is like getting funding or going to your board for something. It's the same. So tell us that one to start off.

Yeah, and it's a great point because it is very similar to, you know, getting a raise, getting a promotion, getting funding. I work with a lot of, you know, startups who are looking for investments or. And a lot of. Right, exactly. And a lot of C suite individuals who have to get yeses from the board and the tool that. So I had a client who came to me specifically for coaching on how to get this promotion that she wanted. And we talked about some of the various tools of an advocate, but one of the main tools is credibility. And one of the things I say is, you can't prove it until you believe it. You know, in the courtroom, so many people have asked me, what did you do if you thought a doctor had actually made a mistake? And when that happened, I would talk to the doctor about a story we could tell that we believed. You know, sometimes it was, this patient is not as damaged as they are, saying it's not worth as much of money as they want in this case. Or the mistake didn't actually cause the injury. But I had to find a story that I believed because I couldn't advocate until I did. And the same is true when you're advocating for yourself. If you don't believe that you deserve that raise, that promotion, that investment, if you don't believe that the thing you're asking your board to give you is going to serve the company, then it's going to be really hard for you to advocate for it. So the first step is often convincing yourself. In the book I talk about, your outer jury is the board, it is your investors, it is your boss, it is your manager. Your inner jury is the part of you that chooses whether to believe that you deserve that thing. And so oftentimes you have to start with your inner jury first and really persuade yourself to believe so that you can go out and persuade others to do the same.

So what did you do with them? How did you work on that? How did that go?

So the way that I talk about building credibility is it's a sort of a three part thing. You want to believe yourself. So that means making yourself promises and keeping them, setting expectations for yourself and meeting them. And when you can't, you own it. A perfect example of this is when I was young, I lost 100 pounds. And I always say I'm so grateful that I had that hundred pounds to lose because it allowed me to believe myself. Now I know if I tell myself I'm going to do something, I will do it because I did a very hard thing. I made promises and kept them, set expectations and met them. And when I couldn't, and I wasn't always perfect, I owned it. And so I talked to my clients about ways that they can do the same in the process of trying to get that raise, that promotion, that investment. And then the next piece is believing in yourself. And that is really recognizing where you have the skills that you need to get this thing. I actually send to new coaching clients a book that we call the Evidence Journal. And every day I ask them to write down three pieces of evidence of their talents, their skills, their resilience, their experience, so that they can look back on that when they need to build this credibility. And so it starts with them, and then it moves on to the outer. And with the outer, it's the same thing. You want them to believe you, so you start making promises and keeping them. You want them to believe in you, so you start telling the story of your experience and your talents. And then I think the most important way to build credibility with the outer jury is to Help them, believe that you can help them, because ultimately that's what's most important.

What'd you do with that woman, though, who wanted the raise? How did you. What had happened with her?

So it was the same deal we started with her, and she needed to believe herself, so she started making herself promises and keeping them. She knew that she was going to have better access to the people that needed to be persuaded early in the morning. She was not a morning person. She started getting to work earlier and earlier because she started making herself promises and keeping them. And then she also kept her evidence journal and started to recognize that she had all kinds of evidence of her value to the company that she hadn't realized. And one of the things that I really challenged my people to do is to look for the roi, look for the data, look for the numbers. How are you bringing value and monetary value, ideally to the people that you're asking, whatever you need for, for her, a raise. And so she did. She started to look and see, you know, what clients have returned because of me, how have we maximized this particular client up, how have we maximized hours on their project, et cetera. And so she was able to collect that evidence. And by the time that she went to her outer jury to ask for the raise, she was feeling extremely confident, very credible, very secure in her ask and the ask. I mean, a lot of times this is what happens, Bill, once you've persuaded your inner jury to believe the outer jury is easy and fun. You know, she had her evidence, she had her data, she had her self, self worth, really well grounded. And the ask for the raise was like lickety split, no problem. And that's often the way that it goes once you've sort of established the credibility with yourself.

You know, I think that this is a great story and I, and I love that you're building evidence, building the case, and in the process, you're selling yourself first, right? You're getting clear about it. I will talk to new coaches or consultants or other people about getting the price, and they're like, how do you confidently ask for your price? I'm like, I'm really clear the value I provide. I'm really, really clear the impact we make on companies. So I'm not at all shy about it. I have no internal dialogue about that. I'm not worth what I'm asking. I'm not like, faking it and going, I want a mirro million dollars. And I'm really clear what we're gonna do. And I've gotten clear in my own head, I can look myself straight in the mirror and know that what I'm asking for is entirely fine and justified. And, you know, like that.

That's exactly right. You know, in my first book, I have a chapter called don't fake it till you make it show it until you grow it. I think faking it is always red. I mean, in my courtroom, the juries always knew when a doctor was being fake. But you show it, you establish that evidence, and you start to build it. And as you show it, as you show that confidence, as you show that data, as you show that evidence, it starts to grow, it gets attention, and then you see more and you iterate. And so I think that you're absolutely right that, you know, you can be really confident in your value when you've kept evidence of your value.

Yeah. You shared another story about the CEO of a large company who was not good at being receptive. And I think it'd be interesting to tell us about this person. What do you mean by being receptive and how did you work on that?

So I see this a lot with very successful people that they're not great listeners and they're not always curious with their team. You know, they may be curious as to the things like when they're sitting in bed at night, how can I make more money? How can I grow the business? Which is always the question that everyone, you know in business asks. But not so much curious as, how can Ann in accounting help me to do that? And what is Bill in marketing have to say that might improve the situation? And in this particular case, he was. The CEO was having a huge amount of turnover, a huge amount of. It was just bad culture. People were unhappy and most importantly, perhaps unwilling to share their ideas. So innovation was stalled. And he knew that he had to do something differently. And so we did a lot of. I talked to. Yeah, right, exactly. So I talked a little bit to his team. I talked a lot to him. And one of the things that I saw very clearly was that he wasn't listening. And one of the tools of an advocate is reception. You know, a lot of times people come to me and they want to start with presentation. How can I use my body language, my tone of voice, and my facial expression to make an impact on the world? And I always say the best way to make an impact on the world is to work on reception. How can you become a better listener? How can you read body language and tone of voice and facial expression and use what you read to change the ask and so we worked together on his reception skills, and a lot of that was working on listening, being completely present, very simple things like leaving the phone outside the room when he went into some of these meetings, and, you know, making sure. One of the exercises I often have people do is, you know, try to, by the end of the meeting, have asked three very real questions, like, not how was your day? But, like, based upon what the person is telling you. So then it starts to get a little bit deeper, and they really have to listen. And then I'm obsessed with tone of voice, Bill, because there's a study out of Yale that tells us that you can tell more about a person's emotion from their tone of voice than their facial expressions and their body language combined. And so I often encourage, especially people like him, to challenge himself, to try to read how is this person feeling by listening to their tone of voice? And that's twofold. Sometimes they actually can do it right, and then that's a huge win because now they know. But it also makes them a better listener because they're all in. You know, they're listening with their eyes and their ears and their heart and their open body. And so this particular CEO really worked at it. And this takes time, and it takes practice, and it takes presence, and it takes, you know, a real understanding that it's a skill that has to be honed. And by the time that we were done working together, turnover had decreased, the culture had gotten better. And I think what he was most happy with was that more and more team members were coming to meetings with ideas and innovation. Even if they might get a no, that's not an idea that's going to work for us. They felt more listened to and heard.

And what did the CEO learn about themselves in the process? Or what do they see or notice?

Oh, my gosh. He changed completely. I mean, he truly credits it with changing his marriage because he became a better listener at home as well. And he. I talk about the five C's of an advocate. One of them is curiosity. And he said, I've become more curious, but not just at work, at home, but even with the barista, he'll start conversations and listen to the answers. And he really likes to challenge himself. He's one of those triathlete type persons. And so he also challenges himself, like, how can I read this person's tone of voice? Let me see how right I can be. And I don't know if he actually says, are you feeling sad today? But he loved that challenge. And it's definitely Worked for him.

You know, I think there's a. There's a fine line there, though, because sometimes I'm talking to someone and they're telling me something or whatever, and I'm like, wow, I think that this person is stressed or exhausted, but I don't want to say, wow, you look terrible.

Well, yes, yes. And you don't have to. Absolutely. I would encourage you not to say you look terrible. Absolutely.

Did you not wear any makeup today?

Right. Did you not sleep well? Are you sleeping okay? No. And I don't think you have to say it, but I think that if someone's stressed or exhausted, it's not the best time for the ask. You know, use one of the. I wouldn't get to asking for what you want when they're stressed and exhausted. I would start using some of the other tools of an advocate. It's not the best time when they're angry. Same deal. You know, if they're. If they're sounding enthusiastic and excited and anticipatory and happy, then those are the times that. That you might want to start pushing for the things that you want them to choose.

Yeah. Yeah. So you're getting connected first. So this is one that I think a lot of our listeners struggle with in this story. And I notice for myself that I speak more readily, more easily than lots of people. Right. So I, by nature, tend to fill the silence, and I end up doing more talking. And in most conversations, I walk out a little uncomfortable and embarrassed about how much I talked.

That's actually a great sign, Bill, because you're self aware enough to know that that's actually a very good thing.

Oh, I wish you had more questions. Oh, I told too many of my own stories. Right. And I'm always thinking that all the time. But I also know that, like, it starts, especially earlier, with, like, an inherent arrogance. I think that I am smarter than the vast majority of people. Right. Like, honestly, logically, I think that it's embarrassing to admit, but I. But I really do. And then I'm worried that I might not be. And so I'm constantly, like, looking and thinking and thinking. I know better most of the time. And then being like, wait, but I did I get something wrong? And the net result of that is a lot of internal dialogue versus actually listening to the other effing person across the table from me. Yeah.

And I think that you. I think you can change the way that you look at intelligence. Right. Because there's all different kinds of intelligence, and there's a lot of talk about Emotional intelligence right now. And different people have different opinions of whether they were pushing on that too much. But I think that, you know, if you are a person who likes to feel like you're the smartest person in the room, then the next time tell yourself, I want to feel like I'm the most emotionally intelligent person in the room. And that means something different. It does mean asking more questions. It means being okay with the silences. I encourage people like you, and I coach a lot of people like you who I have to again, commend you for your self awareness because most of them won't admit it, but a lot of them feel the same way as you do. And I encourage them to go into meetings with three questions prepared so that you can ask those questions and really listen to the answers. And they have to be good questions. You know, one of the tools of an advocate is questions, and it's really important that they're not questions that put the person on the defense and so forth. I do you. You have made it so that I have to share. This exercise that I share in a lot of my keynotes and the way that it works, Bill, is if you and I were face to face right now, I would ask you to snap three times with your dominant hand and draw a capital E with your finger on your forehead. Okay? So you have just proven yourself correct in some ways. You drew the capital E facing yourself so that you could see the E like this. You could have drawn it like this so that I could see the E. Now it's a little bit weird with the camera and everything. It might be flipping.

I'm looking at an image of myself next to you on my screen right here.

So it makes it a little bit harder. But this is a study. I first read about this in the book To Sell as Human by Daniel Pink. And it's a famous psychological study. And it sort of studies if you draw the E facing yourself, it means that in this moment, you are seeing things from your own perspective. If you draw the E facing the other, you are seeing things from their perspective. And the reason I bring this up is as you become more powerful, you get less good at this exercise. And brain MRIs actually show that as you become more powerful, the part of your brain that's affiliated with empathy shrinks. I just had Michael Platz, who's the author of the Leader's Brain, on my podcast, and we talked about this. And so this is something to practice. You know, you practice sort of listening, you practice being curious. You practice another tool of an advocate is perspective. You practice seeing things from the other's perspective. And as you do, you get better. And maybe that part of your brain won't shrink as you continue to become more and more powerful.

So the thing that I do is one, you know, as you pointed out, I recognize that I am like inherently arrogant and talkative, noisy. And so I design in. I suppose I think about. I don't make a list of three questions, but I design in questions and opportunities to ask and think and look. And I've learned to probe different. I also like that question or the thing that you said about noticing the tone and then trying to guess at the emotional state. And so I'm often thinking about and noticing and connecting tone and emotional state. How's this person doing and how are they feeling right now? And. And so I spent a lot of time doing that. If somebody gets really agitated or is animated, then I ask myself what's not being. What are they not saying? And I try to speculate at what's underneath everything that they're either unconscious about or afraid to say. And I try to create some room or permission for that to be spoken. And I might call it out. Are you like this maybe by any chance, and speculated on to try to like crack the nut there and give them room to just be all of it, you know, whatever it is.

I think that's a phenomenal skill. I just did a show similar to this the other night and we were talking about this because as an attorney, listen, I have no, I am not inherently a good listener. I think, I think that. Well, and I had to practice it in the courtroom, right? Like, I remember so many times there's a witness testifying and my client, the doctor next to me wants to tell me something and I get it, right? They want to talk to me about something that's happening. But I'm like, you know, I give them the shush hand because I have got to listen to every word the witness is saying so that I can cross examine that witness or use it with another witness or read the tone. And so that practice has made me an exceptional listener. And if you've ever read the book, it's. And I bet you have, it's such a good book. Never Split the Difference by Chris Foss. So he talks about the best listener in the. In the room is the best negotiator. And I always say the best listener wins. So this is a skill that will help you win.

Yeah, I totally get that. I think that that like looking and listening deeper makes A huge difference. And considering that there are things that are unspoken that are not being said is a really powerful thing. There's a. There's a book we'll have to have these guys on at some point. Robert Keegan and Lisa Leahy. How, how the way we talk can change the way we work. Do you know this?

No, but it sounds good.

Yeah. A couple Harvard professors. And this is the core idea that behind every complaint lies a commitment. When people are making a lot of noise about something and they're agitated or animated, I like to coach our leaders that there's something virtuous, something that they care deeply about. Commitment. You could also say value. What is the thing that matters to them behind this thing? And if you speak to the virtue, the commitment that they have or the value, then people often get like, really moved. Right?

They're like, I love that. I love that idea. I wish I had known that before I wrote my first book because we start our cases with complaints. And so in the first book, I made the analogy that a complaint, if you just stay there and don't move forward, nothing happens in the case. But I love this idea because I think you're so right. If people are taking the time to. To complain, than they care, you know, and so then the question becomes, what do they care about? And if you can explore that, you are, you are well on your way to becoming a better advocate.

Talk about the client looking at a career change. And although our listeners by and large aren't involved in career changes, that same kind of a conversation, it relates to shifts in our business, what we offer our customers, that kind of thing. There's a transfer. So anyway, I think it's a useful example.

Yeah, this was another C suite individual who was working at one particular company and wanted to move to a company that was completely. Couldn't be more different than the first company. And so he wanted to talk about. And a lot of it was building credibility. Right. He had to believe that he had to the skills and the tools to be able to be effective at that second company. But the second part of it was evidence and really honing in on evidence. And I think that, you know, when we talk about evidence, all of your listeners have evidence. And in my cases, we all have the same evidence. The other side has the same medical records, the same medical models, the same testimony, the same depositions. And it's what you do with that evidence that matters. Right. The story that you tell. You know, people often say, facts tell, stories tell. And I say, yes, but advocates its Win. Because there's almost always competing stories. So he was competing with someone else to be the CEO of a different company. And he had to collect evidence of what he would bring to that company. And so we worked for six to nine months on collecting that evidence, on writing it out, on looking at the data and pictures and looking at all of the ways that it could be presented. Who could tell these people, who are the people who could speak to it? What are the numbers that support it? Are there pictures? Are there video? You know, there's an old advertising maxim that says that you have to say something seven times in order for your message to be heard. And when I work with people, we talk about doing seven times, seven ways so that you're not just like shoving them the same numbers over and over again. But you're doing it with a testimonial, you're doing it with a picture, you're doing it with a graph, you're doing it with a number. And so really working with that evidence and then the other thing that we do to play with the evidence, and that's something that my clients hear me say all the time, play with the evidence, is we look at how the evidence could help us to win, all the ways in which the evidence supported him being the best fit for the board that was looking for a new C suite individual. And then we looked at all the ways that the evidence could make him lose. Now, you would think that this is a problem, right, because it's going to hurt your credibility. But you've got to see where you could lose in order to win. I know that for sure from the courtroom. You know, one of my clients actually got upset with me because I was always looking for, well, what about this? What about this? And he said, sometimes I feel like you're on the other side. And I said, that's my job. Because if we're not prepared for every way that we could lose, we can't counter it. And so this C Suite individual did the same. What are ways that the other person that they were looking at is better qualified, has a better story. How can we counter that story? How can we build our story up a little bit more than that? That person's and that. So I have this win, lose, weird process. The weird part is, what weird thing could happen here? Could another person swoop in and try to apply for this position, you know, go into the board? Is somebody related to a board member? Like, we look for the weird. And it's. I think maybe once have we predicted the weird. But when you're creative about looking for the weird, when something weird does come up, it doesn't knock you off your feet the same way. And so he did all of that. He played with the evidence. He came up with more than seven ways to present it, and he came up with how it could help him win and ways that he could lose. And then he counted those ways. And of course, I wouldn't be telling the story if he didn't get the position, but playing with the evidence, I think not only got him the position, but also just like with the other people we've talked about, changed the way that he advocates.

You know, I love what I love about this. It reminds me of the story of the blind man and the elephant. First of all, do you know that ancient story?

Yes, yes, yes, absolutely.

The blind man, the elephant is a very, very ancient story about five blind men taken to see an elephant for the first time. And see with air quotes, right? Means they're going to touch the elephant. And of course, they bring the blind men to the elephant and they all touch different parts of the elephant because they stand around the elephant and one touches the air and describes it as a, you know, a big leathery hide and the other touches the leg and describes it like a tree trunk and the tusk and the snake for the nose and like all that. Right. And I think that the notion that getting people malleable with different ways of looking at the same set effects the facts are the elephant. Right. The elephant in the room. But we all see a little different slice of it from a little different perspective. And they're actually all valid. Right.

And we.

Our perspective is the only way of looking at it. Right. Same data.

That's right. That's why that E exercise is so helpful. Right. They are looking at the world a different way. And the more that you can sort of look at how that's the win, lose exercise is a huge example. Right. You're looking at it from one perspective. How can I win another perspective? How can I lose another exercise that I do to help my clients practice. This is victim, villain, victor. So tell the story of something that happened at work as if you are the victor, which is often how we tell the story or we often tell the story. I'm the victim. They did this to me. But how are you the villain? How can this story be told that way? And the more that you just practice this and again, play with it, it's supposed to be playful and fun. The more that you do that, the better you get at seeing Things from other perspectives. And the more that you can do that. You can't change someone's perspective, Bill, unless you understand it.

It.

So you've got to really understand your jury of clients and customers, your investors, your board's perspective, if you want to change it.

The other thing you touched on, interestingly, in that story, very briefly, was the notion of using stories, telling stories, but you said it almost in passing, and something about the feeling. And I think that the stories evoke the emotional response. Right. If we do them well, we're looking to feel something, to convey and create a feeling. So there's feelings, feeling, and then opportunity that people are responding to. They feel a particular way, they see something, and they say yes or no. Right. Based on opportunity. No opportunity for them from their perspective. We do a lot of work with that when we work on the leadership flywheel disciplines, and we focus first on evoking particular feelings and then creating opportunity for other people by listening, by understanding the way they see the world and what's going on. Right?

Yeah. Yeah. No, I listen. I think that storytelling is really important. I just. You know, one of the things that I don't think enough people who talk about storytelling stress is that if you're telling a story and your opposing opposition, your adversary, the person who wants something that you want, is also telling a story, who wins. And so you've got to tell stories that pull it in motion. You know, when you talk about that, it brings me back to Nicole courtroom days, because the patient story is so much more emotional. You know, there's an injured patient suing one of my doctors and oftentimes catastrophically injured. And so, yes, emotion is important, but all of the tools of an advocate, you know, the body language, the tone of voice, the evidence, the credibility, the questions, the words we use, the perspective, all of those tools are what determines which story wins.

Yeah. And embracing or acknowledging the validity of different, different possible stories and interpretations is really, really useful. We see in. In global politics, people who deny each other's stories are bound to prolong their conflict in their region. Right. You deny the validity of the other person, their perspective, you're going to stay at war.

You are 100% correct. And you build so much credibility when you give a nod to that person's story. You know, with the jury, I never. One of the things that I always say is I never. I pride myself on not taking the patient's dignity, even if I have to take their story. So if I have to point out inconsistencies or things that they have not told the truth about or things that contradicted in the medical records. I do. So without trying to say your story is false, your story is wrong, you know, and you want to be really careful not to do that, because. Because if you do that, you don't just lose credibility with the person whose stories you're taking, but you also lose credibility with the jury, whoever your jury might be.

Yeah, it's really interesting thing in this case, right? When you're selling or when you are speaking to your team or that kind of thing, you are persuading them, you are winning them over to your perspective, and you're working at creating and getting something that you want out of them. The sales support for your initiative, you know, whatever it is.

Yeah, you need. You want to know their story, their perspective, because that's the only way you can change it, you know, and then you can change perspectives. You can, but you need to really understand theirs, to speak to them in words that they understand, overcome the curse of knowledge, you know, really talk to them in ways that resonate with them so that you can start to change that perspective.

Yeah, it's interesting. I think the core. And courtroom dramas are great, and even if you've never been, and, you know, we should all avoid being in a courtroom drama firsthand. But if you watch them on tv, right. You know that when somebody tries to simply deny someone else's reality, suppress it, tell them no, they don't know, it's really hard. Especially if your jury, which is like your. Your buyers or your constituency or whatever, has heard it and already bought into it already. That's reasonable. I get it. I can feel their world. I know what I identify with, their injury or their wrong or whatever. And now you try to tell me, oh, that's all crap. Yeah, no, I already bought that one. So. But if you say yes, that's all real, and they really have suffered and there really is a thing, and my client was doing the best he could. It was inevitable, like, they meant well. They feel terrible within the standard of care.

But you are absolutely right that, you know, I will never say. I shouldn't say never. Never say never. I will rarely say, this patient isn't hurting, you know. You know, sometimes there have been those rare occasions where there's surveillance on the patient out playing basketball. And so in those situations, even then, though, you know, one of the things that's interesting about that is my mentor taught me not to take that away from the jury. Let them be the one to decide that the patient's A liar. So I try to really, when I have something that good, it doesn't happen often enough. I try to really play it very cool with it because there's all, you know, there's all kinds of studies that show that people value things they make themselves more than they value things that others have made. It's called the IKEA effect. And so it's the same deal.

The IKEA effect, that's fun. I put it together. I mounted that on the wall.

Exactly. And now it's very valuable. And so it's the same thing with your jury. Let them come to the conclusion themselves. And that's hard sometimes for people like you, Bill, who think that, you know, as you said, sometimes you feel like you're the smartest person in the room so you want to tell them what the conclusion is, but they find it more valuable if they think they've come to the conclusion themselves. So you just help them get the.

There. Yeah. This is so brilliant. When we're teaching coaching to people, like setting up peer coaching and teaching leaders coaching skills for their one on ones and things like that, it's like, you know what, what kind of advice has your mom been giving you forever? Or. Right. And what difference has that really made for you? There are people and they're in fact right most of the time. But when you see something for yourself, your worldview changes and then your actions naturally follow and you get different outcomes. But as long as other people are telling you what's wrong with you, it doesn't have the same impact until you have that personal insight. Right?

That's right. That's right. Yeah. And you know, all of this takes time and a little bit of effort, but the return is huge.

Well, there's a lot of good things here and you can hear that there's tons of juicy material in the book. So let me touch on a couple of things that kind of recap before we, before we close out the show. Let me also remind folks that about our sponsor. If you are someone who's trying to pick a technology partner, it's one of the toughest things and you want to find a partner who's got the right expertise, balanced with an approach, a process, who's suited to your situation, who can bring those resources to bear. Whose whole model is that? One of the companies that has used scaling up now for some time is one of our own scaling up companies is, is this company that provides technology development for like, you want to outsource your stuff, you should check out Clarion Technologies and we've got a link for you that we'll throw up here bit ly Clarion technology and see if they aren't maybe a partner. That would be great for you and your business and your technology and development. So things I heard so far are the notion of having a jury and your clients, customers, employees, your team, all of those people are that the person that you want to get something for and you might be speaking to one person or you may be speaking to many or people who are having influence. You talked about credibility first. In order if you want to be credible in eyes of others, you got to convince yourself and that might mean that you need to gain some evidence first so that you can buy into your own own thing. Go into then the conversations with questions looking for what it is that you want like being becoming a better listener so that when you ask for what you ask it actually fits their world being receptive. Noticing that tone of voice, listening deeper than simply the surface of what's said and that balance of of the inner and outer. You spoke a little bit about presentation story evoking emotion there. I heard a whole lot of good things for folks to pick up on. You're gonna go find out more about Heather and her work@advocatetowin.com we'll throw that link up on here as well. Advocatetowin.com heather's been super helpful and interesting, fun conversation to go. So I'm bummed we're out of time because we could keep talking on this for a while.

Forever. Forever. Thanks so much for having me Bill.

Super helpful advocate to win.com you'll find out more from Heather. Thanks to Lucy Summers producing before, after and during the show keeping us all the whole thing rolling along. If our show is helpful, like it and subscribe to get them every week you can drop us a note with any feedback to Info Scaling Coach. If we can help you find a coach or anything like that. We've got 200 around the world info. Scalingcoach.com is our email, scalingcoach.com is the web address. Big thanks to Vern Harnish, also author and creator of the Scaling up framework that we know and love. Our audio is edited by Albert Burge at Podfly Productions and our show notes are written up by Ayan Kadina and proofread by Tim McGow and thanks again everyone for listening and keep scaling Up.