Words That Win: How Intentional Speech Drives Results With Phil M. Jones and Jeff Dudan #224

Welcome everybody to the Unemployable Podcast. I'm Jeff Dooden. If you started your first business at the age of 14 in the automotive enhancement industry and by the age of 15 hired crews and was earning more than your teachers, if you have founded five multimillion dollar companies, if you have trained millions of people in the effective use of language in sales, negotiation and many other things, and if you are the author of 11 books, including the most listened to non fiction book of all time, and is known for the phrase, change your words, change your world, your name can only be Phil Jones. Welcome, Phil.

Hey, good to be here, Jeff. Thanks for having me on the show. I love this little intro. That was nice.

Is it really true? Yeah, of course, all of it. And more and more. I, it was. I, I had to sift through, through all of the accolades just to get down to that, but. All right, Phil, here's our opening question. How significant is precision in our speech to the outcomes that we're trying to achieve?

Well, what do you think?

Well, that's a great question. I'm glad you asked. I believe that precision is something aspirational that we should all be striving towards. Extra words create extra meaning and it might might not be the meaning that you're intending.

I believe that regardless of what problem, challenge, obstacle, opportunity, solution, piece of friction that is existing in yours or anybody else's life, it almost certainly could be helped or solved if you had more thoughtful, intentional action around knowing exactly what to say, when to say, and how to make it count. I think it's the answer to every problem. See, most people do not have marriage difficulties. They have exactly what to say difficulties. Most people do not have leadership issues, they have exactly what to say issues. Most people do not have confidence issues. They have exactly what to say issues. Most companies don't have retention issues, they have exactly what to say issues. Now, I know I'm biased in that this is my body of work, but I haven't found a problem puzzle that cannot be solved without having more intention for what comes out of your mouth in the moments that matter. I also believe the everything that leaves your mouth, your keyboard, your pen is helping or hurting. Nothing is neutral. And if it is neutral, it was probably a waste. So if we're looking for precision, we should probably try to do more things that are helpful, less things that are hurtful, and try and cut out the neutral language. We might be better communicators.

Proper speech takes work and it's akin to a foreign language. If you don't practice it and you stop using it, then you lose it. I was an early aficionado of Sandler sales system, which all of the selling systems have the underlying fundamentals that are very similar. And I signed up for a two year program. I signed four executives up for it. We paid $76,000, I think in maybe 2003. And one of the gentlemen that attributes that particular investment in him into changing his life, he's a top broker in one of the top broker networks. He earned seven figures a year. He says that was instrumental in giving him a system within which to always operate, whether he was speaking to a candidate, a prospect, a co worker, a peer, a potential client or his children. And getting lazy in our speech is really an impediment to us because we're just, you know, we're just being a wandering generality. We're not saying anything that's specific and we're just kind of meandering along and we're not helping ourselves. We're certainly not helping anybody else.

Well, this happens everywhere. And I think why it happens is because we're not ready. We step into moments thinking that we just need to be there. And I mean, how many times have you decided that what you needed to do was to be at an appointment and you got to the appointment on time and the first time you thought about the thing you're going to say is whilst you're in the middle of the appointment.

Right.

You step into these podcast discussions and you quite clearly do a huge amount of work before the work to make sure you're ready for the discussion. But that's because this is a 60 minute recording that's going to be viewed, shared, heard by thousands of people. But does it mean that a one on one interaction with somebody you care about doesn't have the same level of impact?

That's fair.

Does it mean the, the conversation that you're going to have with your family over Thanksgiving isn't worthy of the same level of prep or intention?

Right.

Yeah. What we do do is we do do work when we know we're going to be judged for it. But we don't necessarily put the same amount of intention into our language for the moments that we're stepping into where we don't get fast feedback.

Do you say false feedback or fast feedback?

Fast feedback. So feedback comes at speed. Right. If you, if you produce a piece of content and you post it on Instagram, you share it on Spotify, you put it out on YouTube, you know, pretty darn quickly. Was this a hit or not, did this land, did this resonate, did this miss? And, and the feedback is honest. Whereas in our day to day interactions, you don't get a friend or family member that says, hey, Jeff, if you maybe ask three more questions before you jump to that giant conclusion, there's a strong possibility that we, we might be having a different evening.

Yeah, fair enough. And the dishes might have actually gotten done. The, when you're, when you're having a conversation with family members and you know that there's not going to be any feedback, for example, if you're in a sales process, you're going to know whether you got the next meeting, you're going to know whether you got the sale. Perhaps there's going to be a next step. And you're right. The feedback is generally immediate. You can tell sometimes even in their body language, their interest, are they giving you a big fat think it over and just trying to get you out the door. You can tell. You can tell when people are engaged and you can tell when they're not. In the conversations that should matter more than us, the people we care the most about, the family members, our children, we're more likely to zone out and be lazy about it. And I don't know if that's just because familiarity breeds that laziness, but I have always admired people that I viewed being as very intentional with their, with their children, with their loved ones, with their spouses, with their parents in particular. I mean, how easy is it? I mean, we've known our parents virtually our entire lives, right? I mean, I met, I met my parents at a very young age and they, and you know, at some point you've heard almost everything that they've got to say. And the older they get, the more they talk about the weather and what they're having for lunch. It's very difficult to stay engaged when you're fast moving and you're building companies and you're out doing that. And then you, you have to really focus yourself to be intentional and present to give them what they need in the conversation. But I think isn't it really more about being focused on what the other person needs than what you need?

Bingo. Bingo. And, and that's where that challenge comes in. Even with your older parents sometimes is, is you think that what that conversation is about is you providing them a download or an upload about what's new in your life. And, and what you want to be able to do is, is ask them lazy questions like how's your week been? How's your day, what's new for you? All of which are pretty useless. I also have six year old twins. Right. And the, and the challenge that many of us have as parents is we ask lazy questions here like how was your day? And what do we get back? It's very predictable. Yeah, fine. Good, fun. One word answers correct. Big difference between how was your day and what did you do today? Yes, the answer is going to be compellingly different. How was your day versus what did you do today? And all it is is a subtle sequence of words. And if everything is helping or hurting, what I often go looking for is the is the 2 out of 10 everyday language that if it was a 6 or a 7 or an 8 out of 10, it would make a demonstrable difference to the overall outcome. Yet what often gets thought about in communication and particularly communication training is people are looking for perfect. So what they're looking for is how do I find the eights and nines and turns them into tens so that I can get this Instant heroic. Aren't I amazing? You'll see it in the professional speaker market. You'll see in the content game people are hyper focused on like how do I crush my hooks or what do I do for my opening or how do I get my signature story on point? We're not giving anywhere near the same level of intention to the self sabotaging language that shows up on a daily basis. And I'll give one really simple example of this is if a young child in your life was upset to a point, the tears were streaming down their face. Let's say they are 5, 6, 7, 8 years of age and you are the responsible adult for them in this given moment, for whatever reason that may have come to right and they have tears coming down their face. What is the question that most adults would ask of that child at that moment?

What happened?

See, what happened is a, is a very emotionally aware question to be able to ask. If you polled a thousand people, do you know what most people would answer that question with?

Well, that might be why are you crying?

Why are you crying? What's wrong? And we're looking to jump to solve straight away.

Well, because we're bias creating creatures.

Bingo.

We just look to create bias and tuck everything neatly into the universe as we understand it so we can move on.

Yes. And we don't want to run into the risk sometimes of learning. But when you say to a child in that moment, what's wrong? Why are you crying? You're the opposite of helpful. What you're actually Doing is. Is you're agitating their nervous system was. Which was already communicating to you that it was agitated. Because if you say to somebody in a moment of panic, what's wrong? Well, if they knew what was wrong, they wouldn't have been panicked. The panic is the unknown. They clearly don't know that's what their behavior is showing. But whereas your response in that environment of saying what happened allows them to be at a recoil share from experience that if in that response you don't lose your emotional cool, then chances are they'll regulate, and chances are you'll find out what's wrong, and chances are you'll find out how you can help. But you never ask those questions. You ask what happened. And we do this in. In our leadership roles too, is what happens is people bring you problems. And when I say you, I mean the collective you. And then what many people then do is they jump straight into solve mode. And we either tell people what they did that was wrong or we tell them how to do it right, neither of which typically achieves the outcome that we were looking for. And we tell people what to do instead of teaching people how to think. That's a very different idea.

Yes. Bill, can I ask you for help right now?

You can ask anything you like.

It is my podcast the help that I would like. Your speech is. The pattern is compelling to me because you are not filling the required pauses with any extra words. And I am wanting to jump in and acknowledge or say yes or right or something. And I'm literally sitting here with my. My stomach is tight. It's clenched. Because your, Your, Your. Your speech is just. It's a compelling style. I have a challenge. And you would think after 225 podcasts that I would be better at filling the space with extra words. And I'm. And you know, and like. And transitional words that don't add any value to the question or to the interview. And it probably when I listen to it, if the producer doesn't take them out, it. It sou me, but I've been unable to attack that. Is that something that you had to work on with intention? I know you have over 3, 500 paid presentations in 59 countries. Millions and millions of people served like McDonald's. How. You know, what. What advice can you share with me about how to improve my skills and not fill space that should be comfortable with words that don't belong?

Okay. Firstly, be less concerned with words that don't belong in many of the moments, because if you are responding to a question and you are somewhat apprehensive if you are holding space, if you are not ready to give a complete answer, if you do not respond on rapid recoil, there's a strong possibility is because you care. And what you're doing is you are working to formulate a response to a question that is in line with the size of the moment that's been created by the ask. People believe that hyper confidence in conversation comes from having no filler words, no ums, no buts, no ers. It doesn't. It actually comes from being able to hold attention. Our goal in a conversation is to be to create attention. The tool for creating attention is tension. See, if what happens is I sometimes, occasionally, like don't necessarily speak in a, like a complete sentence, what does it do? See, actually the struggle will help somebody become more engaged as opposed to less engaged.

I'm waiting to see where you're going. I'm anxious to see where you're going with it.

So what you're doing is you're hanging on every word because you feel like.

That this matters or I'm, or I'm hoping a word shows up, right?

And what we're doing is that we are showing the other person that this is a moment worth fighting for. Now that is more apparent in a one on one conversation than it is in a recorded broadcast presentation. Because our distraction can move very quickly in a broadcast environment, right? What can happen is if you, if you like, like make me like stop the scroll for a second and then like lose my attention for a second, boom, I'm gone. It's a different game. So a live audience, one on one conversation and media scenarios are all remarkably different moments. And realizing that they're different moments means that what we should be looking to do, or could be looking to do is give consideration to how does our communication style change in line with the moment. You're often told that you need to be more yourself. I'm like, which one, which one of my selves am I supposed to be? Because like if I showed up, the version of myself that was playing with my kids last night and doing silly tucking in games of then that probably wouldn't be appropriate for this version in time. So you're choosing a version of self that is relevant for that given moment. And I want you not to worry because at some point here is I'm going to get to a point that's going to allow you to do something different that's going to change the way you communicate. And the big idea that will help you Communicate more effectively in these moments is to give yourself permission to have at least three speeds of speech. The mistake that most people make is they only have two speeds of speech. They have their standard speed of speech and faster. This is a tractor with two gears. It doesn't have much utility if you can intentionally add a third speed of speech and then more intentionally shift gears. You actually have nine different ways of playing. You have three different speeds of speech that can go in three different orders, which allows you to be able to create a lot more vocal range, a lot more interest in the way that you sound. And then when you start to play with that and you think about pausing, you think about shifting from being like a really fast speed of speech, but then moving to a slower speed of speech randomly for no apparent reason, but then shifting back to your normal speed of speech. You don't need the same filler words. You have the ability in your cadence to hold space. You have the ability to be able to keep just one step ahead of the music, just one step ahead of where the other person's at. And that way they can't get lost because they're not behind. They're just working to keep up. And they're right there. They're like a split second behind and they don't want to lose pace. So the mindset that you have stepping into conversations when you want to avoid filler words is third speed of speech, intentional use of pause, and then look to be the pacemaker in the conversation. Now, being the pacemaker is different in different moments. If you're in a one on one conversation with somebody you really care about, and you're looking to deal with something that is remarkably complicated and perhaps full of sensitive information, you want to be in the same moment sharing the same oxygen, seeing the white of their eyes. And in this moment, you can leave a lot more space without fear of needing to steal attention. In this moment, I can say like, so what were you thinking about when you chose to do that? And we could stay there uncomfortably for as long as needed, and no one's going to steal the conversation until that gets an answer. But if the moment was that exact same person? And here we are at a conference in a corridor, and I'm addressing the same issue. I'm like, what were you thinking that made you think that that was a. The right thing to do? I'm still using the same tools. I'm just using them differently in a different moment.

And you would expect an immediate response in that sense.

And I'd expect the answer to be more shallow. And I'd expect to have 17 more follow on questions.

Sure.

Whereas if I'm from stage, we're now approaching it differently again, because now I'm addressing the whole audience and I'm setting up the fact that there is all a scenario in every one of our lives where there has been at least one occasion that we did something that we wish we didn't, that we find ourselves looking back on, wishing that the outcomes would have been different. You see how I've created tension with a conceptual setup. And in those moments, you've probably asked yourselves questions like, what were you thinking? Why did you do it? And now I'm using cadence in the power of rhetorical questions in that moment to get you and every other one of the thousand people in the same audience to go on the same journey one person at a time. Because a speech has a lot more intimacy than a podcast has a lot more intimacy than a. Than a media broadcast. Why? Because we're all in the same moment. That's the biggest delineator. People think size of audience. But a thousand people in the same room at the same time is not the same as a thousand people sat in the bathroom at any given random time listening to your podcast whilst being sat on the toilet. See, when you are then communicating with people in a one on one environment, like we are right now, what we're doing is we're inviting a third wheel into our conversation. We're saying it's okay to eavesdrop. We're saying, come on in. And for the last. What are we here, 11 minutes? We haven't spoke to the audience once. We just allow them to listen into our conversation and look how the cadence changes. Same tools, though, different moments.

In the times when I've presented to a large room and it went exceptionally well, I tried to deconstruct why, and it definitely had to do with cadence, voice inflection, and being more theatrical.

More.

More engage. More animated.

Yeah, more.

Yes, more. More convicted. And I always know the material because it's. It's just my material and it's just what I do. And I. And there's. It just comes out in the order that it needs to every single time. I've never bombed one yet. I'm sure I will, but it's comfortable. But there's times when I feel like I'm presenting and there's times where I feel like I'm performing.

Yeah.

And at the times that I feel like I'm performing, it's. We're sharing, like we Sharing the same moment, we're sharing the same space and every eye is on me. And, and anytime I, I look to the audience and I catch an eye there, they nod back at me. And it's just, it is the, it is such a high and I don't do it professionally. Some people, it becomes their primary career and in a big driver of their business. People like me, I'm a CEO. I'm a company builder. It's a supporting tool for authority within the industry.

That's right.

So it's not something that I'm getting 300 reps a year on. I'm getting 30.

The miss on communication for the masses is that they think the job is to learn their lines and it isn't. It is to master the moment. People want to be able to master scripts and dialogues. That isn't the problem. It's mastering moments. I'll prove it so simply. Let's go to a personal relationship scenario. Let's look at one of the most challenging, high stakes asks that exists inside many people's personal lives. There's a big ask that many people make. More men have made this ask than women. But I think everybody has the fair right to be able to ask it. And it's a big question that often appears in relationships at certain points. And it's the will you marry me? Question. How big of an ask is it?

It's a lifetime.

It's not necessarily though a big ask. I mean, did you need the script? No, I mean will you marry me? The script was not the problem. Did anybody ask that question? With 50, 50 chance of closing, Absolutely. Some take a long shot, but many have a greater degree of certainty that this is the direction of travel that we're looking to be able to go in. The hardest part of getting that big ask right is creating and finding the right moment. And if you can create and find the right moment both in terms of getting to that point or moment inside the relationship and then crystallizing the very precise, specific moment in which you're going to make that invitation for next step. That's all the work. All of the work is building and creating moments. The words were the easy part. Yeah. How much training is there around confidence in communication, script writing, preparing words? How much effort and energy are people putting into tools like chat GPT to give us a better script? And how much are people sitting in environments and running playbooks about changing up their vocabulary? Yet nobody is talking to those same people about actually what is the moment? What modality of communication are you going to use in that moment and then what the message is. That's the game that we get to pro level. The challenge we have is that there is more volume in the here's the answer. Here's the answer. Here's the answer. Space than there is and do the work to be able to get into position and then choose how you're going to be able to execute that shot and then do it skillfully. That's too hard. Like we'll avoid that.

How do you open? How do you open a talk?

Depends.

Does it. You don't have a meth, a formula.

I have a pantry of ingredients of things that I've done in the past that I might learn from yet. When we think about moments, there's a big difference between if I'm opening a three day event and I'm the opener than if I'm one of the middle speakers and I'm the content speaker versus if I'm the closing.

That's fair.

There's also a big difference if am I picking up off the back of the the CEOs 30 minutes of of sharing State of the Nation. I have to carry that energy. I also would open very differently if I'm in a room of thousand people than if I'm in a room with 35 people. I'll also open very differently if there are a thousand seats in the room and only 600 of them fall versus if there are thousand seats in the room and there's standing room only. Like all of these external factors change how you show up.

For the moment I have a scenario.

Okay.

Monday morning.

Yep.

World City Center Orlando Marriott is our third annual homecoming. We'll have four to 500 people there, mainly franchisees, our staff and vendors. I'm the CEO and Monday morning I open. I'm doing three hours.

Okay.

The it's broken down into segments and the Last hour and 15 minutes is a panel. So but I'm. I've chosen to open not with the welcome but with a story.

Okay.

And just go straight into a story. Hero's journey. Great game of business.

Okay.

Probably 10 minutes because it sets up the importance of knowing your numbers and open book management and all of the things that I'm going to be highlighting as to here's the path to our success. Here's the path to your success.

Okay.

So I'm just going to launch with a 10 minute. Like I saw Simon Sinek open one time. He walked up on stage, he walked to the edge of the stage. He looked into the distance somewhere and he just it was 1936 or something like that. Right. Does that sound like an appropriate opening?

It could be. What outcome are you looking to create?

Confidence in our plan. I want to hold them. We're looking to create great specificity on where they need to focus to have their greatest success. We're looking to create great collaboration between them and with us. And there's also, it's an expensive event to put on. People have had to pay for it. There needs to be a good enter takeaway entertainment value. It needs to be well done. And I have, we do have a keynote the next day, but I do have some videos from some pretty big people that have, that have given a 10 or 12 minute video during that first hour and 45 minutes to, to really share how they use the tools that we're working with them. So, so that's, that's what we're trying to accomplish.

So you want to install confidence in the plan. You're looking to have specificity around the areas of focus that are important to them and you want to feel collaborative and you want to set the scene up for a great few days.

Great few days and also a great 2026.

Okay, what's the first 30 seconds of the story?

I, I haven't, I haven't written it yet but it's the great game of business story with Jack Stack. So if I'm going to do building a story brand, I'm going to say something like International Harvester was a hundred year old company in 1983 and they had grown to dominance by this, that and the other thing. But through a series of mishaps they were now closing factories in Memphis and closing factories in Wisconsin and closing there. And there was a man called Jack Stack who was working in Springfield, Missouri as a 29 year old.

Here's my problem.

Yes.

Is my problem with this story is it doesn't yet have you in it. So what you're doing is, is, is you're telling a story that has most of the audience going where's he going with this? If I know the story, I already know how this finishes. If I'm aware of the case study, I've got knowledge of where this is going and if I don't, I'm confused. So if you're looking for confidence in the plan and specificity and collaboration, you failed on all three.

Okay.

In this opening. So how do we fix it?

Yes.

When did, when did you meet this story?

When did I meet this story?

Yeah.

Maybe 15 years ago in a Vistage group.

Okay. Where Were you?

Oh man. I was in Charlotte in a conference room with 15 other executives, CEOs.

And what was the purpose of the meeting?

Purpose of the meeting was education for us.

Look at this story. I've been in the business of improving myself since as far back as I can remember. And I love to learn every single day. In fact, most of my days are a school day. But one day a little while back, I mean, it was about 15 years ago, I'm pretty sure I was in North Carolina at the time. And I was there with a 15 person mastermind group, other CEOs, other business leaders. My buddy Steve was there, who ran a pharmaceutical company. And Colin, who now you know is here, was in the same group. And just like you all is, we're always looking for inspiration and always looking to, to have new ideas and new challenges poured in us and. And there was an idea I captured on that day there that still lives with me today and I thought would be ridiculously relevant moment. See, some of you might be aware of the story.

Love it.

See now what you've done is you've humbled yourself, you've historied yourself, you've tenured yourself, you've created openings in this for people to have access points into you. And you've made it okay that if somebody knows it, they still don't know why this matters so well to you. If somebody doesn't know it, it's okay because they're now aware that what you're going to do is you're going to share this in, in real time so that if they've got no familiarity, they're not feeling behind. And what you've done by giving that story based contextual setup before you tell their story, we're already expecting. So what this means to you is.

Right.

Which is where you need to get to. Right?

Yes.

You need to get to that place. So the cadence of a great speak is tell a story, make a point, make a point, tell a story, tell a story, make a point, make a point, tell a story, tell a story, make a point, make a point, tell a story. That will give you great cadence, is that you but your points together and you bite your stories together. What you then also do is you overlay that saying that you always have to set up and punchline. Set up and punchline. Set up and punchline. Set up and punchline. So you have these two, two tracks going along each other. Can a point be a setup? Yes. Can a point be a punchline? Yes. Can a story be a setup? Yes. Can a story be a punchline? Yes. See, if you're running those two tracks alongside each other and you're using the vocal cadence, this game over for everybody.

Else, that's like, stand up, dude.

It's exactly like. Right?

It's. Yeah. Yep.

But no setup and punchline whilst also actually making your deliverables. See, what we just did there is we made story point and then got back to story again. But the setup was a story. The point was then there was like this other story that was introduced to you was actually the point.

Yes.

And then you start telling the story again as a new setup. And. And now what you're doing is just a play. All you are is a drummer. Right. What you got is one over here that you're tapping and one over here that you're tapping and another over here. And before you know his music. But you're not doing any one thing. You're doing three, four things at the same time with melody. That's what makes it non negotiable that people tap their feet. That's a fairly big idea. And I know that you just caught it.

Yes. Yeah. This is one of the first podcasts I'm going to actually go back and listen to that I've done first.

This is your. This is your ruse, Jeff. Jeff invites me onto his show for a podcast, delivering a consultation and coaching sessions.

I didn't. I didn't intend to go that way. You know, look at all these. Look at all these questions I have. I love it.

But this is the work and, and I've on so many shows and if people want to understand, how did you get started and what's your story and how did the book come about, etc. I have done that interview a thousand times.

Yeah.

I haven't done this one once before. This one's great.

Yeah. The podcast serves for me the purpose of curiosity and I so enjoy preparing for it. And I come into this with so much curiosity and just a framework. I have my framework and I. After nearly every podcast, people say, I've never had a podcast like that. That was. The questions were hard, they were good. And, you know, but they're not really questions. I don't have questions written down. I've got concepts written down.

Right.

And. And it makes it, you know, let's, let's. It's a bit of a workout, so I appreciate that. But yeah, I don't. You're not going to get the. So tell me what's next, Phil, you know, it's so awesome. Okay. Critical conversations. I was in a mediation recently. And the reason that I was in the mediation is because the person on the other side in any scenario would vapor lock with the slightest conflict. And I didn't handle it well. I basically didn't find a way to communicate in such a way that honored their discomfort. And as a result of that, we ended up in a dust out. And like any divorce, everybody has to take 100% of the responsibility. So while I was explicitly right.

Right.

That doesn't mean make me unresponsible. What, when you're, when you're, if you struggle with critical conversations, how can you prepare to have a critical conversation at any time and not, you know, not, not screw it up, not make it worse and get some relief from the situation?

Okay. For starters, decide for the rest of your life that there is a big difference between being right and getting the right result.

Okay?

Once that becomes accepted, you can step into many situations without this desire to be able to win the day. Because you're not trying to win the day or win the argument or win the fight. What you're actually trying to do is to, is to win the, the entire game, which is called your life. So the right result is way more precious to you than being right in any singular isolated set of circumstances. The other thing to give consideration to is if you're stepping into a complex, high stakes conversation of any nature, decide ahead of time that you might not be right. There's a possibility that you are missing data, you are missing insights, you are missing information and that whatever somebody else thinks or believes could actually be well informed. So you cannot influence anybody unless you're open to influence yourself. It's impossible. See, when you step into these conversations with a touch more neutrality and you're less predetermined of an outcome, you, you can surf a little more. This gives you a lot more freedom. Now what we then have to understand is what actually is a critical conversation. Let's see if you can follow. A critical conversation is a moment inside the moment where your success or failure inside that moment has an over indexing impact upon the overall success you're trying to achieve. You didn't catch it, right?

No, I did. It's critic. It's, it's important. It's, it's, it's an over, over indexing of the outcome.

Let me repeat.

Okay, cool.

Conversation is a moment inside a moment where your success or failure inside that individual moment has an over indexing impact upon the overall success you're looking to achieve.

Okay, so it's an embedded it's an embedded moment that should you not win it, you may have lost the day.

Or should you not give consideration to how you show up for that moment inside the moment, then what you're looking at is generalized improvements or hustle or hard work or energy, etc. Like, a critical conversation could have huge upside. It could be downside. It could, like the, the overarching type of conversation could be full of optimism and joy, or it could be full of despair and distraught. And it could be an argument. The point is, is. Is the, the conversation itself is massive. What we really want to be able to do is to engineer the moment. So I'll approach this slightly differently. Have you ever had an appliance in your household that stopped working was broken, so what you decided to do was to throw it out and replace it for a new one?

Of course.

Was the appliance broken in the moment or was a component inside the appliance broken? Yes, component inside the appliance was broken. What the most people do is they decide the whole thing is broken. So let's move on. What do pros do? If we take this into another area? If you look into the world of sport, you've never seen a professional basketball player saying, I'll tell you what I'm going to do is I'm just going to try harder. Today they're hyper aware that there's a very specific part of their game that is worthy of obnoxious levels of attention, that if what they can do is just improve that one part of their game, everything else gets easier. So winning in critical conversations is more about saying, can I isolate the moments that are going to have the biggest impact inside of this so that what I can do is I can control.

The primary levers to do this? Do you need the ability to hold opposing or multiple thoughts in your brain at the same time?

Sure does help.

You know, I was, I met Jordan Peterson face to face one time and I asked him, I, I told in the, you know, minute I had while taking a picture, I said, Mr. Peterson, I've listened to you tremendously and you've changed my life in, in many ways. And he stopped and he looked right, he got right in my face and he said, how? And I'm like, okay, crap, now what do I say? But I knew what I was going to say. And it was, it was the ability to. He has the ability to have a conversation with himself and to argue for both sides and say, well, on one hand you could say this, and on the other hand you could look at it like this. Now, alternatively, this might create this outcome, but this would create this outcome. So if that's going to be true, and then he marries the ideas back together and I just look and it's almost like you're watching, watching an interview. But he's, he's alone and the, in the, the amount of bandwidth that somebody must have to continue that on and then to also be referencing, he's, he's also indexed, he's, he's using a large language model and he's going out and he's pulling things back to incorporate them. And he's just building this tapestry of a conversation with himself, which is fascinating. And he's, I, I believe he's going to do very well with it one day.

And that is the very high bar. How do we bring it back to something that's accessible towards all of us, the rest of us, everybody else is. There are moments within critical conversations that you don't have to hold multiple conversations with yourself at the same time, don't have to have consideration to multiple sides of an argument. I'll give the simplest of examples is when you walk into a Home Depot, often there is somebody at the front of that store that is employed with the role of greeting people with a goal to be helpful for people who are showing up, perhaps unfamiliar with the store. What do those people say?

Welcome. What do they say at Home Depot? Hello.

Yep.

Welcome. I, I, I can't, I can't think of anything more specific than that. No, it's, they don't offer to help you with anything. They don't ask you what you're looking for. That's not their job.

Nope. They'll say hello and then occasionally they'll ask like, how can I help? To almost certainly get some form of polite brush off that I'm, you know, I'm just looking. And, and then even if you did need to try and find something very specific that you had no idea how to find, you still don't ask them the question.

Right.

So here, what we have is a moment inside a major retailer that has found multiple levels of success over a sustained period of time that has a very specific moment that if they could look at that critical conversation inside the customer experience and train that person to ask a better question, what difference would it have to customer experience?

It would be a positive experience upon immediately entering the store. Which gets, would give you a positive, it would give you some sort of a residual positive.

What they did is said, every store we're going to obsess about what happens in that moment.

Yeah.

And they put 11 out of 10 attention on that. And they decided to find a way of being able to say we're going to find the right words, that we're going to repeat that. What we're then going to do is ask a meaningful question that showcases us as different to our competitors and helps our customers feel like they're in the right place and they know how to engage with our team. It would make a massive impact one moment. And our province personal lives too is.

That it's the my pleasure moment at Chick Fil A. Bingo, bingo.

Same deal. Right. Is they just obsessed more about how they would respond to somebody saying thank you.

Yes.

The result of which have created a global phenomenon simply because they have decided that that moment matters more. And that's a point of differentiation in our personal lives. We say that what we want to be able to do is to be better connected with our loved ones, better connected with our kids, better connected. And then we find ourselves in moments with them and then we're tied towards these things. We're tied towards our cell phones because we didn't respect the moment. The love was there, the intention was there, the attention was there, the appreciation. In fact, we also had all the skills. We just didn't decide the moment that was more important. I give an example of one singular moment that if every adult had more intention around it would change relationships forever. And as if you could put obnoxious levels of intention to what comes out of your mouth in the first 15 seconds when you re enter the home having been away for a minute. What difference would that make to the rest of the evening, the weekend?

It would be material.

This is what I mean by critical conversations. They're not what you think they are. The critical conversations are these hidden little cogs and components inside of machines that we say that we care about, that if we just look after that one component really well, we can be the same everywhere else. But the over indexing impact is bigger. If you're known to respond abruptly when you find yourself in conflict and that your natural response is that when somebody throws a punch, you throw a punch back. Well, that is a critical conversation isolated in that moment. If you can improve your skill in that moment to say, well, I'm going to count to three and I'm going to respond with a question instead of a statement. What difference does it happen to the rest of it? Yet we try focus on all of the skills we need for the rest of it. We have these pivot points Everywhere. If you isolate the pivot points and just get really good at them, the rest figures itself out.

When I asked you the opening question, you responded with a question. Can I ask you why you did that?

Sure. Context. I have content in galore that I could deliver, but if I deliver content without context, then all I'm doing is adding noise to noise.

You wanted to see what I was thinking about so you could focus some.

Degree of a sandbox to go play in here. Are you coming at this question from.

And.

And I also somewhat playfully want to create an environment that is a conversation that isn't. Yeah, I think it's nice for, like, make a mess together in these conversations, struggle through some difficulties together, like let's. Let's break some stuff and then try and see if we can fix it is that's where change happens. And we live in a world right now where people are looking for the right way to do things and the best practice to do things. And what's the sop and what's the blueprint and what's the how to and what's the script and what's the swipe, fly or et cetera? And. And it, in my mind is bordering on stupid thinking because limits potential everywhere. A very interesting and strangely ironic piece of advice I'm about to give is, where possible, never speak in absolutes. You catch the irony there, right? When I say never speak in absolutes.

Yes.

Is any time that you say always, never, favorite, top, number one, biggest, smallest, then you leave no room for change. I give a really simple example. If I said to you, Jeff, what's your favorite city in the world?

San Diego.

Okay. You scrambled for an answer and gave me a fairly decent one. If I said, if you think about all the places that you've. You've ever visited in your life and like, like, where is somewhere you've been that you either share with other people that they should go to or that you're. You're dreaming that one day you can.

Go back the British Virgin Islands on a catamaran.

Hmm. Isn't that like the same question? Kind of, but one, you gave me a very shallow, rapid response. And. And the second you told me a bit about who you are.

Yes.

Because if I ask a messy question, it becomes easy for you to answer. When I ask the lazy, where's your favor? You give me a lazy answer. You just go, where's a city I quite like? That's pretty decent. That I'm happy to respond to. Well, I'm not even going to go Outside the country on this one. I mean, San Diego, I quite like. I didn't even, like, break any. Break any oceans on this. And the same would be true if I said to you, like. Like, what's your favorite restaurant?

You know, I know that's tough.

It's a really hard question.

Yeah. What am I. What am I looking for?

Right. But if I said, look, if I was coming to your city and I had a few friends with me and I was only in for two nights, and I wanted to take them somewhere really special, where might I possibly go based on the recommendation from you?

Oh, we have a great new place that's New York quality in North Carolina. It's called Seaboy.

Yay. See, the difference, though, is you just told me one of your favorite places to eat locally. I didn't ask that. I asked a different question. And you could access your answer so much easier because I wrote the hard question, making it easy for you to answer. We ask easy questions, and then we make it hard for people to answer. Whereas if you can learn to ask messy questions, you can make it easy for people to give you richer answers. And the challenge in that, that most people bump into all the time is they speak too much in absolutes.

Yeah.

I'll show you again how words can work. And play with me on this for a second is if there are a thousand people in the room and I went for the word everybody, how many people am I talking about?

A thousand and one.

It's at least a thousand. Right. Plus me. Right? Right. So and if I said nobody, how many people am I talking about?

Zero.

But what if I said most people?

Two thirds?

Many.

Less than 50%. But a good number.

Some.

A handful.

A few.

A smaller handful.

A good number.

50%.

I never gave you any of these numbers, yet you found them relatively easily in your mind. I can sort and create order amongst the thoughts of other people more easily when I play in the gray space than trying to operate in the absolutes. You ever been in a relationship where somebody says to you, like, you always.

Yes.

And your inside voice instantly goes to the one time you didn't. You? Never. And you're like, it's not true. See, absolutes create friction. I could say like, like, like. Why. Why do you always leave your shoes at the front door? Friction. Hello. Why? Why so often am I bumping into your shoes here at the front door? See, if you leave room for the other person to change in the. In the question, the other person to be able to meet you somewhere, and you create Movement by not being complete, they fill the gap.

I had an answer for each question. And why do you always leave your shoes at the door? My answer was I don't always leave my shoes at the door. Why do you so often leave your shoes at the doors? I said I would say, well, sometimes I've been out to the barn and they're dirty and I don't want to track dirt through the house in those occasions.

Right.

So there's a, there's a more specific answer. May not be true 100 of the time, but it's a start. And ask you a question, what's good?

Go on.

No, I was. What I'm getting is that if you want to be a positive, influential conversationalist, there is a role of manipulation inside of it because you're.

What is your manipulation and influence?

Well, I would say leadership is manipulation with good intent.

So the intent.

Yes.

And I think Peter Parker or Uncle Ben was the first one to say that with great power comes great responsibility.

Did you just do a Spider man reference?

That's right. That's right. Nice catch. Fair enough.

Just want to make sure I was tracking.

Yeah. It's funny when you quote people and they have to second guess it, right. Maybe I did that on purpose.

Is.

We are all leading people in some way, shape or form. Every skill that I'm sharing and talking to you all about today is, is usable for good or for evil. This is true. And I do also believe that there are more good people than evil people in this world. And I do believe that if you can raise the consciousness about skills that can be utilized to create change and put them into the hands of more people so that the good people feel confident enough to be able to step into complex scenarios and respond to bullies and speak up when being over done and can create influence and change, that is more beneficial. And I'm also somewhere near 100 certain that whatever I teach the bad people will still do bad things and they will find a way.

Yes.

So the big difference between influence and manipulation in my mind is influence is something you do for somebody. Manipulation is something you do to somebody. That means that you have to be happy to live with the consequences of the actions that somebody takes as a result of how you help them take that action.

I like that. When is an appropriate time to say nothing? Is there ever an appropriate time to say nothing? Is this the time that you're saying nothing?

I mean, there are choices where you can be very slow to respond. One of my favorite phrases on the planet is an old saying, and it's the old saying, the second mouse gets the cheese. Now think about that. Literally, the second mouse gets the cheese. Now they're clearly talking about a mouse mousetrap type scenario. What happens to the first mouse, the one that comes out flying, that gets the cheese or goes for the trees? They don't get the cheese, they trip the trap. Second mouse. Now, the second mouse is actually one of the most challenging positions to come. Try and come second on purpose in the hundred meters at the Olympics, like your goal is to. Is to win a silver medal. That's your intention. That isn't run as fast as you can and see where you land.

Right.

The, the level of intention to come second is the hardest place to come in any race if you're trying to do it with intention. And this is where I would think about saying less sometimes be second. Your second thought, your second idea, your second reaction or response, not your first. So saying nothing sometimes is an elongated pause that gives you enough time to be able to respond with your second thought rather than your first the other time. Sometimes where you're looking to say nothing is when you potentially are going to find yourself arguing with an idiot. Because if you start an argument or join an argument with an idiot, you just created another one.

Yes.

And it is sometimes the best thing in the world to simply move on, to simply let it go, to simply not join the mindless debate.

Can't save them all. We can't save them all, Phil.

And you don't lose a game you choose to not participate in.

True.

So you can just choose not to play sometimes and decide is it worth it? And if winning isn't worth it, well, losing sure as hell ain't worth it. So even if you win, you don't win. Maybe let it go. Yeah, you say nothing.

Awesome.

There are other times, though, where you want to say nothing, where it's often then worth speaking up. And examples like this in your life are sometimes the, you know, the dramas and, and these could be dramas as a leader inside your organization where there's a member of your team that you know is less than performing. Right. And you know that have things are going on and you could say nothing, you want to say nothing. And actually not that much bad would happen if you said nothing. But really a lot of good could happen if you have these challenging conversations. And there are other times, like in your personal life, where you know, there's some drama going on over here and somebody's reached out or had a barrage at you, etcetera. And you saying nothing could have amplifying consequences.

Yeah.

That result in somebody taking that narrative of your nothingness and turning it into something bigger. So stepping up and hushing that thing down with new context.

You shared something about there's nothing that's neutral. I tell people that there's no decision that is. That is neutral. And there's no action or inaction that is neutral. Everything we do moves the needle incrementally. Every action we take, every decision that we make.

Had a challenging conversation to have today. And not overly challenging, but in family dynamics, etc. There was some outreach and some crossfire that was less than ideal. I knew that a phone call was the right modality to have and I knew not giving this too much oxygen was the right thing to be able to do. So what I didn't do was schedule a call. What I did do was make a phone call to said person eight minutes prior to me having a hard stop commitment. What did that allow me to be able to do was to enter into the conversation with grace, have the discussion need to have, but also pre frame that conversation and say, look, this is just a quick call. I'm doing something else at the top of the hour. But I thought this was worthy of a phone call rather than a text message.

Was the most important thing you said in that conversation the first thing you said or the last thing you said?

Yes.

Both.

But you don't get to deliver a punchline if you don't set it up. Right.

Right. Sometimes I found you rip the band aid off and then you have the conversation. But I've always learned that the last thing somebody says before they hang up the phone with you is the thing that they wanted to say and been waiting to say the entire conversation.

Yeah. Very much can be, can't it?

Yeah. So I tend to go first and listen last.

But a well designed frame at the front of that.

Right.

Will help what lives inside it.

Yeah.

Feel safer, stronger and more defined.

Yes.

Even. Even. Look at a tough conversation with a team member or a colleague. If you can start it with, you know I love you. Right.

Now, here's, here's your box. Put your stuff in it.

Right. But. But even we're not going to jump straight to command. Here is a. I don't mean to go here. I just think the nature of our conversation today wouldn't be fair if I didn't add some structure to this.

Okay.

If you are looking to be able to have any form of challenging conversation that you need to start, here is your Structure, O, F, Q Past, present, future, when was the last time? Would it help if when would be a good time? The O stands for opening. The F stands for fact. The Q stands for question. Polite opening, mutually agreeable fact, easy to answer question. Then we go back in time in the past, then we talk about the present, then we question the future. Then we use a qualifying filter which was when was the last time? Then we offer help with the preface, would it help if they then transact on that help by buying Here? We then schedule the action that follows that help being delivered with the words when would be a good time? And give me any scenario of a conversation you're looking to start. Let's just see if we can role play this right now so we can prove to the listeners how much this framework will help in any area of life.

We have to reposition an employee to a slightly lesser role.

Okay.

That will impact their compensation and their span of control.

And for the purpose of the exercise, give me a made up name that is definitely not the name of the person that you're looking to be able to do this with for right now, but just to help me make a more humanized conversation.

Rupert.

Okay, so my polite opening is. Hi, Rupert. My mutually agreeable fact is that you've been here in this company at this period of time now for XYZ period of time, my easy to answer question is do you still see yourself working here? Would you still like to work here? Are you happy working here? Have you enjoyed working here? Any version of that? He's going to say, I'd like to think yes, yes.

You're asking. Okay, yes, yes.

I'm going to say in a past based fashion is when you think back into your career today, where have you seen yourself playing from the most strengths? Where have you historically either enjoyed or made the biggest impact in any role you've had here at the company?

I believe in this particular task that I've performed those well. While I think in other areas it was a little bit outside of my scope.

Okay, but answer the question for me. Look back on your career up until right now is like, where historically have you felt like that you've been, you've been winning, playing at your best, making the biggest contribution towards the company.

When I'm out in the field and I'm meeting with new clients and I'm creating a relationship and I'm engaging with them and getting a commitment for them to spend time with me outside of business, which deepens the relationship. I feel like I've done Really well with that. Okay.

And then when we look at your, your current role that you're in right now, how would you see your own performance in this, in this current role of this very specific period of time?

Well, I'm in sales management now and I have to spend more time doing coaching and doing ride alongs and I don't get to spend primary time with the clients. I feel like I'm taking all of this time that I've could be out there generating results for the company and I'm investing it in coaching and managing a group of salespeople that I candidly don't think are as good as me.

And do you see that as you playing to your strengths or not?

It doesn't feel like it.

Okay, so if we're to look into the future, is the current role you have now something that you would love to be doing long term.

It? I don't enjoy it and I don't think I'm as productive as I was, as I, as I would like to be in doing the other role and being more customer facing.

And when was the last time that you, that you felt a deep sense of satisfaction and joy about a day at work?

Oh, that was on the Underhill account.

So a little while back.

Yes.

And how often do you live in your days feeling, you know, less than satisfied?

Half. Half the days.

And for how long has this been a concern to you?

At least six months. So.

So would it help if we could look at changing and evolving your role in some way so that you could perhaps play more to your strengths?

Look, I want to be here. I came here because I believe in the company. I came here because I believe in you. But I just have to. I just feel like I need to be doing something that I'm really good at. So. Yeah, absolutely. I'm certainly open to it.

Okay, so when would be a good time for us to sit down next week and get really practical about what alternative options could be?

Anytime. I work for you.

Do you see the play of the cadence?

Yes. Yeah.

And that is a series of well orchestrated chess moves in a conversation that many would have taken as a stronghold. Conversation is like, we know you've been here a long time and that you're doing the best you can with the role and that you're. You did bring some real skills to it, but there are some challenges here that would exist in the way the role is evolving. And you know, we're sorry to put you in this position and we absolutely want to keep you and. Right. Whereas the cadence that we ran here got to a point of patient self discovery that allowed them to be able to own up and go, yeah, like, I was happy to, like, step into this role, but not really. And.

Yeah, and sometimes you have to give people an exit with honor through a door that they can open. They feel like they're opening themselves.

And look at my final question. There it was. When would be a good time for us to get together next week and explore what those options could be? Because that little emotional journey in one conversation probably isn't ready to decide upon the next role with a pay reduction.

Right.

So you get to the next conversation and you opening, fat question. Past, present, future. Watch how it runs again. I say, great that we could find some time together today. And no doubt you've had a lot on your mind over the last seven days and you're keen to be able to get this result today. You're gonna say yes?

Yes.

I gotta say. So. So what have you been thinking about past. And where are you at coming into this conversation? What's your current situation and what are you hoping to get from our time together here today?

Future. Okay.

And, you know, would it help if I share with you what I think the right role is?

Absolutely.

Then I'm going to share it because I've got permission. And then I'm going to say, well, when would be a good time for us to activate this change?

As soon as possible.

This was a lot less painful, wasn't it?

Yeah.

And all you're doing is leading and guiding a conversation in a way that's considerate and human and kind and impatient.

The conversations that we avoid have probably already been played out in the heads of the people that we're avoiding it with. Everybody knows. Everybody knows the score. Everybody knows the deal. It's very. I can't. It's very rare when somebody's blindsided with a performance conversation if they're being honest.

And if you move them a few degrees at a time, yeah, they'll go 180. But if you try to move them in 45 and 90 degree shifts to get them to 180, yeah, the earbuds start coming out. And once the earbuds start coming, you're off the tracks.

Right? Yeah. That's a brilliant framework. I had a few others here written down that as I listened to you on some other podcasts around sales and disarming and stuff, but maybe we'll save that for a different time. I think it's probably time. This has been an amazing conversation, Phil. I can't tell you how much I enjoyed this and how valuable it was for me. And I'm sure it's going to be valuable for the listeners. So as we tug gently on the reins and turn this thing towards the barn here, I've got a curveball and a fastball to close it out. Let's go. But before that, please tell people how they can get in touch with you.

I guess let's, let's look at three things. Here is if you want to continue the conversation then come find me on Instagram at Philem Jones uk. It's the one platform that I'm on as a person. Would love to be able to chat to you there. If you want to learn more about the kind of services that we provide, either philemjones.com or exactly what to say.com you'll see much of what it is that we've created across those two. And I think a third CTA here is if you've enjoyed this conversation that we've been having here with Jeff, if you have scenarios or situations that you'd like more tactical language to deploy towards, then, then, then hit Jeff back up and let's see if it's worthwhile me coming back on the show and, and see if we can have more of a sort of rapid fire tactical how do we help you with sales and business growth language if that's got some appetite towards you.

Oh, don't throw me in the briar patch man. I'll take that, I'll take that for sure, Phil. Okay, here's the curveball. Gun to your head. You have to start a business in the next 30 days. It can't be something that you're currently doing.

Yeah.

Where is the opportunity in the market that you see that you would exploit?

And it has to be profitable in that same timeline.

No, there's no other constraints around it.

30 days looking to be able to expel them.

Just where what would you start? Just like where. What if you discovered that you said wow, that would be a really great business to be in right now.

The retraining of mid experienced career professionals that have simply realized that they need to reinvent themselves in their 50s or 60s and they still need to make another 25 years worth of income. Something that helps that group of people understand how they can create value in the next chapter both in terms of, and I'd probably three legged stall it as well is how do I attract them for fee, for consultation, train them for fee to be able to develop and grow and Then place them and a modern day attract train placement agency that takes experienced professionals and lays them back out to corporations in a way that they've re engineered their value from a past employment into something the modern world would appreciate.

It's going to be needed. We do it in a way in franchising because that's what we do. We give people an opportunity to recreate themselves inside.

Franchising is a precise example of that. Right. It is actually probably the closest to, to a proven track record of being able to do that exact same thing. But there is going to be a large subsegment of the database that don't necessarily want to be unemployable. They want to be employable and they believe that they are unemployable and they believe the only employment that exists. So retraining, reskilling, re empowering, reconfidencing those people and having them rehirable at somewhere near the levels that would be required for them to be able to sustain and maintain their family existence. I think there's going to be a massive market for that.

Do you know Ilana Golan with Leap Academy out in California? I do know San Diego. She created something similar to that called Leap Academy and it is a fanatical group of clients. She is an ex Israeli Air Force IDF pilot. Wow. And trainer. Commander and trainer. And then she moved to California and she created this. She then she built a big company and found out when that company was sold or she was removed from it, that she didn't have any skills and she hadn't done anything to make herself marketable for the next opportunity. So that's exactly what she did. She's a big deal. I tell you. I really respect her a lot. I went out and spoke at her conference and we've done a back and forth podcast. I think you'd love to meet her. Maybe I'll make an intro.

And I think for friends here that are in franchising and looking to attract new franchisees is remembering that even like that, that is the business that you're in, right. That you're in the business of being able to help, help retrain and, and sometimes the languaging is less about the service you provide or the products that you sell or the, the work that what it looks like is helping protect that ego through and helping somebody understand that they are retrainable to have a new chapter in life.

Right. Okay, here's the fastball. Last question right down the middle. If you had one sentence to make an impact in somebody's life. What would that be?

Stop counting your conversations and start making your conversations count.

Perfectly, said Phil Jones. This has been amazing. Thank you so much for being on the podcast.

My absolute pleasure. A joy to be here.

Yeah. I'm Jeff Duden here with Phil Jones. We have been on the unemployable podcast. Thanks for listening.