How to Turn a Bad Deal Into a Great One (Must Watch) Feat. Chris Voss and Benjamin Hardy

Collaboration is both people wading in and being, you know, there's a difference between being assertive and being aggressive. I need you to assert your best interests. Otherwise, you're relying on me to read your mind about what's best for you.

Mm-hmm.

So for everybody out there, you've got to be assertive. You don't have to be an asshole when you do it. You know, the trick is to be assertive without being a jerk. Now cooperation is sometimes a little more passive.

Hmm.

And I want you to be collaborative. I want you to wade in. I don't want you to leave it to my mind reading to know what's best for you. And sometimes if we lean too far in the direction of cooperation, we find ourselves in a resentful position, and that's not good long term. So, you know, I want all of you to step up and politely let people know what you need, because otherwise you're relying on them to read your mind, and that decreases your percentage chances of success.

This is one of my favorite things that I've observed about as I'm getting to know you is that you're a wordsmith. As I love the distinctions in words, and that's that makes a big difference. I think people have linked assertive and aggressive as the same thing, especially people who are not likely to be assertive, that they kind of miscommunicate or misinterpret it that they need to be aggressive when they're really what they're trying to be is assertive. You can be Sort of politely, like you just said. That's kind of a, uh, that's a great thing.

Really, I, I agree with you completely. One of the most assertive people on earth, uh, somebody I'm a big fan of, Oprah Winfrey. You don't think of her as being aggressive. You know, I've talked about her enough that I've had people close to her detail to me some very specific conversations she had with people where she was extremely assertive. You know, if you were to boil down her message to one sentence, it would be, it's my way or the highway. But she says it in such a supportive and nurturing and loving fashion that people go, okay.

Yeah.

When you say it in a way that it's like, it's okay. That if that's not your way, that's fine with me, in a way, right?

That's— Yeah, that—

you know what, that's, that's it exactly. She always says, if it's not your way, it's fine with me, and no matter what, I will always love and support you.

Yes.

You know what, that's, that's interesting because I have, uh, met Oprah twice, uh, briefly, uh, the second time, but the first time I spent about 15 minutes talking with her at Maryville Resort over about 20 years ago, and she was at the resort for the first time, and my friend used to be the spa director there. And lo and behold, like Oprah kind of walks around the corner, and she looks so tired that I couldn't even bring it to myself. I wanted to ask her if she'd do an interview because even 25 years ago is when I first started doing interviews, but she looked so tired that I didn't bring up a single thing about business or anything. I was just talking to her about the equine experience using like like horses as this therapeutic thing that they were doing at this spa. And people were coming up to her and she just like had to just dismiss them. But you're right, Chris, the way she did it was, I mean, extremely assertive, but also the tone of her voice, the way she did it. But it would, I mean, there was no doubt that, you know, like, don't talk to me and that sort of thing. So it's, yeah, I think that, so I mean, to master something, Chris, from like mastering the skill negotiation here. You obviously have a book. We wanted to have you come on because certainly what you can teach people can change the trajectory of their life and the results that they get and how they interact, not just in business but in all areas of life. What are your thoughts on mastery? I mean, you even have a masterclass, you have trainings. I mean, what does it take for someone to get to that level?

You know, it's repetition, small stakes practice for high stakes results. Be willing to make mistakes and then learn from your mistakes. Now that seems obvious, but first of all, most people over the age of 25 don't want to make mistakes. You know, you're horrified, you're embarrassed. You know, you find mistakes embarrassing. And so that's the first problem. I mean, that's a real problem. And then the second thing is then learning from the mistakes. You know, it's practice makes perfect, but perfect practice makes perfect. Learn from your mistakes and be willing to get better. Like, we, you know, we got internally, we got sort of a game that we play on getting suite upgrades in hotels for free. It's a little bit of a contest. My son Brandon prides himself on always getting a better room in a hotel than me. And I'm paying the bills. But, uh, you know, he taught us how he does it. And the last time I was in a hotel, and I happened to be in Dallas for a football game just a couple of weeks ago, I did it badly and I got the suite upgrade. And afterwards, as I was going through it in my mind, I was like, ah, I made a mistake. I mean, you know, I got to do this better. But it was a learning, you know, it was a repeat experience for me.

Practice.

And, you know, I was willing to make a mistake and then, and relearn, get back into practice. Because negotiation is a perishable skill. It's not riding a bike. If you're bragging about a negotiation that you did a long time ago, then you're out of practice. Because you should have a recent victory or not quite a victory that you could talk about and get better from. So it takes practice.

So Chris, where is negotiation not utilized in life?

Yeah. You know, I don't know where it's not utilized. I mean, when are you not trying to get smarter? When are you not trying to gather information? When are you not trying to have influence in a good way? You know, again, this is what this collaborative thing that I referred to earlier about. I mean, using your powers for good and not evil.

Yeah.

If you collaborate, if you want to hurt people, it's going to catch up with you. But, you know, if I'm only information gathering, maybe, and I don't want to have influence on the outcome, you know, maybe that's it. But yeah, negotiation's involved in everything. Negotiation, one of my favorite stories is negotiation involved when you order at Starbucks. It's in everything. And the reason why it's involved at Starbucks, which which most people say it's not. I had a guy tell me that a Starbucks employee told him that he gave decaf to people that were mean to him.

Sometimes you're in negotiation, you don't even know you're negotiating.

Exactly. The most dangerous negotiation is the one you don't know you're in.

That's right.

Yeah, exactly. You're like, you're the recipient of what happens when you're an asshole to people, right?

Exactly.

So, so going back to collaboration, so let's frame it this way. So, um, you've been in some pretty serious life-or-death situations. I mean, the top international FBI hostage negotiator was one of your roles that you've done in your pretty expansive life. Uh, how does one— how does someone who's threatening to blow someone's head off wanting money or whatever that they're looking for freedom from, you know, their crimes. How do you view that as a collaboration?

Yeah, well, you know, it sounds like a cliché, but what are their actions, are there threats in a larger view? What are they designed to get? And whether or not you're a terrorist or you're a CEO or you're a paperboy, you know, it doesn't matter. I mean, we're all kind of after a few of the same things. You know, we want a better tomorrow. You know, we want to live. We want to flourish. We want to prosper. No matter what, you know, there's a higher purpose. You know, a bank robber says they need a car in 60 seconds or she dies, which is one of our favorite exercises. That guy wants to live. You know, a terrorist who has a demand, I'll kill this person if we don't have this political demand. They have greater aspirations. Yeah, I was training hostage negotiations in the United Arab Emirates a little over 10 years ago. They brought me in to sit down with the sheikh that was in charge. Brilliant guy, American-educated, interesting dude. I mean, an interesting dude. And they told me before I sat down with the sheikh, uh, if they had any, you know, if they had al-Qaeda come in The Sheikh wanted to kill him. You know, he said, understand, the Sheikh is not here for you to save terrorists' lives. The Sheikh is here for you to save lives of innocent people in the Emirates. So the Sheikh says to me, all right, what are you going to teach my guys to tell? And I said to him, I want your guys to get on the phone and say to a terrorist, What you're doing is a great thing. And the Sheikh's mouth fell open. And I said, and when they do, they're going to have them the same way I've got you right now. You can't wait to hear what I'm going to say next because there's a larger purpose to the action. So, you know, a business person, if somebody's demanding, A price reduction. They're under pressure. You don't talk about— don't talk about the price reduction. Say, sounds like you're under a lot of pressure here. Sounds like you're really up against— you're really up against it. Sounds like you're backed into a corner. Get out of reacting to what they said and think about in a bigger picture, what are they really after? And it's pretty much always the same thing because all human beings are hardwired the same.

Yeah.

So what's the most stressful negotiation you've ever been in and how did you deal with it?

Talking to my sister earlier today. Now, you know, the ones we all struggle with, the closer somebody is to us, the harder it is for us. Because it just becomes harder and harder to get out of our own way. Anytime that if I can step back at all, then I can get myself under control. And usually the way I step back is, you know, I'll vary my tone of voice. There's a couple different ways to step back to get yourself out of a reactive judgmental mode, get yourself out of you know, in angry mode. You know, they say, give a speech when you're angry, it'll be the greatest speech you ever regret.

Yeah.

You know, when your buttons are getting punched, you're actually dumber and you're also simultaneously more self-righteous. So it's not emotions that are bad, it's negative emotions. And anytime you can take a step back in any way, take a deep breath. I mean, you know, we're seeing all this stuff from traditional thought that now is being backed up with scientific data. Taking a deep breath is a way to step back. You know, that book Breathe is out there.

Mm-hmm.

I was thinking actually earlier today, you know, because I got a little heated up in conversation with my assistant. And but then I happened, you know, it was time for me to— I took a cold shower. I take cold showers for health reasons. I instantly, my mental state changed. Cool off, literally, physically. You know, so I've, you know, I varied quite a bit from your original question. What was the most stressful negotiation you were in? Anytime that I don't have a sounding board, if I'm in it by myself and I don't have somebody on my side, as a sounding board, then I'm not in as good a position. I've had some kidnappings that were ugly. You're not going to bat 1,000. You're just not. Anybody that wants to give you a negotiation strategy that says works every time, they're lying to you. I told somebody in a conversation recently, hostage negotiators had a 93% success rate. Which is an enviable success rate for any sales or business person, 93% success. But that meant we shot the bad guy 7% of the time. So engage in skills that increase your batting averages and don't expect yourself to be perfect.

Okay.

Got it. Um, so what is your, uh, process for like fleshing out a situation and then determining the best approach to take? Because you, you have to size things up, and sometimes you have to size them up relatively quickly. So, how do you, how do you speak to that?

Yeah, all right. So, the first thing is, Colin Powell said a long time ago, never let your ego get so attached to the position that if the position collapses, your ego goes with it. What does that have to do with what you just asked me? What it has to do with what you just asked me is, when you size things up initially, understand that you're going to Get in more data and your assessment of the situation is going to change. So yes, initially I'm going to size the other side up for collaboration. I'm going to size them up for whether or not they're L for half. Everybody knows what that is. I mean, I live by those phrases. I probably use them every day. I'm going to try to figure out if they're L for half. Are they easy, lucrative, and fun? Or are they hard, annoying, lame, and frustrating? And then I'm going to be willing to adapt that as I go on. I'm, you know, I'm going to use a couple of negotiation skills that are the diagnostic tools, mirrors and labels. I'm going to repeat something that they just said to get them to go on. I'm going to label what they just said. You know, it sounds like this is important to you. Anything to give me more data as we're going through to back up whether or not they're L for half. Conversely, what am I to them? Am I the favorite or the fool? If you don't know who the fool in the game is, it's probably you. In point of fact, and I'd bet the ranch on this, 20% of everybody's opportunities, 20% of business opportunities are fake opportunities. We actually think that the number is higher than that. 20% of the time the person is coming to you for your good or your service. They're looking for you to be a competing bid only. They're looking for you to flesh out their due diligence. They're looking for you to be the rabbit to drive the price down on the other side. 20% of the time. We— why do I think the numbers 20, and it's actually much higher. There's a book out there called The Challenger Sale. They ran a survey. They asked business people, how often do you actually lie to a vendor? You have no intention of doing business with them, but you're acting like you do because you need a competing bid. You're only doing due diligence. Executives responded about 20% of the time. Now, did they exaggerate or did they minimize? Because basically what they asked the executives was, how long do you lie to someone? How often do you lie about whether or not you're going to do business with them? There's no way they exaggerated. They had to have minimized. So part of my assessment at the very beginning is, am I the favorite or the fool? If I'm the fool in the game, I'm going to be Oprah. I'm going to be nice and say go away, but I'm going to say go away.

Very soothing voice that makes anybody just go away and feel good.

Be nice.

Always be nice.

ABN.

Don't always be closing. Always be nice. Always be nice.

I like that.

Hey, I hope you're enjoying this video, and I want to let you know that I have a new book that's come out, and if you'd like to get it absolutely free, There's a link below in the description, or you can wait till the end of this video, or you can simply go to joesfreebook.com and you can get a copy there. So let me ask you this, Chris. Uh, so what's the most valuable negotiation technique or strategy that you've ever learned and why is it so valuable? Because you know a lot of them.

You know, one of the simplest ones. All right, let's go with simplest. Um, mirroring, repeating the last 3 words of what someone just said.

The last 3 words?

Yeah, you know, the last 3 words. Just repeat the nice job, Dean. I know what you're doing to me.

I know what you're doing.

How dare you?

You fell for it right away without even—

How dare you? How dare you put me on me?

Nice.

You know, if you can master that skill, because a lot of times you just need some time to think. You know, everybody says, boy, you know, now that I'm thinking about it, I know what I wish you would have said. And now that I'm thinking about it, now I see what I missed. That mirror technique, the last 3 words buys you that time in the moment without the other side realizing that's what you're doing. Because they're going to go on, they're going to talk some more. They're going to add a lot in. One of, you know, one of the crazy things about the mirror technique is It's a preferred move of the people that possess both a high IQ and a high EQ. Now, I cannot explain why that is the case. I can speculate on it. I think if they are high in both areas, they love the simplicity of it and the lack of effort. And they're data-loving people. So they love how little they have to do to get a bunch of information out of the other side. But that's, that's, that's probably the single most valuable thing that you could learn, simply.

Very good. Very good. Well, so we've talked about this one before, but it's always so important because you've shifted, you've helped so many people just with this one. So, why is the word no more important than yes? And if you could give an example.

Wow.

Wow.

Yeah. Okay. So, The key to negotiation, it's not about you. You know, we hear this all the time, but here, you hear no and you're like, oh my God, oh my God, I hate no. I hate being told no. I think we get that conditioned. Every child on earth, regardless of the language, what's the first word they learn?

No.

Because they get told no and they get pointed at them and no, don't do that.

No, no, no.

So we get it beat into our— hardwired into us. So when we hear it, something horrible has just happened. But the flip side, the person who's saying it feels protected and safe. And they calm down and they relax. They feel like they just protected themselves. The other thing too is you can say no when you're tired and then immediately contribute to the conversation and think, Things through really quickly, so it's completely different. If if it's about them, people love to say no. They feel, and they're gonna they're gonna say a bunch more afterwards. You know, I got I got a couple no stories that I love, but I'll tell tell tell one of my favorites: Robert Herzog. We negotiate with Robert Herzog's crew over how many tickets they're going to buy for one of our training events. I've already offered him one. His response: for free. His response to the one for free was, how many can we buy? Not how many more free ones can we get? I'm a huge Robert Herjavec fan based on my interaction with him. I find him to be a generous, decent human being. So we're going back and forth and the event is getting ready to sell out. And my son, Brandon, who runs my company, he calls me on the phone late in the day. I'm in LA. He says, you get Herjavec to commit to how many tickets they're going to buy now, Or they're going to be sold out by the time the sun rises in New York tomorrow because my son's on East Coast time. We're getting ready to sell the event out. And Brian says, and if he doesn't buy any, I'm giving away— I'm selling a ticket that was supposed to be given for free. So I'm like, all right, I got to cut this deal. Now it's 5 o'clock in LA. When was the last time you tried to get a hard decision out of somebody at 5 o'clock? At 5:03, and also an email. At 5:03, I sent a 2-line email to Robert Herzog. Is it a ridiculous idea for you to commit to buying 3 tickets now? Second line, are you against paying for them before the business day starts in New York tomorrow? Again, we're 3 hours behind New York. The timestamp on his email response is 5:04, one minute later. No, we'll commit to the 3 tickets right now. No, it's not a problem. We'll pay for them right away. Send me a link. We'll pay for them right now within the hour. I sent him the link. We got the money at 5:23. Get people to say no. You'd be shocked at the responses you get.

Fantastic.

So there's, there's some questions that people have, but what I'm going to ask, uh, everyone, uh, save your questions. When we open it up for Q&A, I might ask you to repost them because it's sometimes hard for me to, to track everything and be present here too. So, um, so Chris, how might an entrepreneur use, uh, these strategies and techniques that you teach to better understand and serve their clients?

Well, yeah. I mean, first of all, simply understanding them better will help you serve them. You know, all right. So let's say you're the favorite. And let's say that they're elf, they're not half.

Okay.

They want you to dial into them. You know, you want to be open To a better deal, which is you tailoring your services to them so that it better serves them and it's more lucrative for you. Because first of all, I'm going to presume that everybody on this call believes the same thing that I do, that you overdeliver. So first of all, if you're overdelivering, you were bargaining whatever you were charging anyway. Which means if you tailor your service, your good or service so that it's a better delivery for them, you're worth even more. Yes, you want to get what you do. No, don't be greedy. Don't grab with both hands. But when you provide a service that's worth it, you are entitled to be paid. So the more that you listen to them and understand them, and I'm here to tell you, there are ways that you can tailor whatever you're providing that would be easier for you to provide it, which means it would be more profitable for you and it would be better for them. So be willing to engage in conversations and be open to that. And then, you know, the other, the other crazy thing is There might be something really counterintuitive that'll make it profitable for you in unexpected ways. And one of my favorites is, you know, our mutual friend, Dan Sullivan. And he's talking about his book deal. He's talking about, listen to me, never split the difference. And we pay people—

Sorry, I pushed the wrong button.

We pay people what they ask. No, I don't, I don't pound people on price. So Dan turns around and gives every dime of the book proceeds to Dan and Tucker. Ben, Ben and Tucker. Sorry, Ben and Tucker. And then Ben and Tucker— Tucker says, Dan got the last drop of my blood. When you're not greedy on the price term, What the other side gives you back might be worth 10 times what the dollars were worth. And, and those guys, I think those guys, I think Ben and Tucker would die for Dan.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And, and that's, that's— see, the beauty of Dan too is, and I think it's one of the reasons, I mean, heck, me and Dan have done podcasts on this, is we like reciprocal people. You know, we like people that are generous. We like people that are useful. And it's just so much easier to— that's what an ELF person is. People keep asking, what does ELF mean? ELF is easy, lucrative, and fun, and HAF is hard, annoying, lame, and frustrating. It's actually a term I got over 20 years ago from my friend Mark Schneider, who unfortunately passed away earlier this year. But I, I heard him say ELF years ago, and I said, I'm going to develop that into something because I started thinking of all the different business methodologies you can use in terms of marketing and the stuff that me and Dean Jackson teach on I Love Marketing. It's ELF marketing. It's automated. It's robotic. But then, I started thinking, how do you— you can filter everything through an ELF filter. What are people? What are projects? What are things that you're doing? Are they easy, lucrative, and fun? Or are they hard, annoying, lame, and frustrating? Sometimes, people can be hard, annoying, lucrative, and frustrating. Not all money is created equal. So, ELF is a really great filter and I'm super happy, Chris, that you're referring to that because I I think it just, it just offers some framing. So, yeah, I mean, it's— this is— once you, once you become skilled at utilizing what Chris is teaching and what he is talking about here, you will find a lot of things in your life that were difficult become more ELF. And that's the whole, that's the whole goal, is to bring ELF to, uh, to people in all areas of their, their entrepreneurial endeavors.

Yo, I'm gonna, I'm gonna jump in real quick because there's one more tangent I want to go on to on half.

An ELF.

Before you fire your half clients, and we just shifted into this recently, we got a couple of deals that were proposed to us and they were half deals. Before we walked away, and I had this conversation with my son, Brandon, and everybody else in our company when it came up, I said, what's the counteroffer that would make this an ELF deal? Before we walk, maybe they don't know that this is half. Maybe they don't understand it.

Yeah.

And there's a pretty good chance of what, you know, the chances are that they're going to offer you a half deal because they don't know any better. They can't help themselves. There's a whole bunch of reasons. I said, let's counter with what would make this an ELF relationship. At that point, There's no doubt in anybody's mind what we're looking for. And they had the option to take it or leave it. And we have the option to take it or leave it. And we turned a couple of deals around with that by simply countering. Instead of saying goodbye, so long, we said, all right, here's what would work for us. Here's what would make us want to do business with you forever and make us want to 10 years from now look back on the last 10 years and say, that was cool. And we threw it out there. And the batting average is actually pretty high on that. You know, we don't counteroffer their offer term by term. We construct what would be great for us and how we would love to do business with them before we walk. And you'd be surprised at how many people will embrace that because they just didn't know any better.

Do you ever have situations, Chris, where you look outside of the scope of what will be the immediate terms that are on the negotiation to see, to draw in other things that might tip things some way or, uh, be an influence? I was just thinking about how, you know—

That's a great question, man. I'm glad you brought that up.

Um, we're trying for that all the time.

And, you know, how do you know what you don't know? What we'll do is we'll start to say, let's brainstorm this a little bit.

Like, here's some ideas that people have gotten in the past.

Start throwing out wacky stuff that people brought up, and that will kick their brain into gear. So yeah, try to kick them into a collaborative brainstorming process to look for how to get outside the scope. But I mean, I love that question because that's absolutely what everybody should be doing.

So I've got some interesting questions here. One is, you say that Oprah Winfrey is the greatest negotiator of all time. Why do you say that, and what skills are needed to be A great negotiator.

Yeah, it's—

Oprah Winfrey got Lance Armstrong on camera and got him to admit to everything. And no question was a surprise. He agreed in advance to be asked every one of those questions. Think about that negotiation in advance. And you could pick out time after time after time Where she and her people did something spectacular, which required communication. She's had no shortage of blowouts with celebrities. How many of them do you know about?

None.

That's a mark of a great negotiator. Not who they crushed, but what they achieved, what they accomplished, and who's still doing business with her after those blowouts. And then also, Look at where she started. A poor Black female from Chicago, right?

Shit ton of trauma.

It isn't like she was— she didn't have her dad give her $1 million to start out with, right? So when you start looking at the length of the things that she did, and then I've gotten to know her vice president for booking and talent relations for the last 19 years recently in LA, and I've gotten to know some of the stuff they did. And I was like, wow, yeah. a lot of the exact same stuff that we did, only in a different way, which was a relief to me to hear that it was the same ideas.

Oprah's interesting. I'm not friends with her. I've met her twice. Once in 1999, I think it was, in a spa down in Tucson. And she is just hardcore. I mean, she, you know, you can just tell she has a force field. I mean, she is a force of nature, and she's very strong and very powerful, but she also knows how to be pleasant. And she's a very interesting personality. And she was just so tired when I spent about 10 minutes talking with her about equine therapy with horses and stuff. And I so badly wanted to ask her to do an interview, but she just looked so exhausted at the time that I just had to keep it on a personal level. But she was very pleasant, but very protected until she could see that, you know, there's someone— because all day long she's just getting hit up. People want a piece of her, and you have to do that. But yeah, I mean, you're absolutely right. She has not developed a reputation of being a jerk. I mean—

Yeah, I mean, anytime there's the whiff of controversy, it goes away. She doesn't fan the flames. Yeah, I mean, I, I had somebody tell me a very specific conversation she had with an extremely high-profile celebrity. that wanted to put conditions on the interview. And in sum and substance, Oprah called her on the phone. And the message was, it's my way or the highway. And the celebrity completely agreed. Now, she didn't say it like that.

Mm-hmm.

But that was the essence of the message. And so if you can say someone who's used to getting their way— and this person has pretty much gotten their way through the entire world— you say it's my way or the highway to them, then you're good at negotiation.

Yeah.

What is the next step now, Dan or Ben? What, what, what, what, what's, what's the, what's the first thing? If you were, if you ran everyone's life and would wave a magic wand, what's the next action you recommend people take? You've already talked about some by finding, you know, some goals, some things that you want to, anything else you want to speak to on that?

Well, I just do a quick thing because Ben built this into the book. And that is that in COACH we have a main tool which is called an impact filter, where you identify what you want in such a way that other people can really get it. And that's actually included in the book. And but what it does, it simply says that, that you have a project in mind and you, you say what you want to achieve, the importance of, the importance of it to you. And then the ideal result you're looking for. And then there's a section where you say, this is the best possible result. So you say it's done and it's fantastic. And you say, on the day this is done, what does this look like? And you identify up to 8 measurable results when the project is done. And once you're finished with that, you go and say, what's the worst result? If I don't move forward on this? Because when you get engaged with a goal and you're emotionally committed with it and you don't act on it, you've set yourself backwards. It'll be harder for you in the future to actually have a bigger and better goal that you act on. So, when you commit to visualizing the goal and writing it down, it's serious business because your brain takes it seriously and it wants— wants to know why you're not moving forward on it. And then I take— I type this up. It's a writable PDF, or you can write it in purpose. And I run my life with impact builders. And so the— and then what I do, I said, now, who can I send this impact builder out to and talk to them about my project? And invariably, within a matter You know, if I send it out to 10 people, within about 2 or 3 days, I've got the entire team put together. And my job is just to maintain the focus on the goal, and other people are actually doing the goal. So I write a book every quarter, but I have 10 people on my team, and it takes me roughly 25 to 30 hours to write a brand new book every quarter because everything else is handled by a 9 10-person team. And so people, how can you write a book every quarter? And I said, don't do much of the work. Don't do much of the work.

Yeah.

Don't do much of the work, you know. And so, well, I would say that Ben and I creating the Who Not How book over the past year has cost me 50 hours.

I would think that most people would agree that when it comes to negotiation, that all of us could have a little bit of improvement. Now, even if you are a seasoned negotiator, there are some times that you believe that you could maybe have said something a little different. So this talk is for you if you want to increase your negotiation skill sets, but also take it to the next level of how do you have deep connection in every one of your conversations. So through this 3-step approach, I'm gonna be teaching you that. So before we get into this, how do we define high-stake environments? Well, it's anything that is a negotiation, a high-stake conversation or presentation, and it's also an area where we have to connect on a deeper level because we're going through maybe a challenge or a struggle, and it can also affect your time, Your money, and even how you perceive your reality, so your, even your values. So even if you aren't in the, the situation where you might be fundraising hundreds of millions of dollars in your life, you're in difficult situations and conversations every single day. How many people in here are parents?

Awesome.

So having those deep connection conversations with your loved ones, And being able to have that, that effect that you want. What about you or your spouse or intimate relationships? How many people are in those, right? So it's slowing down, being able to get the most out of those situations so that you can get the results you're looking for. Team members and business partners. All of us, I'm assuming, even if we have those remote, that remote team member, we wanna be able to connect with them, get to the heart of the matter. And then we have clients and customers and patients. How many people are connected to them? Yes. Only 3 or 4? Come on. And then we have also team members, and we have investors, board members, and advisors. And so looking at how we navigate those situations. And so you're probably looking at me and saying, how did she get into negotiations and sales? Where did that start? Well, it started at the kitchen table. My parents were in real estate and real estate sales for over 50 years. 40 years. So growing up in a very highly entrepreneurial atmosphere, I saw the highs, and I saw the lows, and everything in between. And so, in the early '90s, I was a teenager, and as you know, real estate, we're going through it right now, has some cycles. And we were in a deep recession, and it was a time where I got to wake up to a time in my life where I realized that If I was gonna have something in my life, I had to own my results. I had to take ownership, I had to take responsibility, and I had to make a decision. So you all in your seats right now, and at home, you might be in a spot where today is that decision to make, that you wanna take your relationships to the next level so that you can live the life that you want to live. And so that was a very impactful experience that led me to be in sales and to understand it on all different aspects. And doing extremely well at a young age, making a lot of money and helping a lot of people, and how to take things to the next level.

Hey, I hope you're enjoying this video, and I wanna let you know that I have a new book that's come out, and if you'd like to get it absolutely free, there's a link below in the description, or you can wait till the end of this video, or you can simply go to joesfreebook.com and you can get a copy there.

So where we gotta start here is negotiation strategy. And so we negotiate from strategy. We have distributive and we have integrative. Distributive is that tug of war that you have, that maybe that one-time negotiation where you don't know if you're gonna see that person again. And so it's a lot of bargaining. It's, it's, you know, cards are close to your chest. And so you're trying to get that result, but you might not see that person again. What I really focus on is integrative, which integrative is looking at long-term relationships that we all benefit, that we all win. But don't worry, Chris Voss, I'm not gonna say win-win, right? So it's looking at how do we get to that deeper connection so this is an ongoing relationship that everyone benefits. So as you know, in negotiation there's a technical side, which I could go into, which would be a 2 to 5 day intensive where we could go into things like pre-framing, reframing, framing to— Agreement frames, anchoring to sales cycles, all these different things. And what I'm gonna do today is really focus on the artistic side, because that's something that you have a lot of control over. And it's really looking at how we have this technical and artistic side combined, which really makes it so that we are able to be authentic and have your true essence come out. So the first concept that we're gonna go over is to breathe. And I love this group because we have Jason in the back right here who's done such an amazing job. in groups and environments where there's so much pre-framing and people are ready to go with breathing. And what I'm gonna try to do is take that breathing, how do we bring it into our high-stake environments? How do we get that artistic side with our breathing and start connecting those dots into those high-stake situations? So here's some, just some basic takeaways is you wanna elongate your breath, especially the exhale, because that stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system. Which is really where we want to be in our rest and digest. So rest and digest. So we want to slow down and elongate that breath, especially the exhale, because at the end of the day, our breath is the entry point to increase our life force energy and really have that essence that we're looking for. And as you've, you've heard, I'm sure from Jason too, but a lot of different cultures talk about this in ancient wisdom. We have ki, mana, prana.

Qi.

And so it's understanding that there is this thing called energy, and how does that— we have this access point of our breath and using that and to be able to slow down. And the big thing that you're looking for is to have that alignment, embodiment, and congruency. Our breath is connected to so many things. It's connected to how we look at our values, which creates our beliefs and attitudes, which creates our thoughts, emotions, actions, behavior, and our words. And how we have clarity and how we execute. So slowing down and being able to embody your breath really gives you that range of what we wanna look at. So something too, looking at your breath, a part of my background experience, you're probably thinking like, okay, she's teaching us negotiation sales, why is she slowing down and talking about meditation and breathing? And so something that happened to me over 14 years years ago, as I was a corporate sales executive and I was also a competitive triathlete, I was in 2 consecutive accidents where I had to rebuild my whole entire body and relearn how to walk. And it was a crazy time. And literally, I didn't know what to do. It was one of those things, and it's something you could relate to too, when you're in a situation where the difficult things become simple, that you're not— you just don't know how to navigate. You've had these strategies your whole life and you don't know what to do. And so, So I wanted to give tribute to some teachers that I met along the way that taught me this information. Narazi Magnolia, he was my first teacher coming out of these accidents where I could barely walk. And if it wasn't for this man, I probably wouldn't be here today. And he was a huge believer in tai chi and qigong and yoga. And he even got me to live in an ashram in India where I had a lot healing in going through my breathwork. I also studied with Harada Roshi for over 10 years doing silent meditation retreats in Japan and all over. And, he taught me just the connection of our breath and how that is connected on all different levels and what we can do with it. And then, I also wanted to highlight just one more person was— or 2 people, Catherine Bitz-Morris and Saul. And, Voice work for 3 years because I had major PTSD after my accidents. And so what I wanted to do is just go over some basic things you wanna do with your breath. So you wanna speak at the top of your inhale. So when you're in high-stake environments, you wanna be able to be at the top of your inhale so that you have that range with your exhale and you can be able to do a lot of different things with your voice. So it's something to practice. You wanna do— also do a 360-degree breath. Most people do a 180-degree breath.

Mm-hmm.

And so you wanna use your whole entire body. Your lungs are in your back, and so to be able to do that. And you wanna do 4 to 7 cycles of breath cycles a minute. So something to focus on there as well. Most people do 14 to 17 breath cycles per minute. And this is all to increase in being in the present moment. So breathing, the next thing we're gonna go over, the number 2 thing, is listening. So remember, you have a 3-step approach, so listening. And that is really looking at the levels of listening and breaking that down. And so the levels of listening, the first level is level 0, which is really no listening at all. It's no listening, speaking only. How many people have been in that experience? When you're in a conversation, you're not really even in that conversation. So it's something to slow down and look at what level are you at. Level 1 is looking at subjective listening. This is all about the listener and their agenda, and this is where 80 to 90% of people are, and this is where they're taking their reality through their filter and reacting. Level 2 is looking at listening and not being in the present moment. When you start slowing down and looking at the how and coming out of this to be present, a lot of times we're thinking about the past or we're thinking about the future or something that is on our mind or what we're gonna say. And so it's being able to slow down 5 minutes a day and just being present with our breath and remember elongating especially the exhale. Level 3 is objective active listening. So being able to objective active listen is really about problem solving. It's looking at the facts versus the story. How can we get to the solution? What is actually going on here? We can move it forward, which is great in work environments. Level 4 is looking at intuitive listening, and this is where you're taking all 5 of your senses. So that's visual, auditory, kinesthetic, gustatory, and you're able to see what's happening in between the lines. Because most of the time we're in these surface structures And we want to get to the deeper structures. So you want to slow down and be able to actually, like, ask questions and look at how this all connected. And so within listening, we have the levels, and then it's also looking at active listening and looking at things like, it seems, it sounds, what I've heard, and then asking, is that right? And with that, asking questions. So these are some of my favorite questions, just to go through this quickly and to wrap up. Questions you wanna ask when you're in negotiations, 'cause it's really about the other person and listening. So what does success look like? What are you looking for specifically? Tell me the next step in the process. Tell me how you make decisions. These are all really great questions to ask. So here's a summary of that. Take a picture. And so it's about practicing attuned listening and elongating your breath in low-stakes situations so you can do it in high-stakes situations. And the last area I wanna talk about is connection, 'cause that really, when you're able to breathe, listen, we're all looking to have deep connection. And so deep connection starts with us being able to slow down and connecting to ourselves first. So how do we do that? How do we connect to ourselves first, and how do we look at kindness, empathy, and compassion for ourselves first, and then we're able to do for others? 'Cause most of the things that happen, That happen is that when, in most cases, anything we do to ourselves, we do to others. So it's being able to slow down and be able to connect with ourselves first. 'Cause at the end of the day, we're meaning-making machines, 'cause we just, that's what we do on unconscious levels. We're making meaning out of our experiences and events. And I'm always curious what other people are, are meaning and making out of their events. And so understanding meaning is how do we bring the heart and the mind together? And when we're talking to people and connecting with them, That we might be talking about something and agree on something, but it might not, it might mean something different. So how do we slow down and actually ask, what do you mean by what you're saying? Or what do you mean by this? So you can connect on those deeper structures I was talking about, and so you can move the conversation forward and actually get to the heart of the matter of what's most important. And then just really quickly, I think people know about verbal and nonverbal communication 'cause it's such a huge component of connection. But you have physiology, we already talked about breathing and posture, And being able to do conscious gesturing. You have tonality, and what I want you to take away from this is tonality, the most 2 important things is volume and speed. So having that range, especially when you elongate the breath, you're able to do that. And then you have your words, which is only 7%. Everyone's always surprised by this, and I know some people have seen this before. And so it's looking at predicates, which is your verbs, keywords, common experiences, and content chunks. And so just to look at this all together, which is always interesting to me that 93% of communication is so nonverbal, and to slow down and really connect to all those different aspects of how we're communicating. And to wrap up, it's looking at intonation patterns. So especially when you're in big deals and you're negotiating, or you're in those difficult conversations with your spouse or your loved ones. To, when you're getting to certain important parts, especially when you're closing, for instance, you really wanna be aware of your pitch. So where are you? Do you naturally go upward sometimes when it's a little awkward or uncomfortable, or do you go flat or neutral or a command? So for instance, I'm working with a security company right now that is pretty high up. They're doing a lot for Ukraine, and they work a lot with the DOD and military. And so one of my CEOs and clients, we have to work on his intonation pattern of doing a command language, because military's very command-like language at the end of a sentence. So these are just some things to think about. So what you can do is in your next high-stakes environment, or negotiation, or high-stakes conversation, you can breathe better, listen better, and connect better. And what I imagine for all of you is to slow down, and in that next conversation or negotiation that maybe the last time it didn't go the best way it did, but for some reason this time with having that right approach and thinking about these 3 things, everything comes into place.

There's so much great stuff that we could do this.

I think we should talk about communication because I don't know if we touched on that yet. Let's—

there we go. Yep, what the best communicators do to establish deeper and more meaningful connections.

Oh, great. Okay. Yeah, so I'm not going rogue on you.

No, no. And listen, I, I love— and thanks that we can look at this. Eunice prepares these, uh, for me so that we make sure we get exactly the best things that we can get, uh, out here. So Because sometimes you get— I get caught up in the moment of the conversations and we could just go, uh, you know, deeper. I'm very curious about things, so I— and I'm ADD, squirrel, and we end up all down the thing and we're talking about something. So it's nice to have our, uh, true north to come back to here.

Great, great. Well, we have to be trustworthy. We said we're going to deliver something, so we have to deliver, right?

That's right.

So, so here's what great communicators do. And it's simple, but not easy, right?

Yeah.

So the main goal of all communication is not to persuade, to sell, to convince. It's not. The primary goal— and now think about what I said about establishing the active empathy and active listening. The main goal of all communication, first and foremost, is to establish Mm-hmm. Because if you don't have a connection with somebody, yes, your message will fall on deaf ears. And that's what happens when I yell across the room to my husband. He might not be listening to me. I think I told him, I think I got my message across. Yeah, but it wasn't the connection. And that's why so many times you have— you— and it creates distrust. You didn't tell me. No, I did. And you're both right.

Right.

You're both right. So the main goal is to connect first, followed by your message. Now, why? Theodore Roosevelt said, nobody will care about how much you know until they know how much you care. And without a connection, how can you possibly know how much somebody cares? Now, to bring this full circle, Dean, A connection is a prerequisite for establishing empathy, for establishing understanding. And without empathy, you can't have a healthy relationship. And you will never be able to— and very few absolutes in life, but you will never be able to resolve conflict.

Yeah, it's really, it's an interesting thing that the I've been thinking a lot about know you like you trust you. We talk about that know, like, trust, right? As, as, but when we're saying it, they, it reads as one thing.

Mm-hmm.

Know you like you trust you. I don't think that people value the incremental, uh, step, like to go from not knowing you, not knowing you exist. Like this may be the first time that somebody's ever heard the words Dr. Patty Dublin, that they never— maybe don't know that, right? So to be able to go from, I don't know that, to, okay, now I know that you exist.

Right.

And then we've had this experience of being able to— the more that they get to kind of look at you and, you know, the neurons Testing. And Jerry Spence has this great thing about how our psychic tentacles are reaching out, kind of measuring and testing things, and they can detect what he calls the thin clank of the counterfeit. That we're testing on a deeper level for authenticity. That is, this person the real? Can I— do I like this person? And can I trust this person? And I think you can get to that stage quickly, um, but it's okay too, I think, to know that you can get to— it doesn't all have to happen instantly either.

Well, so, so I'm going to talk out of both sides of my mouth for what you just said. So on the one hand, yes, Um, that first impression, that gut, right? Like, oh, don't ignore your gut, right? That evolutionary history telling you something. Yeah. Um, on the one hand. On the other hand, um, you, you don't ask someone to get married on the first date.

Exactly. Yeah.

Right. So, so it's almost like the Ronald Reagan, Reagan trust but verify. Now, to complicate things, once you think you like somebody, then the conscious bias kicks in. So you're only going to see things you like, right? But, um, people aren't stupid, right? You know, I used to say I'm fooled when I was younger. I'd say, like, you know, 90/10. I'd be fooled 10% of the time. As I've gotten older, I think it's 80/20.

Yeah.

Now I'm smart enough to know that I'm fooled 20% of the time. But when I was younger, I didn't realize it. I was too dumb to know.

Yeah.

So go, go with what your gut tells you. And I am a huge one of eyes are the windows to the soul.

Mm-hmm.

Right?

Yes.

Look at people, look people in. If someone doesn't look you in the eye, I'm not talking about people on the spectrum and stuff, very respectfully.

Right.

But if you're talking to somebody and they can't look you in the eye, their eyes are shifting, what's that about?

Right, exactly.

Now, it's just a curiosity question, right? I'm not judging. I'm not saying it's game over, but, hmm, yeah, I did. I, I actually once had that encounter with the woman, and I said, listen, I'm having a hard time talking to you because you're not looking at me. And, you know, she told me, I was raised in a cult and women were not allowed to look you in the eye when they were spoken to.

Oh my goodness.

So that changed everything.

Wow.

But I had to ask.

Yeah, right. Most people wouldn't even have the awareness to know that that was what the thing was that was, uh, seemed unusual. They might not even just be aware that something's off with this and looking for those, uh, for those, those cues. Is there any— I mean, things like when you're doing Those things, are there simple things that you can do that are going to raise the, you know, I know that smiling is one thing or making eye contact maybe is the one thing, nodding.

Actually smiling. Here's a good one with nonverbal communication. I think when you smile, if you, I can demonstrate this great, right? If you don't see someone's crow's feet, I got a million of them, right? Not a genuine smile, really. So then you're like, hmm, is it—

or, or Botox or something?

Well, just, just listen to any politician talk.

Yeah, right, exactly. That's funny.

I love it.

Brian, come on.

Okay, stop. You just heard one word.

That was good, y'all.

Did that get your attention? That is the power of words. Thank you, Kyle, you did a great job. What words are you using? What if we had— and I certainly wouldn't yell this at a meeting— if we heard the word fire? If that was said at a meeting, We would all know what to do. We've got to get out. That's the power of your words. Your words have great power. We talked about that earlier when I mentioned that comment about what you're saying to yourself. So we need to think about just the words that we use, whether it's to ourselves or others. So I'm going to give you a word. Would you think of elephant?

Okay.

How many see an elephant, maybe not one on a pot, maybe you see— how many saw something like this?

Elephant.

In your mind. Did anybody see these 8 words?

No.

Every time you use a word, it creates a mental picture. And Darryl, your willingness, and Brian, to go help whatever was happening in that room was illustrated by that, that our words have great power. And that's why when you speak, everything you say is transformed. Transferred to your audience's mind. So whether you're speaking at a Genius Network event, at an annual meeting, or a 10-minute talk here, you're doing a webinar, you're putting a video on your website, which so many of you do, a podcast, or a radio interview, television interview, or if you're at the Redneck Yacht Club giving a speech. Now all these ideas are in a handout for you so you don't bother taking notes. So what if I said to you, Since we heard we have a lot of financial advisors in the room that are in the money business, I can help you earn more money. Does that sound like a good statement? I can help you earn more money. But if you think about those words, doesn't that infer that you're probably not doing very well? Or what if I said, I have a system to get you into better shape? Now, Fred, you're in great shape. I am. Right, Mr. Muscle Man here. But if I say I have a system to get you in better shape, what picture comes to mind? Something like this. So here's your first four-letter word: even. If you will use this four-letter word every time you say more or better. So let me give you those two sentences again. I can help you earn even more money.

Oh my God.

What does that say? This is the kind of person you are. I have a system to get you in even better shape. What does that mean? Jim Do. Is that good? Is that what you wanted me to say, Jim? Magnificent physical shape. It also gives people credit. It builds people up. Do you like that first idea?

Yes.

It's so simple. And in working with many of you on your presentation, Linda, on your meeting, we talked about just changing a few words that make such a greater impact. So just imagine it's Monday the 3rd, that's this coming Monday, about 9:37, and you're back in front of your team. David, you have a lot of people that work with you. How many people do you have? We heard Nick had 20 About 155. 155. So let's say at 9:37 in California, David's going to be in front of his people and he says, you know, I just got back from Genius Network. I am so excited. I got so many great ideas. We're going to make 3 changes around here that are going to grow our business even more. Now, is that a good statement?

Yes.

Okay.

But we had that word change. Well, how do you feel when somebody says we're going to change something?

Fear.

Fear, uncertainty, disruption, confusion, all of those thoughts run into mind. A threat or loss if we're going to change something. So you know what these people are going to say, David, in their own mind? Wait till Thursday. He'll forget about everything and we'll just go back to normal because he'll calm down. So here's your second Great word. Replace change with improve. I've got some great ideas on how we can improve what we do here. You know what people will say? If you go back on Monday and say, oh, I just came back from Genius Now. I got so many ideas on how we can improve things. Well, what do you have in mind? People love to improve. So replace change with improve. Would that help you have a nice day? How many say that to people? Have a nice day. Have a good day. End our emails, it was so great talking to you. Have a nice day. Don't ever say that again. It's a conditional phrase. It means, sure, I'm going to have a nice day as long as I don't get a root canal, as long as I don't have to sleep on a bed of nails.

Go through life that way.

I'm going to have a nice day. Sure, I'll have a nice day as long as I don't have to learn the names of David's 11 kids. You have one of your daughters here, right?

Yes, I do.

And there's 10 more back home. He doesn't even know the names of all 11 kids. Alex, please stand up. Sure, I'm gonna have a nice day as long as I don't have to pronounce How do you say that last name? See, see how easy it is for him. Or keep up with Linda McKissack's 101 activities, right, Jim, that she's got planned for this week. Then I'm gonna have a nice day. So here's the third word: instead of have a nice day, make it a great day. If you put make it a great day when your kids leave for school— have a nice day, well, bus drivers, tests, all Well, that's going to affect me. Make it a great day. Who's responsible?

They are.

It's our responsibility. Just one little change, and people get stopped by it. Put it on your voicemail. End your emails with it. Now those of you in Genius Network that I've been working with see that on all my emails, and notice now it's coming back the same way to me. Make it a great day. Little things can improve your speaking impact. If you just think, of those 15 letters, even, improve, and make. Could that make a difference?

Sure.

Mike, you're a master, and we're gonna hear about that, at sales letters and videos. You spend a lot of time thinking about the words you use because you've learned that if you just change this a little bit, it makes such a difference. And I saw the reaction when I said even. I can help you make even more As opposed to, I can help you make money, because you probably don't have any. Just those little things. So we are needing more political correctness. Now we got Trump in the White House. We got Joe up in front of the group. You don't want to say to people they've got a beer belly. This is not the best use of words. He has a liquid grain storage facility. This would be much better. You don't want to call a woman a nag. She's just verbally repetitive. Much better. And you don't ever want to say somebody is a total ass. You're much better off saying that they have a cranial— a rectal-cranial inversion. That's much better for that. But seriously, even before you use more and better, improve instead of change, and make it a great day. One last thought, since we have a lot of women in the room. I don't know much about personal defense or anything like that. We have many members that do that. I don't think any of them are here today. But if you do need help, just like Kyle yelled in my opening, help! This group came to help. But if you were in a parking lot and yelled help, we've heard the Kitty Genovese that happened in New York where a woman A woman was screaming for her life and she got killed in front of all these people and nobody did anything. So here's a suggestion, and this would work for men too.

Help!

My baby! Just add my baby. Old women will come to your help if a baby is threatened. But if it's just you alone, you might be out there all alone. The power of words. So I told you I had a handout. Let me pass this out quickly, and then we'll cover a few things on making your own killer 10-minute talk. So if you could pass this down your way and this the other side, and this your way.

Great.

And then there's some at the end for the back table, and we have some extras for the people downstairs. If somebody could, we'll just stack them up, an extra stack for downstairs. When you speak, it's great to have a handout. Wasn't it nice you didn't have to write all the ideas down? So on the first page there, we have the help and the fire, the mental picture about the elephant. At the bottom of that first page, it says the 3 power words: even, improve, and make, and the examples I gave. On the back are those other illustrations. E is help. My baby. But look down below under some of the speaking ideas. Is there any question, number one, the golden thread? That's the one sentence that summarizes what you say. In my case, it was the power of words. Does anybody get confused by what I was talking about? Are you having a single statement that your audience can follow? Then the visuals added impact. I had 78 slides.

No.

Use more visuals, but make them simple. 1 or 2 words, that's it, or a picture. And number 3, add humor. And here are 5 examples of visuals where you laughed. I didn't have to be funny or say a joke. The picture added the impact. Think about doing that when you speak. Speak. And now, make it, make it, make it a great day.

I want to share with you a strategy that we've been using at my company, and I teach my clients, that has helped us to dramatically improve our chances in closing the opportunities that we get in front of. Okay, so just to kind of give you an idea, we are closing roughly between 23, 24 of the raw leads that we generate, and we are closing 70% when they get to the point where they're actually talking to a salesperson, and it's for a $3,000 product. And I don't know if you consider that really good or really bad or whatever it is, but that's what it is, and it's real, this process has helped us. And what it is, is instead of handling objections the way most sales trainers teach you, it's about thinking about what the objections are going to be in advance, Mmhmm. And killing them before they've ever been brought up, okay? Because I think sales training fails in the sense that they teach you how to handle objections, and I believe that if you try and handle an objection once the customer has delivered it to you, you're not handling anything, you are arguing with them, okay? So let me give you an example. My clients sell outsourced IT support services. Right, and how many— does anyone in here outsource some aspect of IT? Right, okay. So let's suppose you're talking to an IT person, and I'm gonna read you— this is a sales trainer, I'm not gonna mention who the sales trainer is, a very well-known sales trainer, and I'm not discrediting what he's teaching, but imagine you're sitting across the desk with a potential IT company you're thinking of outsourcing to, And they tell you what they can do and they give you the price and you think out loud or you say out loud, I don't know, that price seems a little bit high, I can get it cheaper somewhere else. That's what you tell to this salesperson. Now imagine them responding to you and saying, well, that might be true, Mr. Johnson, and after all, in today's economy, we all want the most for our money. And a truth that I have learned over the years is that the cheapest price is not always what we really want. Most people look for 3 things when choosing an IT provider. 1, competence. 2, a highly responsive service. And 3, lowest price. And I've never yet found a company that can provide highly competent technicians and a highly responsive help desk for the lowest price. I'm curious, Mr. Johnson, for your long-term happiness, which of the 3 would you be most willing to give up? Competence, responsiveness, or the lowest price? Now, I had to read that because there's no way in hell I'm going to memorize I can visualize that. But can any of you imagine being on the other end? Like, you'd laugh, right? I mean, I would laugh. I'd be like, okay, can you say that again? I gotta record this on video because this is pretty damn funny. And how many of you can imagine actually with a straight face articulating that to a customer? You can't. And because you're arguing, it's condescending at this point. I've just verbalized something that I'm not comfortable with or a question I have or something and now you're trying to argue with me and tell me that I'm stupid or I'm wrong and so forth. So that's why I think when you build your sales presentations you have to know what the objections are in advance and you build it into your presentation and you deliver it as an educational piece of content. So for example, the way I teach my guys to handle that objection is we actually have a report that I wrote actually, which is what you should expect to pay for IT support in like LA. If, if we were in LA. Okay, now, this is a report, it's very well written, it's well researched, it shows the different pricing models of how the industry charges, what the average price is, it talks about gotchas in a contract, some things that are excluded and what you want to look for. Now, when we give that to a prospect in advance of the sales meeting and we ask them to read it, or even in the sales meeting itself, we reference parts of this and say, well, according to the industry research that we've done And I can tell you that this is what most people charge. Yes, we're a little bit higher, but this is why we're a little bit higher, and you give an intelligent answer to that, now the prospect's more likely to trust you and more likely to buy. So in our, in my business, we think of what is, what are gonna be the objections in advance. So what, a lot of it is what we send to the prospect before they meet with us, and if I could get this screen up, I want to show you something that we we've been working on. This is, we call it our online shock and awe. Now what this is, it's a customized, personalized URL, so where it says Erin Light up there, it would be whoever your prospect is. And what you can do here in this video, we actually have 2 versions of this. One has, this is Jeff Johnson, who's my VP of the high-end coaching we do, and so you can have a personalized video message for the prospect. And you can see over here there is a, there's like a little video. This is gonna be a video testimonial. There's an audio, but I'll show you this one. So in this case, this one for example is a testimonial video. So they come to the personalized URL and instantly it starts playing a testimonial video.

Personalized URL business increased sales probably about 15%.

Last year was 30% and I expect no less this year.

My net profit was up by almost 100%.

Wait, say that again.

Your net profit was up 150%?

My net profit was up 149+%.

Yes.

Last year I spent 3 weeks— So I'm not gonna play the whole video for you, but you get the idea. Now that could be a personalized video or it could be a testimonial one. What I want to show you though, which has been extremely helpful for us, is in these personalized websites, we can stand them up in literally 30 seconds, but we send this in advance of the consultation that my salesperson is going to sit down with this prospect. And so one of the things that we know, for example, is they might no-show for their consultation, right, because they kind of know it's a sales pitch in some— so one of the things we tell them is you have to be in front of a computer because we do not send them the content of the presentation in advance. So for example, if you do any kind of report of findings, if you're giving any kind of value with our consultations, we actually give them a marketing roadmap, and it's, and it is a very high-value piece of content. We make sure that they are on the call, all decision makers are there, and then we email them. So that's, that handles one objection. Another objection we know is that the decision maker might not show up. So what happens is the CEO doesn't show up, but the marketing person does. And what objection then does that create? Does everyone know? I gotta talk it over with the boss. I gotta talk it over with the boss. And we know they always say they're the decision maker, but But then they use that as an out. We will not hold the consultation if the decision maker is not there, and we— in advance, we've got on the letter, you know, to get the most out of the consult, we have 3 requirements. One is you're in front of your computer in a quiet place in front of email. That way we can send them the roadmap. Number 2, that the decision maker is there, and we have a whole script if they come back and say that they can't be there. And we also ask them to watch a couple videos, and the videos essentially are handling objections. Another thing that we've done, now depending, these little reports down here are customizable and depending on who the person is and what size company they are, what type of company they are, we change the content at the bottom. So let's suppose for example we found when we were doing consults with companies that are larger IT service providers, they're doing $20 million a year, $10 million, $15 million, $20 million, they might say, they were saying to Aaron, my sales guy, Um, you know what, your stuff probably doesn't work for us, we're a big company, it's too small, and vice versa. So in— if he is talking to a larger IT services firm, we actually have this, which is a little page of testimonials that will pop up that are all from companies that are doing anywhere from $12 million to $24 million, and testimonials about the program. So that handles that objection. Um, over here, you know, this is basically a testimonial book. And we make sure with our testimonials that we have a variety, so we make sure we don't just have men, we don't just have women, we have some people that are from India, Indian descent, because that's a percentage of the IT industry is that. Over here is an audio that if I played on— this is an interview.

9-step marketing secret.

So I'm not gonna play that for you, but that is somebody interviewing me on basically handling objections. So, couple things to take away from this. Number one, this is a cool factor Which gets people to consume it, 'cause they start clicking around. So that's number one, you gotta get people to consume your marketing. If you don't do that, it doesn't matter how brilliant it is, it falls on deaf ears. Second of all, because of the cool factor, people share it, right? So they're like, hey, check this out, and they email it to other people and we can see how many views there have been, alright? Now, how do you put this to work in your business? Even if you don't have this kind of a shock and awe box, here's what I would recommend. Make a list of every single objection that you get in your business, and if you get right down to it, there's probably only 3 or 4 really big ones. Think about how are you gonna handle that in advance before they talk to you, how are you gonna design your marketing and your sales presentation so that you kill those objections so that when it comes to asking for the order, they can't weasel out of it with something, some kind of excuse. Alright, and the other thing is be listening to your salespeople. people's phone calls because there's so much value in that. As I grow my company and I hire salespeople and I'm not doing the selling as much anymore as I used to, you can sort of lose touch with that end customer. So it's really important that you're actually reviewing some of the recorded calls with your salespeople, listening to those objections, and then building the marketing out in advance so that those objections are basically erased.

Have you heard of Um, um, the Working Genius, um, assessment. It's like a Kolbe. Do you do any of those kind of things, like for self-awareness, where people do—

I do Kolbe.

Kolbe is very interesting because it tells you when somebody's a quick start or whether—

Oh yeah.

All of that stuff.

And I love that stuff. Um, I don't do as many personality things. I do Kolbe, and I'm right now doing, um, I have my own process for the why. But I don't know if you guys— if you— everybody else here saw the YOS thing that Mike Koenigs was talking about a couple of weeks ago. I'm doing some certification on that because getting people to know who they are is so helpful in what I do.

Interesting. So the one that I've seen that is my new favorite now is Working Genius, and it's specifically for teams where it's kind of Colby and Unique Ability Like, where it's practical. It shows you what your natural genius is, what you, what you feel like. There's 6 basic, um, things, and they go from, uh, Wonder, which is somebody who's looking to see the big picture of how things can be better.

Mm-hmm.

Invention, to figure out how to do something specific. discernment, knowing what is the right, uh, thing to do. Then there's galvanizing, which is getting people together. Somebody has a genius for galvanizing the team.

Mm-hmm.

Someone has a genius for enablement, which is helping everybody get what they need to work together. And someone with a genius for tenacity, which is driving things through to Completion. So you can see there's a correlation to kind of fact-finding, quick start, follow through, and implementer.

What are you—

what's your Kolbe?

So I'm a 4/4/10/1.

And I'm a 3— I'm a 3/3/9/3.

Okay, there you go. Oh, yeah, exactly. So I imagine if everybody has that awareness, Yeah. Kind of thing that nobody's— any kind of frustration or friction. Like, it would be so bad to put me in a position of making sure that we're driving this to completion, that that's not the— I'm at the start of something is where my genius is, you know.

That's me too.

Imagine people get put in a position where they're in charge of now, uh, something that's completely off of what they're, uh, what they are. So imagine getting people— Jim Collins used to say getting people, the right people on the bus, right? And then getting the right people on the right seat in the bus. And there's so much of that.

Yeah, to your point earlier though, with the doctors, right? So they come to this realization that they're entrepreneurs. And they're— a lot of their frustration comes from having people that are working in their office who don't think like them. And they can't understand that. You know, one I'll get all the time, that question I'll get, Dino, how, I've explained this to them 30, 40, 50 times. Why am I having to repeat myself? Or, hey, Dino, like they don't get it. I actually had a phone call once from a dentist who is a female dentist and she was frustrated and upset about her team. She's like, I just don't understand. Why don't they think like I do? And I said, well, if they did, they would have gone to dental school.

Yes.

And so when you talk about not having the right people on the bus, they don't even fully understand, a lot of times, what types of people they want or need on the bus to then get on the bus. They're literally going up to random parking lots and picking up anybody who's there.

Hey, you want to get on the bus? Come on in.

That's right.

We got a seat.

I have a, my second book was called Hire and Fire Like a Boss. And the whole idea behind it came from a course that I did which was, by the way, it was a Dean Jackson thing. I did the course first. I just did the audio and then I made a little book out of it. Okay.

I like that.

And which is almost all my books. And the idea of it was to help them understand how to actually find the right people instead of just looking for warm bodies. And especially right now, a lot of people very concerned about this idea of not being able to find anybody in the right amount of time. So they get time pressure, stress. They've got a schedule that's full of patients coming in. We just need a warm body. And of course, we all know that's a terrible way to hire people. But yeah, trying to get them to understand. So I saw somebody post something in the comments here. So the genius thing, that's a Lencioni thing?

Oh, I don't know.

I'm not—

The working genius? I think it's a Lencioni thing.

Okay.

Yeah.

So I do a piece around Lencioni's ideal team players. And that surprises people when you talk about, listen, you got to find people who are humble, hungry, and smart. Right? And how do I find those people? And what am I looking for? And what do you mean by that? And so I do this whole training around that. Now, that actually leads into talking about personalities. So I have a personality test that I do from stage. And it's a little different because as I said, I like to dance. So I call it Dino's D-A-N-C-E Personalities from the app.

Okay.

And so what happens is I take people through how they show up.

You know, I don't know, Tim, Timothy, I'm looking at the backdrop here and it seems that that table was just pushed a little bit out of the way there, Dino. We could probably demonstrate something. Let's do it, man. Everybody, everybody is looking for some dance.

Come on.

I mean, really.

I need, I need this set up and everything.

Oh, okay.

But I can walk you through it though.

Okay.

So, what I do is I say that you can actually see people's personality in the office by how they show up on the dance floor.

Okay.

Now, most of these events that I speak at have an evening event where there's an open bar and where they get like free drink tickets and then a DJ. And Because I like dance so much, I can see people's different personalities through the D, A, N, C, and E. And yes, on stage I actually do. We have music built in and I dance out each personality. That's so funny. And it's a funny moment, but the point is, is to help them see themselves and go, that is how I am in the office. Or the doctors to go, yep, that's totally Linda. Yep, that's Gary. So it's important to know those types of things, those personalities.

So you kind of break that in then, and everybody's there. And, um, so when you're coming into it, everybody's kind of— imagine that there's some— I don't know if festering is the right word, or, or below the surface, uh, drama that you're coming into with the, the team. And maybe this is an opportunity as you, as an outsider, do you find that that's something that allows people to kind of address that inner team drama?

Oh yeah, for sure. So a couple of things I've done is I, in trying to make my business a lot more elf, I definitely have screened a lot more now than I did before. Like 10 years ago when I started, I'd take pretty much anybody in. You know, I would work really hard. Now I work with a lot more teams who I feel are at least halfway, if not 3 quarters of the way there already, where they are— they're a good team, they like to work together, they just have some underlying conflicts that we need to resolve or some underlying vision that we need to focus on. But yeah, definitely. And because I can create that relationship with people because I can go in and help people gain trust with me pretty quickly. They'll tell me their stuff and I'm also able to address it though. So, for example, like I'll use often, I'll be using it tomorrow for, as a matter of fact, I do this survey that I send out before I go to any office. And one of the challenges in this office is a couple people are frustrated that they're not getting annual raises. Well, I don't believe in annual raises. And so I'll use the Keith Cunningham thing. Well, I'll come in there and I'll say, look, do you think you deserve a raise just because you're breathing the same air as everybody else this last year?

Right.

No.

But let me show you how to get a raise. And so then I show them the secret on how to get a raise. And I give them like 3 or 4 or 5 things that they can do the next time they go in for their employee interview. So now I'm able to say the thing that is hurtful, like it hurts to say that, or it's a little sticky, but I'm also giving them a resolve of, oh, but how, here's how to overcome it. I'm not just telling you, you're, you know, an idiot for asking for a raise for not doing anything.

Right.

I'm saying, don't do that, do this. And then they go, oh, so they see I'm on their side. I'm not there to do anything against them. So.

Yeah.

Well, that's interesting. You know, I remember Do you think about the, uh, the love languages in the, uh, office, like learning everybody how to communicate?

So the guy who does love languages, Gary Chapman, he joined with a guy named, uh, Dr.— I think he said White— and it's, uh, the something of an office, the personalities of an office, but it's basically love languages for an office.

Joe Polish, I mean, I'm laughing on the inside right now, but Joe Polish and I were laughing to the point of tears one day, sitting in the back of a JJ Virgin event where she was introducing this idea of love languages at work.

Oh.

And we were imagining like, what could the possible love languages at work be? And we were coming up with the, like, you know, awkward eye contact, Or, you know, hugging.

We're going dirty. I know you. We all know on this call, Dean, you guys were going dirty. We all know.

There's not a single person who's like, well, what do they mean by physical touch?

It was just like, yeah, it was inappropriate touching. Or it was—

I mean, we were just laughing about how we could totally see you guys doing that.

Love languages that work. But I guess essentially he took the same things and applies the same love languages to a work setting, not creating new ones for work. And we were disappointed in that.

In my first book, I did that with support. I called it support. I just changed it with support. Like, and I have everybody do a test on how do they best feel support. Some people want the rewards. Some people just want the encouragement, but other people want to be left alone and other people want oversight. So same type of idea. But yeah, I actually interviewed that doctor, man. I can't remember his name, the doctor. I wanna say white, but anyways, for that book.

Okay, I hope you found that video awesome and useful. So if you wanna get a free copy of my book, I want you to click here. And if you wanna watch some more videos that'll be useful and awesome, click here.

Go ahead, they're over here.

Do it now.

Come on.

Thank you.

Watch 'em.