Effective listening - Highlight Reel

Hello, my fellow negotiators. I have a quick question for you and some exciting news to share. But first the question. Have you ever used a piece of advice from Negotiate Anything in any part of your life? What impact did that have, and what would it mean if you could amplify that impact? Now, while you're thinking about that, let me share the exciting news that is what your life and career will look like when you join Negotiate Anything Premium. Negotiate Anything Premium is a comprehensive resource for mastering negotiation, providing exclusive content and community support to enhance your growth. It's everything you love about Negotiate Anything and so much more. Are you ready to negotiate more of the best things in life? Click the link in the show notes to learn more. I'll catch you later. And now, I know for the audience, we don't really need to sell them too much on the benefits of listening. I think those are pretty obvious. But I think it might be more interesting to talk about why we are worse at listening than we think we are.

Well, largely it's because we think we already know the answers, Right? So one of the things that I talk about is there's a difference between hearing and listening. And I think we've all heard that, but there's a difference between making a connection and having a conversation. And so I think the benevolence in us thinks that if we're just having a conversation, then I say my piece and I wait my turn. Sometimes I don't wait my turn, but look, see, we're successfully having a conversation. But it takes a lot of courage and vulnerability to actually make a connection with someone, whether you're going to see them again and again and again, or maybe that's the only time you're ever going to see them. It's a very different thing and involves listening.

Okay. And so what I'm hearing now is that the goal with listening is to. Or one of the goals is to create a connection. Is that right?

Absolutely.

And what do you mean by connection?

Let's take somebody that you're probably not going to see again. So let's take a barista in between your landing gate and your departing gate during a very tight connection. But you have just enough time to grab a cup of coffee. In that moment, there's a human who's helping you pay for the coffee, make the coffee, give you the coffee. So when I talk about the difference between hearing and listening, if the person at the barista is like, hello, my name is Tanya, and you start off with, hi, venti, soy chai, you're not actually listening. They're attempting to engage you in a conversation. Even if it's a script. You have interrupted their introduction and their name to give them your order. Now, maybe it's because you're in a hurry, but you're certainly not listening. You're playing the script out of that. Here's my order. That is one not listening. That's really not even hearing. But it's not a conversation. Because when you've interrupted someone doing that, even if it's part of an inauthentic script, they get the message that you are not interested in listening or having a conversation. So they just want you to move along as well. So to me, that's a really powerful missed opportunity for a connection. And what I mean by that is, is that the barista can say, hi, my name is Tanya, and I can say, hi, my name is Jessica. How's your day going? And sometimes they're like, yeah, keep it moving, lady, what's your drink? I gotta go. You're not entitled to a connection. But in that moment, I broke the script. Both my script and their script. We probably made eye contact. And then if they opt into a connection, they can say like, it's been pretty busy today. And from me, I can imagine I used to be a barista. Like, what would it be like to be a barista in an airport where you don't really have regulars? But the connection is letting the human know I see them, and then it gives them a chance to let me know that I'm seen too, instead of just being another person in line.

And now let me play devil's advocate, because I can hear some of the hard charging business folks in the audience saying, well, I mean, that makes sense, but why? Let's play devil's advocate and break it down. Why is there value in creating this level of connection and not just focusing on getting what we want out of the conversation?

Right. Like, you don't do it because you get like free pumps of vanilla in your chai. That's not why you do it. I think why you do it is that it is never wrong for someone to feel like they exist in your world. So like in sales 101, they always say a person's name is the most recognized sound. So part of that is validating that that person exists. And so if you're kind of a schmoozy salesperson who's dropping name all the time to pretend make a connection, what would happen if you actually slowed that down just enough and actually made eye contact and Actually shut your face long enough to actually listen to what the other person has to say. So I know under the guise of negotiations, one of the things I think is the most underused, underrated first step of a really successful negotiation or sales moment is listening and observing the person that you're about to engage with. And if you've decided we're going to have a connection, which I think is also rooted in like loyalty and respect, so not just one shot clients, but potentially long term relationship building connections, you're going to do this by this moment is going to be an intentional conversation. Then the step that I think you have to do that most of us don't do is observe and pay attention to the person we're about to connect with. So to find out where they're at, allow them to enter the conversation and then you follow. Some people I can hear say, well, that's not initiating, but initiating by giving someone eye contact and listening to them. You're still the alpha there, right? You're still the A. The B still has to respond. And it might be subtle body language, it might be words, it might be an exchange. But if you as the salesperson, the one who's taking the lead in the negotiation, listens to them as if they are wise, as if they have something to actually teach or give you to improve the negotiation, you've slowed down enough and let them respond to you, creating that negotiation space.

Absolutely. These are really great points when you think about just the word listening versus disciplined listening. What's the distinction?

Thank you for asking. So as I get into this, I want to make sure that I'm clear up front that I'm not talking down about active listening. I don't want to come across that way at all. Those traditional active listening behaviors that have been taught since the 50s are good and we should do those things. But there are several opportunities that lay within them. So first, really active listening equates to attentive listening. So it's true that if you believe that I'm showing you more attention while you're talking, then yes, you're more likely to share more information. That's true. I'm willing to bet there's a pretty serious percentage of your listeners that are black belts at looking people in the eye, smiling, nodding, mirroring their posture, occasionally summarizing a word or two they heard, all while summarily ignoring the person that they're looking at and thinking about some other pressing matter in their day, how they feel or what they want to say next. So it looks like we're listening, but we're really not. And that's. It's how our brain works. Our internal monologue runs about four times faster than we can speak audibly out loud. So our mind is going to be racing ahead and there are some distractions. So with disciplined listening, yes, all of those active, active listening behaviors still apply. However, the focus of disciplined listening is identifying hidden value in every conversation as trite or as, you know, listening 101 as this may sound. How do we elevate the goals we take into every conversation and then apply that goal oriented approach? So now I'm observing, looking and listening for any indication to achieve that goal, to enhance the relationship, to enhance the project, to enhance the outcome based on the conversation. And I think that's basically summarized. I may have rambled there a little bit. But that really, from my bias perspective is what separates disciplined listening. Understand the goals we're looking to achieve, implying applying specific behaviors and techniques to maximize the relationship to achieve those goals.

Oh, this is great, Mike. Because for me one of the signs of a brilliant insight is that it seems obvious in hindsight. And that's how I feel about this because you're right. And I think one of the best parts of what you just said is that you've normalized the listening experience for so many people because we've been taught active listening. Square your body, make eye contact, give those nonverbal like encouragers and summarize from time to time. We're really good at that. But I'll call myself out sometimes I would be doing those things and my body essentially goes on autopilot. It does it naturally at this point and then a few seconds pass by and I say, where did I go? Could they tell I was gone? I don't know, you know. And so really what you've done with this is you've taken listening to the next level. Because yes, active listening is good, but this is much better. And I like the fact that it's goal oriented. We're not just listening for the sake of listening. We're actually focusing on the outcome that we're trying to achieve through listening.

Thank you. And that goal outcome or that goal focus is really important there. There's a fair amount of research that is consist and clear that we generally will apply as much focus and effort we believe to be necessary based on the expectations we have going into the conversation. So if I go into a conversation thinking what I say isn't going to matter to Kwame, he's got his mind made up he's going to do what he wants. Or if I go in thinking my mind's made up, this, you know, maybe he surprises me, but more or less I don't think he's got anything for me. Now, my expectations are low. If I go in expecting there to be, and I say this in air quotes that people might not be able to see, but expecting there to be a fight, right. This is going to be an argument, then I'm not going to put in a lot of effort to make sure that doesn't happen. And subconsciously I might do some things that actually create that argument that otherwise could have been avoided. But if I'm going into a conversation and I literally elevate my goal, shift my mind's eye from the short term tactical to the long term strategic. So instead of thinking about what is the time drain that this conversation is going to have on my day or my life, what's the emotional drain that this is going to have, where are you and I so different that it's going to be frustrating and hard to work from if I'm focusing on that? My expectations tend to be short term focused, negative, and reduce the amount of effort and focus I'm willing to put in. But now if I look at and say, okay, well, I'm here for a reason, what's the greater reason? What's the long term impact of this conversation? Not just where does it have me today, but where does it position me down the road? The next conversation, the next relationship, the next opportunity. Now the reward or the incentive is bigger. And because the reward or the incentive is bigger, I'm more likely to, to apply more effort, more focus, compartmentalize my emotions, separate the people from the issue, all of these things that I know that you teach. Because now it isn't just about surviving this conversation. It's about moving bigger pieces on a bigger chessboard to a more productive outcome.

I've got a quick story for you. So I was at this keynote and I talked to a listener and he said, kwame, I love the podcast, but my favorite part, man, I love those commercials. And I said, I don't think this is a true story. And now let me tell you about Negotiate Anything Premium, where you can listen to your favorite Negotiate Anything episodes ad free. With a subscription to Premium, you can get access to more insights from your favorite experts and ad free listening and extended episodes. Bonus, you'll also get access to exclusive episodes and personalized advice from yours truly. If you've been looking for an easy and affordable way to Level up your skills and negotiate more of the best things in life. Join our premium community. Now for that gentleman in that fictional story. This ads for you and for the rest of you, I'll see you in premium. And so now for the listeners, they might be saying, okay, I'm sold. Now I want to make connections and now I want to listen effectively. How do I do that besides simply opening up my ears? What is the actual process?

The ugly part is not just opening your ears, but it's noticing when you're more likely to open your ears and when you're more likely to start talking. I think sometimes doing this in a physical sense is really challenging. So I flip it to social media. So when are you more likely to look at a post and read the comments without typing? And some people depending on the topic, it doesn't take much. You just immediately start typing. So slow down, look at the comments that have already been said. There's a possibility that whatever it is you think you're about to type has already been stated and has already been commented and replied to. So now you can add and contribute to that connection or that conversation instead of looking like some dork who saw something, got all fired up and started typing without realizing, yeah, we were there like three hours ago. Thanks for joining the conversation. Join the conversation. That's a connection. Once you realize that, okay, I've listened, I've observed, now I have something to say. Intentionally forming a message is important. Don't just talk off the cuff. Specifically when we're talking about sales and negotiation. There's an outcome that you're trying to get to and you get yourself. And we all have done this. We have all gotten ourselves in trouble by over promising or interrupting or making assumptions or saying something without intentionally forming a message and then really figuring out what you intend the meaning of that message to be and then put it outside of your face when you've said things that you have to backpedal or you have to figure out how to do something, or possibly, heaven forbid, manipulate the conversation so that the person didn't hear it or they misunderstood or something. That's your fault. That's my fault. So part of listening is also paying attention to what am I going to try and say and what is the intentional meaning of the message? I'm going to say, so you're listening to the other person first and then you're listening to yourself.

This is incredibly disheartening because I was here hoping for an easy answer and everything that you've described seems. Seems incredibly Painful to do and. But you're absolutely right. I'm thinking about even in. Again, like, I think about these conversations just in everyday social interactions as practice for the conversations that matter. Yesterday I was talking to my mom and she was talking about the royal wedding, which I think is just absolutely ridiculous. I don't know why people care about it, and it just annoys me to no end. She said, oh, Kwame, did you hear about the royal wedding? And I immediately rolled. Rolled my eyes because I thought I knew where the conversation was going to go. And I already had my opinion set and ready to go. She saw the eye roll and she said, wait, wait, wait, Kwame, I just want to let you know the conductor of the orchestra that was playing is of Guyanese descent. And we're Guyanese, so that was a good thing. I like National Pride. I love my country. That's great. But I would have potentially missed out on that gem if I would have just went and attacked the religious relevance of this wedding to my life. And I think about it then, when you consider it in the context of an actual business conversation, where, like you said, you mentioned this earlier in the conversation, when we think we know the answer, we stop listening and we start formulating our response and we miss the gold that's behind it. And during that whole time, we might not be talking. And like you said, listening isn't just the lack of talking. We are sitting there not connecting with the other person, and we are formulating our own response, which makes us worse people in general, but also worse negotiators and less persuasive. And people can notice that, and they can see it not only in what you say, but also in your body language as well.

Absolutely. And you are doing a really great example of where most listening conversations stop, because you're missing the connection piece. When your mother brought up the royal wedding, she was not fact checking your knowledge of the wedding. She was trying to connect with you about Guyanese pride. Right. So you like, ugh, the wedding. Right. Totally get you. I'm there, too. And it wasn't about the exchange of information. It was about having a moment with your mother and your mother having a moment with her son about the visibility of the conductor being a Guyanese descent. Does that make sense?

Absolutely.

The listening often is an exchange of information that's actually kind of lowercase. Hearing. Right. We call it listening, but really we're just hearing. But the connection piece isn't just about the exchange of facts. It's about that moment of like, yeah, that's amazing. Like, the connection that you made with your mother there wasn't directly derived from the script. And that connection piece is what you had before that conversation took place, and that connection piece is what you have after the conversation takes place. And we're responsible for the impact of the messages that we're sending to one another. So, I mean, you didn't roll your eyes at your relationship with your mother. You rolled your eyes at the absurdity of people making a big deal about this wedding. Right. Do you see that?

Absolutely. And I can see that from the other side, she might think that possibly maybe I was rolling my eyes at my mother. You know, maybe she felt that way. And that's like you said, it's on me.

I would recommend not doing that.

Exactly, exactly. And one of the things that you mentioned was hidden value. So when you're using the disciplined listening method, we're searching for hidden value. So when you say that term, what does that mean to you?

For me, that comes from my interrogation experience. And honestly, it comes from victims, witnesses, and suspects. Not just what you, you know, not every. Especially for where I come from, we're not just sitting down with people who, you know, this person committed this crime, get him or her to confess. You know, generally, for the situations my former teammates and I found ourselves in, we're getting called out for situations with multiple suspects, no evidence. Everybody's already been interviewed, at least, and declared that they did nothing and know nothing. Several weeks or months have gone by, and now that the situation has become so untenable, my former teammates and I are called out to identify the truth, resolve the situation. So at that point, it could be very easy to say, okay, I need to figure out who did it, and I need to get them to confess. But now confirmation bias sets in, diagnosis bias sets in. All kinds of other problems start to flare up. Instead, if I start looking at those conversations and thinking to myself, okay, there's a 99.9% likelihood that nobody involved in this investigation wants anything to do with talking to me. The victims don't want to go through it again. The witnesses don't want to go through it again. And whoever the guilty person may or may not be, they most certainly don't want to go through this again because they probably feel like they've almost gotten away with this by now. So by realizing that, pretty much nobody wants to talk to me, I cannot take that personal. Just understand, it's part of the game, what we're going to go through. And now, instead of Looking for a confession or looking for an admission. I can take an educational or a learning mindset into each one of these conversations and say, okay, what can I learn about this situation through each one of these conversations? And through that learning mentality, I can be patient. I can let the conversation come to me. And now, instead of listening for a confession or a gotcha moment, I can listen for opportunities literally to build unexpected bonds. There's value there. I just found out that we have something in common. I just found out that someone had a different perspective. I just learned that someone was facing pressures inside of their life that previously investigators were unable to identify. So the more I learn, the more I put myself in a position where people feel like I'm not judging. We're two equal parties in the conversation, and we can arrive at an unexpected outcome together. We can both have input in that. So when we talk about listening for hidden value, oftentimes it's being surprised. It's allowing ourselves to go into a conversation with the mindset of, I certainly don't know everything I've got to learn as I go through this. And if I really pay close enough attention to the nuances of the conversation, I can pick up on what people are really thinking, how people are really feeling, and sometimes even maybe not the best term. But throwaway statements, you know, little side remarks that people make can, can really unlock new roads for us to take to get to the goal we really want. So it's more about having a framework that allows us to uncover new and valuable information as we go through, as opposed to going in with a script and trying to just ram my head into the short term goal that it might look like on the surface I need to achieve.

This flips the script for so many people in these difficult conversations, because one of the things that people want to have is something they can never have fully in these conversations, which is control. They want to control the conversation, they want to control the other person. People don't like to be controlled. And then it actually creates more resistance. And you can have an impact with the way that you approach the conversation, but you can never fully control the interaction. And so again, going back to the mindsets that you're talking about, the, the willingness to be surprised, I don't think I've heard any, let's just say straight negotiation expert say you need to embrace the unknown and be willing to be specifically surprised. They're always talking about how to minimize surprises. And so that mentality, I think, is really important. And so I want to dig Deeper into that, because it's so rare in this context. Why is it so important to embrace that?

Couple of things I'd love to touch on there. I believe in my bones, especially when we talk about difficult, uncomfortable, potentially contentious conversations, the single best way to maintain control of that conversation is to let the other party feel like they are in control, is literally. And this actually kind of ties into something you and I were talking about before we came on. But generally speaking, if I push you, you're going to push me back harder. Now, that's also metaphorically true. So when you metaphorically push me back harder, you are now putting your flag in the sand. You want to keep control of the conversation. So if I never push you, you don't have to push me. You feel like you're in control of the conversation. But I know where it's going. If I have a really good idea on generally speaking, what I want the outcome of this conversation to be, where it starts and who controls the start doesn't make a difference because I can take wherever you start the conversation and over time work it to the outcome or the general area of outcomes that I believe will be productive for this conversation. So by allowing somebody else to have control now, I'm guiding or facilitating the conversation. I'm not forcing it. And in a lot of negotiations, for people that believe they have to be in control of this conversation, it's like they step right into the spider's web. They're leading the conversation in their mind the way they believe they need to lead it, because I'm not trying to wrestle that control from them. It's just a matter of time before the circuitous route, more often than not, not always leads it to where we want to be. So that's. I wanted to touch on that. About the control piece that you mentioned, getting back to the surprise piece, preparation is absolutely key. Situational awareness is absolutely key. If we minimize the amount of variables to deal with during the conversation, we minimize the amount of things we have to think about, we can be more focused. So I'm a huge fan of not preparation to the point of paralyzation, but, you know, a thorough preparation to limit some of those surprises. For sure. For me, where I think about the willingness to be surprised is forcing the maintenance of the learning mentality. If I believe I know how this movie is going to end, then I'm in a validation mentality, and anything you say or do is just going to reinforce what I'm looking to validate. But if I'm in a learning mentality. And I go in saying, you know what? I think I've got this pretty well planned out. But Kwame may surprise me. He may or say or do something that opens up an opportunity that I might not think currently exists. So I have to be open and aware of that going in and also being open and aware to surprises and helps limit the unproductive emotional reaction when it happens. So if somebody springs something on me or something comes up out of the clear blue sky, instead of me spinning in my chair thinking, wait a minute, what do I do now? It's like, all right, cool, that happened. How does that slot into the goals we're looking to achieve? How can I use that? So I may have rambled in a couple different places outside of your initial question, but that's, I believe, how it frames together.

Now. Let's get a little bit selfish for a little bit, because a lot of the listeners tune in so they could say, hey, all right, how do I get more of what I want? So how can we listen effectively, but at the same time use our listening abilities as a persuasive tool?

Let's start with the persuasion tool. So I think what happens is deeply rooted in our sense of responsibility to this connection and that the other person, whether conscious or unconscious of it, feels that. And then you become elevated, or I can't think of the opposite word of elevate, not elevated, or not of their go to person. So, for example, there's my distribution center that does all of my books and all of my products, etc. So Jason was the. The My rep. Well, Jason has been promoted like, six times and is now like the director of Fancy Pants, right? Since. In the decade that I've worked with this company. So the person that is my contact now was not Jason. And I think it's fascinating that the new person, I don't really know what he could do, but he is never going to be Jason. But when we talk, when we communicate, when he says selling me new products or when we're negotiating prices or things like that, I don't feel a connection with him. I feel like one of his customers. And I don't want to feel like a customer. Jason made me feel like a family member. So even though Jason is no longer in that job, I'm critical of my new person that I'm supposed to be talking to because he doesn't make me feel important. And so there are times where I will reach out to Jason with his new fancy email and say, I know that I'm not supposed to be contacting you for this anymore, but I like working with you better. I miss you being my customer representative person. I have brought clients to the current customer person and warned them about their personality and they've had a good time, they've had a good experience with the new person. And Jason is smart and knows that I'm doing that. So Jason still services my account occasionally or butts in when he needs to when I don't feel like things are going as he would do. And new clients are still coming in because I talk about businesses I work with when I like them. Now, what's selfish about that from a sales point of view is that you have limited time and endless amounts of potential new customers. But it is, we all know this. It's cliche at this point is that it's more time consuming and more expensive to be recruiting new customers. But if you create the habit that when I engage with you, I'm going to feel connected to you. I'm going to feel more than just heard, I'm going to feel listened to. You're going to know me even if you actually don't know me. You just have like an index card or whatever the modern version of an index card is that reminds you I have a dog named Leo. Whatever the methodology is, I'm going to feel connected to you. I'm going to be loyal to you to the end of time. That's the selfish reason. Not to mention, you know, side effect is that you become a better human being.

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