Practical Tools to Help You Find Confidence in Conflict with Denise Cameron

Hello, my friends, and welcome to another exciting episode of Negotiate Anything. Negotiate Anything is produced by the American Negotiation Institute and with over 3 million downloads and listeners in over 180 countries, listeners just like you have made it the number one negotiation podcast in the world. I'm Kwame Christian and I'm the director of the American Negotiation Institute. We're growing and I want to introduce you to our new team members and new trainers. This will give you new and diverse perspectives on negotiation and conflict resolution. And that's why Shane Martin, our head of sales and partnerships, is going to serve as co host of the show from time to time. We're excited to continue to provide you with the best content that will help to make your difficult conversations easier both at work and at home. Lastly, our team conducts negotiation and conflict resolution trainings in the United States and abroad. Our trainings will give you the practical skills you need to resolve conflict and negotiate, lead and persuade with confidence. Click the link in the description below to learn more about how we can make your difficult conversations easier. Denise, thanks for joining us today.

Well, thanks for having me.

Yes, it is my pleasure, my friend. So how would you get us started? By telling us a little bit about yourself and what you do.

I am a 25 year massage therapist, osteopath, I'm a clinical instructor, I'm a coach, and I also am a PhD candidate. So I'm a busy, busy lady who's working in multiple different areas with lots of different stuff behind me. And yeah, that's who I am.

Fantastic. And the thing that brought us together, listeners. You and Denise have something in common in that you both are listeners of the podcast.

I am. I came across your podcast when I was out walking the dogs in the woods and you know, I got hearing some of the things you were saying and it was really resonating with me and I was just like, I just need to hear more. I think this can really help me. And so I signed up for the program after being on the podcast and I loved it.

Fantastic. We are so glad. So, yes, everybody, the program that Denise is referencing is our online course. And that's really what we're talking about. But not just here to pub the course. But hey, check the link in the description if you want to get it. We're not just doing that, we're actually talking about the practical benefits of it. Right. Because the thing that I love about what you did, Denise, is that you not only went through the course, but you were actually intentional about putting the tools into action. So let's start off with you kind of talking about the course, setting that foundation, and then giving examples about how you were able to use the skills from the course in real life scenarios.

Yeah. So I would say that right off the hop, that course taught me one awesome thing that you think would be obvious that's not. Which was be prepared. And you think, okay, of course I'm going to be prepared. But being prepared means a lot of different things for a lot of different people. And what I learned was the first thing you have to do to be prepared is think about yourself and think about where you're at, what you want, and what it is you want to accomplish. Think about where you're willing to concede, what you're not willing to concede on, and, you know, write all of those notes out. So take some time to focus on yourself. And so that was the first thing that I applied because there was a couple of areas in my life that I really needed this program to help me with, and which it really did, and that was the first thing that I put myself through, is I went, okay, what is it that you want? And you think that would be really simple, and it's not, because oftentimes we're chasing a feeling, and sometimes you come right down to the core grassroots of what's the feeling that I'm trying to get out of this? And then what's the end result? Then I learned that I needed to sort of put my feet into the other person's shoes, put myself into the other person's shoes and say, what is it that they want? What is it that they need, and what is it that they're trying to get out? What do I think that they're willing to concede on and what they're not willing to concede on On. And take a look at, do they want to be valued? Do they want to be appreciated? Do they want to be respected? Are they coming from ego? Where are they coming from? And once you've gathered that information, that in itself will change, it'll up your game by 50%. So, you know, for people that like me, who really didn't take anything in negotiating whatsoever, and, you know, probably I grew up as a pathological people pleaser trying to make everybody else happy and, you know, think about what you want and what you need, you're just trying to make everyone else happy. Well, it's impossible to make somebody else happy. And once you come to terms with that, you can start thinking about yourself. And so where I was able to apply these skills and There's a lot of other skills in the program that I learned, but just based on that, I was able to use it in both a really interesting medical appointment and in a job position that I wanted. And with the doctor's appointment is I had to go see an oncologist. I'm a breast cancer survivor, and I was on this medication, Tamoxifen. So I'm sure lots of women take it, have no problems with it, but I hated it. It was death to me, and I did not want to be on it. And the previous doctors were. They scared the crap out of me, to be honest. Well, you can't not take it. You're not protected. You know, your cancer's gonna come back and you're gonna die. And I'm like, oh, my God, I'm gonna die. And then I just said, well, I don't have a quality of life right now, so I need to figure this out. And so I kind of sat down and had to assess, what do I want out of life and what do I need? And when I walk into that doctor's appointment, I know that doctor is going to say, you know, I have to give you this medication. So how do I do this? And do I actually want to come off the medication? Well, I think I do, but the reality is I just want to love life. I just want fun. I want to feel like a human being again. So then I took a look at the doctor's perspective. And from the doctor's perspective, he needs to make sure he's doing his job the best he can. He needs to make sure that he can sleep at night with the advice he's giving me. He needs to make sure that I'm well educated on the situation. And I took all of that together and kind of wrote it all out. Went to my appointment and had a great conversation with him, and he went over all of my options. We had a really great discussion. In the end, we both decided, yes, you can come off this medication, and this is what I want you to do. We came up with a plan. We worked as a team. And I know that that probably doesn't happen to that doctor very often. He probably comes home frustrated most nights just shaking his head. And he would have had an intelligent conversation with the patient. You came up with a great plan. If you have any questions, you call me whenever you want. And that was a win, win for both of us. And I still. I've called him up a couple of times since, a couple of questions, and he's there to answer Them. And I didn't just walk into his office and say, I want to come off this medication. I hate it. You don't know what you're doing. I came in and said, okay, this is how I'm feeling. This is where I want to go. I need to know what my options are. And we opened up that discussion, and it was a great discussion. So I was really happy with that. I was happy how it turned out. And to be honest, I was quite surprised because I knew I wanted to come off the medication. But I walked out of that office actually feeling empowered because I had a plan. So I'm not scared. I'm not scared that I came off of it. I do have options. I know what I need to do, and I made my choice as to what I wanted to do, and I'm happy with that choice. Whereas if I had walked out not happy with that choice, I'd have been mad at the doctor. Meanwhile, the doctor did nothing wrong, so I was quite happy with that. And I'd be really happy to see other people also be able to take their health into their own hands, whether it's their doctor, their physio, their massage therapist. You know, knowing how to come in to get what you want is not as easy as you think it would be.

Agreed. Yes. So much good stuff in there. And I want to really hammer home. And listeners are probably going to say, oh, Kwame's going to talk about the free guides again. Of course I am. I'm going to talk about the free guides. So if you haven't downloaded your free negotiation guides, go to americannegotiationinstitute.com guide to download all of your free negotiation guides. Business negotiation, conflict resolution can help you to negotiate anything. And even, like Denise said, negotiating healthcare, I think that's fantastic. And one of the things in the course we talk about is just helping people to identify what is a negotiation, because people don't identify those interactions as negotiations. And so really, the first step with your preparation, first you also had to identify, hey, this is an opportunity for me to negotiate. I can approach this, I can advocate for myself. And then you leaned in and you got the result that you wanted.

Agreed. And I think the biggest thing you just said there was advocate for yourself. And, you know, you go in sometimes to these appointments, and I've had people come into my office and they sit down and they start talking to you, and they just break down crying. And how are you supposed to get what you want when you're having an emotional breakdown? And we've all been there. And so if you, the more you prepare, the less likely you are to break down in front of your therapist or your doctor and, and actually get what you want. And so not always is somebody there to be by your side. And given what's going on right now in the world, a lot of people through Covid haven't been able to have an advocate. They have to go to a lot of these things themselves. And, you know, I don't know if that's going to change or when it's going to change. But self advocate is really important because somebody else can advocate for you and you still don't get what you want because that communication could have been just that little thing and you come out and go, oh, how did you not know I didn't want that? Well, I thought you did. And you know, you start arguing with your advocate.

Absolutely. And one of the things that you mentioned that was really cool, I want to dig deeper into is one of the mistakes that people make is that they're chasing a feeling. Right. Or they don't understand that the reality is they're chasing a feeling. Can you go a little bit deeper into that point?

Absolutely. We're in life, we'd be robots if we weren't chasing feelings. So all of us walking around, I don't care who you are, we're all getting up in the morning, having our morning routine, whatever it is, we're all the same. We're humans. We're all waking up going, how do I want to feel today? And at the end of the day, how did I feel when I go to sleep? And most of us have very little control over what we're doing throughout the course of the day because we're chasing feelings that we think are going one way but are actually steering us another way. So you can come in and say, hey, I'm chasing the feeling of self respect. So here we go. You're probably going to get a better outcome than I'm chasing the feeling of I'm just mad and I'm pissed off at the world and you just need to make me feel better. You're not going to get what you want. You're going to just upset somebody else. So if you're going to chase a feeling, then chase a feeling of positivity and a feeling that's going to have a foundation to something that you want in life.

Does your company invest in professional development training? If you believe that your team would benefit from a negotiation workshop, all you need to do is go to Our website, fill out the workshop request form, and then we'll set up a time to chat. These workshops are completely customizable, and we've done them all around the country. Negotiation and conflict resolution skills are beneficial across all professions, but they're especially useful in professional procurement, purchasing, sales, sourcing, and contract management. Our calendar is filling up quickly, and we even have some workshops scheduled for next year if you think you might want one. I'd suggest reaching out soon so you don't miss out. Check out the link in the description to learn more. And now back to the show. Yeah. Oh, that's fantastic. That is really fantastic. And I love that you're actually leaning into that reality. Right. Hey, emotions matter. They. They were. They will have some kind of impact if you can look into it and find the positivity in it. Right. Because a lot of times we're trying to shut down. We're trying to pretend like we're robots, even though we're not robots, but really embracing that and trying to understand what that feeling is trying to tell us. I think that's. That's really important for us to understand.

It sounds so simple as you and I are talking, but it's really hard. So as people are listening to this going, yeah, easier said than done. It is hard, and it definitely take time. It's a skill to learn how to be able to get down to your root emotion and what it is that you're really looking for and then how to manage it. And there's a lot of different things that go into this, but being aware of it and even just applying a few of the things we're talking about today, that you're most likely going to be able to walk into a situation and say, oh, hold on, let me hit the pause button here. Because I know that maybe I'm on the wrong track or maybe I'm on the right track.

Absolutely. This is great. Well, give us another example, because I know there are. There are a few other examples that you wanted to share, too.

Yeah. So we had moved into a little town, and I had gotten connected with a chiropractic office, and I wanted to do some treatments out of that office. And I wanted to make a pretty big change. So I didn't want to do massage anymore, and I didn't want to do basic treatments. I only wanted to do the specialty work. So this was an opportunity for me to completely change what it is that I was doing. And what I wanted was a little unconventional to what most therapists would do and what most clients would think about doing. So I had to be really careful because I didn't want to fall down the path of familiarity and just go back to what I was doing. I wanted to change and that can be really scary. And, and I needed to charge more for what I was doing. I needed to be patient in building up a new clientele. So I wrote down again, okay, let's decide, what is it that you want and why do you want it and what's your long term goals? And I had to dig really deep into what my future was going to look like from a business perspective. And then I kind of came to a lot of realizations and then I flipped it and said, okay, this chiropractor who's going to be interviewing me, you know, from just what I know right now, where is she at? What is it that she wants? I know that she wants a good fit for her office. I know that she wants to be respected. I know that she wants to make money, but not at the cost of doing anything at all that doesn't agree with her business plan. And so I kind of wrote it all down and thought, okay, what is it that she really, really wants and needs and can I match that? And is there anything that I think I want that I know isn't going to be a good fit that I can then concede on? So we had our meeting and I knew some of the things that she was going to throw out at me, like, well, can you work Saturdays? And I would say, no, I'm not working any Saturdays. That's a non negotiable for me. And a lot of the times us as therapists will say, oh, well, I'll work evenings and weekends because I just want to build up a clientele. I said, no, I don't want to do that. And I had to be firm and you know, I had to be firm on what I was going to charge. I had to be firm on the hours that I was going to work. I had to be firm on a lot of different things. And then there were some other things that were don't really care. And those were the things that I conceded on. So for her, it was a big win because, you know, I was able to give her the bulk of what she needed. And she knew that, you know, she was trying to press me and you know, she'd hit a point where, okay, well, Denise said no to these four things, but I am saying yes to these things. So in my world, I got exactly what I wanted. She might not have gotten exactly what she wanted, but she was pretty happy in the end. And I think, yeah, you know what, this actually is exactly what I want. Because in the end she wanted one thing. She wanted a staff member that was going to take good care of her patients, and she got it. And so I was able to go into that office, work the hours that I wanted to work, charge what I wanted to charge, and I loved it. I had so much fun with it. And I met amazing clients who referred tons of people to me and I had a great time. And if I had of not sort of sat down and just said, okay, I'm putting my foot down and this is what I'm going to do. And if I hadn't have done it the way I did, I probably wouldn't have enjoyed the job as much and then I wouldn't have been happy and then she wouldn't have been happy. So it worked out really, really well. I was prepared.

That's great. And now let's do, let's do a fun thought experiment. Denise. Okay, so let's see. What do you think would have happened differently if you would have gone into that situation without having the negotiation skills from the course?

Oh, that's a good question. So with the chiropractor, I think I wouldn't have appeared as professional. So I am professional. I always present myself professional. But you're going to have a little bit of nervousness come in because your thoughts are scattered. So for me, I went in clear headed. I had everything written down. The conversation was easy. So I came out appearing more confident, appearing more capable, and that would have shown a lot on her side. Now did it change how I did my job? Had no effect on how I did my job other than when I came in because I nailed that interview so well. Well, that just jump started some more confidence. So, you know, it definitely helped moving forward with a little bit of momentum. But I was really proud of myself for just nailing it. And once you nail it once, you know you can nail it again. So that's pretty exciting.

Absolutely. Yeah. You're spot on. Confidence by itself is persuasive. So if you say something with confidence versus saying something without confidence, the outcomes are going to be different. Even if you are saying the exact same thing with the exact same wording. Right. So that really, really matters. That is great. When it comes to other key takeaways, if there was one other key takeaway that you would share, like there's only one that you could share and it can't be preparation because you've Already said that.

Yeah, because I already did that one.

What do you think it would be?

One of the things that I can definitely say that I took away was taking any kind of a program. With self improvement, you learn something new. And I would probably say that I learned that confidence can be learned, negotiating can be learned, that I've been in some situations, years ago, early in my career that did not end well. And I was young and I didn't know and I was never taught. And I think going through your program, I was looking back on those early years in my early career and, you know, I often would have viewed my opponent as a threat. I would have viewed the opponent as, okay, it's you against me and you're the devil coming in, trying to take my territory. And I'm taking yet with everything I got, and I don't like you and you're a bad person. And that's just not true. But we often, if we're in a difficult conversation, we're in a difficult situation. Whether it's somebody maybe is suing you, or you're having to sue someone else, or you're going through a divorce, or you're going through a really difficult situation. Emotions are really heightened. And nobody has taught you to stop and say, hey, you know, maybe they're behaving really badly right now, maybe you're behaving really badly right now. But this is just the situation today, and it's not how you're going to perceive it a year from now, five years from now, or 20 years from now. And look at it from the perspective of the person who's the mediator or the person who is in control of the situation. They don't. They're not emotional to either side and don't think that they are. And so the other thing I would say I learned is going through your program, if I was ever in a situation where I had to. I couldn't advocate for myself, and let's say I had to have a mediator there for whatever reason, well, then I would know whether it's a good mediator or a bad mediator. I would be able to pull that mediator in and say, whoa, hold on a second. I think you're going down the wrong path. I see that that person is getting upset. I want you to try a different tactic. And that negotiator would say, holy cow, how did you see that? So sometimes just having a little bit of education, a little bit of experience can help you, even if you're not the one directly doing it. Because that other person might be having a bad day or maybe you just had a really bad one and you don't realize till later that you had a bad lawyer or a bad mediator or a bad advocate. And you're strong enough now to say, you know what? I don't think you're the right fit for me. And it's okay to say that. And you don't need to worry about offending the person because that's on them. You know that you need to get your best outcome and you need to get your best fit. And you now know you can respectfully say, you know, I just don't think I like where this is going. I'm going to kind of maybe take a look over here, and that's okay.

I love it. Oh, there's so much to talk about. So little time. So we have to have you back on this. This has been really, really helpful, Denise. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for sharing with what you've learned with us today.

Really appreciate it. Well, thanks again for having me on and for an awesome content. It was great connecting.

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