How to Stay Confident in Difficult Conversations | LIVE with Kwame Christian

Hey everyone, welcome. Drop in the chat where you're joining us from. I always love to see how global this community is. So here's what we're going to be doing today. You're about to experience something interesting. You're going to learn from one of the world's leading voices on negotiation and conflict resolution, Kwame Christian. So Kwame is the founder and CEO of the American Negotiation Institute, host of the number one negotiation podcast, Negotiate Anything, and bestselling author of How to Have Difficult Conversations. But what I love most about Kwame is this: he makes difficult conversations feel human, practical, doable. He teaches you how to speak your truth with confidence without turning every disagreement into a battle. Now, his brand new Quest on Mindvalley, Negotiate with Confidence, is officially live. If you're a Mindvalley member, you can start the Quest immediately. And if you're not a member, stay with us, because before you decide if you want to go deeper in this quest, we want you to experience Kwame's framework for yourself. So in just a moment, we're going to broadcast this stage talk live here on YouTube. This was one of the highest-rated talks at Mindvalley University that happened this last summer. So lean in, take notes, see how this lands for you. And if it resonates, you'll know your next step. Enjoy this. I'll be back with you right after.

All right, so keep the cell phones out. I want you to get this QR code, all right? Yes, this is going to be a little bit of a presentation, but I want to turn this into a coaching session. So with this presentation, once you get the QR code, you'll be able to participate and engage in polls with the presentation and ask me questions. We'll get to the Q&A after the session. So the harder the question, the better. So if you have scenarios, deep questions, you want to push me on something, let's do that. That makes it fun. So throughout the presentation, you'll have the opportunity to press that Q&A button once it comes up on your screen, and then you could ask the question. Also, my presentation is designed to be stolen. So if you like anything on the slides, you can just screenshot it as we go through. I want to be as generous as possible. All right, so how many people got the QR code? Okay, you're good, we're good. Anybody still need help? Still need— okay, well, for you who needs help, if you look at the top, you can go to menti.com and put in that number. And if you are an Eagle, you can see that number. All right, let's rock and roll. So this is going to be our— these are our goals for today. I'm going to teach you my mental model for having these difficult conversations. I was at the Sistine Chapel 2 days ago, so I want to quote Leonardo da Vinci. He said, "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." And so my goal is to keep this as simple as possible without being simplistic. Okay? So compassionate curiosity is the tool that we're going to use to have these tough conversations. And then at the end of it, I want to make sure that you have practical and actionable tools that you can actually use. I want you to have this session and immediately after, use the skills with confidence. That's the goal. And if you don't see how you could use this in your personal life as well as your professional life, then I haven't done my job. All right? Sound good? All right, let's rock. So this is our motto: "The best things in life are on the other side of difficult conversations." So if you were to take a moment and think about the most impactful moments of your life, you would realize that there was a difficult conversation somewhere in the vicinity of that moment. So to a large extent, your happiness and sadness, success and failure is going to depend upon how well or how poorly we're having these tough conversations. So it doesn't matter what industry you're in or what life you're kind of living, if you are a human who interacts with humans, you need this, okay? So I want you to think about these conversations as opportunities. For me, like we said before, I'm a recovering people pleaser, and to this day, I still feel it. You still hear that voice in your head holding you back, and so one of the things that you can do to help overcome that in the moment is just force yourself to answer this question: This conversation is an opportunity to What? Whenever you hear that voice saying avoid the conversation, put it off, delay, just finish that sentence. So just raise your hand, yell out something. So if you're having a tough conversation, it's an opportunity to what? Grow. What else? Learn. Good. What else? Change. Nice. What did you say? I thought you said fight. I gave you another chance. Delete, scratch that. Because here's the thing, because a lot of times when I go on podcasts, I do these trainings, people are like, how do I argue better? And so for me, as a lawyer, I can teach you how to argue, but you know, it's tough when you practice law, you work really hard to pass the bar exam, and then when your wife says you're acting like a lawyer, it's an insult, you know? Because a lot of times you might be able to win the argument, but at the same time, you lose the relationship. That's the problem. Think about it. Because arguments are often not really about right or wrong, it's about winning versus losing. It's about dominance versus subordination. So even if you win the argument, usually it's because you just won a war of attrition and the person just gave up. So how does a person feel when they give up? Frustrated, right? And you know what they're doing? They're plotting. They're like, "You won this one. I'm going to get you back." Right? And so they might agree in the moment and then work really hard to undermine you on the other side. So even if you win the fight, you ultimately still lose. It's tough, right? And so we have to remember there's always an opportunity here. There's always a way to finish this sentence. And even if everything goes terribly, This is still an opportunity to practice. So for me, even when the conversation is really, really tough, I say to myself, "Okay, well good. I'm going to be stronger for the next one now." Because most of my conversations aren't this tough. And especially in your career, let's assume you're advancing and growing in responsibility, the conversation you have today is not going to be as important as the conversation you have next year. So you want to make sure you're performing as well as possible in the moment. Maintaining your form, because even if you're not getting the outcome you want, you're practicing and getting better for the future. And that is how I think when my toddler is having a tantrum. I'm like, "If I can survive this, the next negotiation is going to feel really easy." So this is your first opportunity to participate. I like science. Let's do a little poll. Does this sound familiar? You're in a conversation. You have all of the facts, data, and logic on your side, but they still don't agree. Your options are "Yes," "Oh my gosh, yes," or "I don't talk to humans." This happens to everybody, right? Happens to everybody. So what do we do when facts don't work? Do we just say the same thing but a little bit louder? A little bit more attitude? It's really tough, it's really frustrating. And sometimes you'll realize that with the way you carry yourself, as you are correct in the conversation, it actually might make things worse. So we have to realize that there is a big difference between being right and being persuasive. Those two things are not the same. Persuasion is a blend of art and science, right? So being right is not enough, and I know that can be frustrating. I know that can be frustrating, but once you understand that, it can open you up to new approaches to having these conversations. Now, this is a fun question for me, because when it comes to trust, everybody will say, "Hey, we need to build trust in these conversations." That's not controversial. But what's interesting is when I push people to actually define trust. And let's— raise your hand, let's see. And for the folks online, I'll repeat what it is people say. How would you define trust? What is it? Safety. Good. That's good. What else? A win-win. Good. And I heard a feeling. Say that again. Loyalty. Yes, absolutely. Loyalty is a big one. Let's get one more. Assurance. Yes. Good. Now let me ask you another question. If I put the face of somebody who you know up on this screen, how long would it take for you to know whether or not you trust them? A split second. You didn't need to think about that, right? It was instant, subconscious, automatic, kind of like a bias. At the end of the day, trust is just a positive bias, right? Imagine this. Imagine you have the world's greatest negotiator right here negotiating with you on a topic, trying to persuade you. But you don't trust that person. Now imagine here, you have the world's worst negotiator and communicator, but you trust them on the issue. Who's going to be more persuasive to you? It's the person you trust. So we over-index on these negotiation strategies and tactics. We're trying to break through, and we think we just need another tool in our pocket to break through. But if we reconnect with just our core base humanity and connect with the other person and build trust, that's going to be the most persuasive thing that you have at your disposal, right? So remember this: trust is gained in drips but lost in buckets. Gained in drips but lost in buckets. It takes time to build trust, and so it's important to take some time to make strategic and intentional deposits into the relationship bank account. Anytime you meet with somebody, don't just make it a little hi-and-bye type of interaction. What can you do to elevate that interaction, right? If you have 90 seconds, you can still make that a meaningful interaction. Ask questions, go deeper, remember what they said, bring it up next time. This is just core base humanity. Because most likely, the person that you're having these tough conversations with, they're still going to be in your orbit. So the thing is, we make the mistake in a lot of our relationships to only have the conversation with the person when something is at issue. There's a problem, right? And so we say, okay, I'm never talking to this person until there's a problem, right? So for you, you think of yourself as yourself, but when they look at you, they see you as bad news. It's like, oh my gosh, here they come. I know there's a problem. Oh my gosh, here they come. I know they want something, right? And so we start these conversations at a trust deficit. We need to reconnect with our core humanity and reconnect with the people around us. And so, one of the core things we need to do is actually listen. And this is going to be shocking. You have to actually listen. And what's funny is, once you understand how to listen and the mechanics of listening, you'll realize how poor we are, and most people are, at listening. One of the things that's been fascinating about my life, and this has been consistent, when I have conversations with people, it is not surprising at all where even if it's the first time I'm talking to them, they say, "Well, Kwame, I've never told anybody this, but blank." First time meeting them. I'm not asking them personal questions. They're just volunteering the information because I know how to listen. And one of the things about listening is that when you listen really, really well, the person can become addicted to talking to you because they'll realize, "There's nobody else who listens to me in this way." you can listen in a way that makes them want to share. So negotiation is an information game, right? The more information we have, the better off we'll be. And we focus so much on curiosity, asking questions, but we accidentally turn it into interrogations a lot of time. Just question, question, question, question. It's not a unique or realistic back and forth. But if you can listen really well, you don't even need to ask that many questions or be that good at asking questions because you are listening in a way that makes them want to share. And so this is a really simple way to operationalize listening. It's called the empathy loop. The first step is going to blow your mind. Listen. That's step 1. You actually have to listen. And it sounds kind of silly, but think about this. How many times have you said, "Hey, I'm Kwame, what's your name?" And then they tell you their name, and then you instantly forget. Huh? Does that sound familiar? Let me tell you what's really happening. You didn't forget. You didn't listen. You just didn't listen, right? Listening, a lot of times we mistake listening for hearing. Hearing is just the thing that happens when sound waves reverberate and hit your tympanic membrane, also known as the eardrum, right? It just happens without you actually noticing it. But listening is something very, very different. That's a skill. You do it with intentionality. So when you hear the person say that thing, then you summarize it, and use your own words here. With everything that I'm saying, I'm giving you examples of what to say, but I want you to take this and make it your own. I don't want you to leave here sounding like me, I want you to leave here sounding like a better version of yourself, right? So, correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like you're saying this. Don't parrot what they say, give a true general summary. And I was interviewing a hostage, no, not a hostage negotiator this time, it was a police interrogator. And he said, oh, see, correct me if I'm wrong is good. What I like to say is correct me where I'm wrong, because it's more humble and makes it more likely for the person to actually jump in and correct, right? And then at the end, we confirm to make sure we have it right. I'm not going to assume I got it. I'm going to say, did I get that right? Am I close on that? What did I miss? Giving them an opportunity to check, because for a couple of reasons. Number one, I want to make sure I got it right. I might have been wrong, so I want to make sure I'm understanding. Number 2, I want to make sure that they give me an opportunity to correct myself. So if I am wrong, they can tell me. And so by doing that, I'm getting the point of not just listening and understanding, but also making sure that the other person feels heard. Because there have probably been times in your life where you actually have been listening, but the person accuses you of not listening. That happened, right? So at these core moments, we want to take a pause and just make sure that you are understanding and that they give you that credit for understanding too. And another thing that is often overlooked here, sometimes people misspeak. I remember I was in this mediation one time, and it was a really important point, so I said, "Let me slow this down and use the empathy loop." And so I summarized what the person said, and I knew I had it right, I just wanted to double-check. And they said, "Oh, I'm sorry, Kwame, I misspoke. It's actually the opposite of what I just said." said. It's like, well, damn, well, that— I'm glad we stopped, right? That would have been— that was really important. So this is really important. So you want to just take the time at these really, really meaningful pivotal moments of the conversation to just pause. And then another little hack that I like to do is sometimes in these conversations, I don't know what to say next. I'm completely lost. I'm like, I'm a little bit confused here. I'm going to make this a little bit of a timeout. I'm going to slow it down, use the empathy loop, gather myself. I'll come back with a question, so I feel a little bit more composed. So let me tell you a story. This is my mother. It's Kwame and his mommy. I love her very much, and I feel like I need to disclaim that before I tell you this story. So my mom is from the Caribbean, Guyana, and so this might shock you about folks, my parents from the Caribbean. They're very opinionated, and when they disagree, they will let you know. So it was a scenario where mom disagreed with a parenting decision that I made. And I just got off stage from a keynote and I taught the empathy loop. And I was like, Kwame, use your skills, you know what to do. And so I just used the empathy loop. And she called me, right? So I was looking at the clock the whole time. And so I said, okay, so correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like you're saying this, this, and this. Do I have that right? Okay, cool. What else? What else would you like me to know? And I kept on doing this over and over and over. And I did this. For 16 straight minutes. And I know it was 16 minutes because I was looking at the clock the whole time, and I said, man, if I could pull this off, this would be a great story someday. So after it was done, I said, okay, is there anything else you'd like me to know? And she paused. She's like, no. I said, okay, well, thank you. That was really helpful. And she said, Kwame, are you okay? It's like, yes, I'm fine. I just wanted to make sure that I fully understood you, and I get where you're coming from, and it makes makes sense. Out of curiosity, would you like to hear my perspective? She said, yeah. And I took 1 minute, I explained myself, and she said, oh, I get it. That was a good call. And that's the end of the story. That's it. That's it. Now think about this. What if I would have jumped in at 13 minutes, said, Mom, I'm a man, I made a decision.

Right?

We'd be arguing to this day. And here's the thing, here's the thing that people don't know about listening, is that when you are listening really well, especially in a conversation where you don't agree with the other person, the discipline and restraint that is required to listen effectively will reverberate through your body like a physical pain. It did not feel good. And a lot of times in these tough conversations, it does not feel good to do the right thing. And we have to recognize that this is the limbic system, the amygdala, our emotions telling us to jump in, to argue, to fight, right? And so a lot of times, the feeling that we have isn't an indication that we're doing the wrong thing. It might actually be an indication that we're on the right track, right? So we have to be able to understand what our emotions are telling us and what it really means. The other thing is that when it comes to the fundamentals of tough conversations, I didn't need to do anything really complicated. A lot of times the difference between an expert negotiator or expert communicator and somebody who struggles in these conversations is simply the fact that the great communicator does the right thing and does it until it works. Other people will do the right thing until they break. They can be really, really, really, really good for 7 minutes, and then they break down, right? So you don't need to master any really complicated skills. You just need to hold on to the fundamentals long enough for them to work. That's it. Okay? So we're going to talk about this framework called compassionate curiosity. It's a simple 3-step framework. It's not just for the external negotiation with the other side, it's also for the internal negotiation with yourself that will help you to manage your emotions more effectively. So step 1 is acknowledge and validate emotions. So I think it's good to start off with a quote. I quoted da Vinci, let's get another quote in here. And so again, opportunity to participate. I want to hear your guesses. You put it on the screen. Who do you think said this quote? "It doesn't make sense to send a message to a person who is not psychologically ready to receive it." Let's get some guesses up on the screen. Where do you think this came from? Jung, Gandhi, similar build but not right, Dalai Lama, close. I saw somebody, Vishen, that's a good guess. Kwame, Kwame. What kind of narcissist would quote himself in his own presentation? That is, that's absurd, it's absurd. That is, that's wild. Wait, wait, wait, where do we get to the next slide? I need to get off this. Oh, look, look at that. I did do it. So, all right, so let me tell you about my son Kai. He's my first son. He inspired step 1 of the compassionate curiosity framework. So my wife is a doctor, her job is much more important than mine, so taking him to daycare when he was 2 was my responsibility, and it was always a battle. But then it started to escalate to the point where he would start off every morning by telling me who he loved more than me. So I would go and I would say, "Hey Kai, you ready to go to daycare?" He would say, "I want mommy." I would say, "Mommy's not here." He would cry. I would want to cry. It was just a rough morning every single time. But then it escalated. The next day, same thing. "Hey Kai, you ready to go?" "I want mommy." "Mommy's not here." Then he says, "I want Grandma." Okay, interesting. "Son, as you can see, your grandmother is not here. Can we please go?" And so then he says, "I want Uncle Kobe." So at this point, it's getting a little bit hurtful because Kobe is my brother who lives 2 hours away. I said, "Kobe's not here. Can we please go?" So he says, "I want Buxton." Which begs the question, who is Buxton? Who do you think Buxton is? Any guesses? The dog. My brother's dog who lives 2 hours away. So I said, "OK, I need some help." So I got this book called "How to Listen So Children Would Talk" and "Talk So Children Would Listen." And they said you had to acknowledge the emotions of the child. And I did not want to do this. I'm a first-generation Caribbean American. I didn't grow up with rights. Nobody was acknowledging my emotions, and I turned out just fine. But I said, "All right, okay, let me try this out." So I changed it up. So the next morning, I go up, "Hey." "Hey, you ready to go to school?" "No, I want mommy." So I said, "Oh, you want mommy?" "Yeah, I want mommy." "And you want mommy because you miss her, don't you?" "Yeah, I miss mommy." "And you love her too, right?" "Yeah, I love mommy." "So how about you do this? How about you just yell as loud as you can? Just say, 'I love you, mommy!'" He says, "I love you, mommy." "You ready to go?" "Yep, I'm ready to go." And he walks, and he brushes his teeth. Don't clap! Because I was a little bit pissed. I was like, "How does this work? This doesn't make sense, right? I didn't do anything." But it helped me to understand something. You have to address the emotions before you address the substance. And I'm telling you, I'm not saying that when you have these tough conversations, you acknowledge the emotions, you're compassionate, and you manage the emotions, they magically give you what it is that you want. That's not what I'm saying. But what I am saying is that in a lot of these conversations, there is an emotional barrier that makes them more difficult than they need to be. So our goal is to use this framework to make these tough conversations a little bit easier. When we can manage the emotions, lower the emotional temperature of the room, now we can actually have a real conversation. And once I started to understand the psychology behind it, that's what gave me the faith to stick with with it in these tough conversations. So check this out. This is the amygdala. So this is the epicenter of emotions. All of our emotions, both positive and negative, come from the amygdala. Okay? Now let's compare that with the frontal lobe. The frontal lobe is here, right at the front of the brain. It has the prefrontal cortex. This is where we have executive reasoning, logical management, and the deep thinking that really makes us human. But this is the key that we have to understand. There's an antagonistic relationship between the amygdala and the frontal lobe. So the more emotional you are, the less clearly you're thinking. The more clearly you're thinking, the less emotional you are. It's an either-or proposition. So once I see somebody with an emotion, I am not even trying to push my agenda anymore. My number one priority is to address that emotionality, Lower the emotional temperature, because again, like a wise man once said, it doesn't make sense to send a message to a person who is not psychologically ready to receive it. You say the right thing at the wrong time, and it doesn't work because their brain isn't functioning the way it needs to work in order to process it effectively, okay? This is gonna be the hardest part, because you're approaching it with empathy, you're approaching it with respect, and they are emotional, and they're not here today, and they won't be giving you the same courtesy. Okay? So that's why it's so important for us to take the time to manage our own emotions so we can be present in the moment with the person and do the right thing under these circumstances. Right? It's not that what I'm saying is hard to understand, it's just hard to apply in the moment. So I like to keep it as simple as possible. So I like to label the emotions. Using "It sounds like," "It seems like," or if it's very clear what they're feeling, "I can tell that." So we're going to provide them with an emotional label. The reason why we do this is because the part of the brain that accepts or rejects emotional labels is located in the frontal lobe. That's the magic behind this. So when you say, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like this is a really frustrating situation for you," then they have to say, "Frustrated, is that correct?" It activates the frontal lobe and starts to calm them down. That's why this process works. And I added that last one, "I can tell that," because if the person's there flipping tables and you say, "Correct me if I'm wrong, it seems like you're frustrated," that seems patronizing, right? So you can say, "Hey, I can tell that this is really important to you," right? Now, people often ask me at this point, 'Kwame, what if I'm wrong? Wouldn't that just make them more upset?' And the answer is yes. And you're saying, 'Well, why would you tell me to do this?' So let me tell you a story. So one time I was mediating, and the person in the mediation, she was a woman who found herself in a really tough situation. Everybody knew the situation was not her fault, but because of the way that the contract was signed and written and the laws were working, she was the person left with the liability. So she was clearly not happy, in a really tough situation. And so she was stonewalling me, but I needed to get the information out of her so I could try to work a creative deal. So I said, okay, she's stonewalling me, that's an emotional response, let me go with frustrated. Frustrated is a palatable emotion, right? A lot of times people reject anger, sadness, they feel like it doesn't— it reflects poorly on them. So frustrated is typically really good to go with. So I said, "Hey, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like this is a really frustrating situation." She paused for a moment, and then she glared at me, and she said, "Oh no, Kwame, I'm not frustrated. I'm angry." And I said, "I apologize. I can understand why this is making you angry. Can you tell me a bit more about what's making you angry about this?" She said, "I'm angry because of this and this and this." And so I used the empathy loop, summarized, and then she started to calm down. So why did that work? Because here's the thing, if you're wrong with your label and you tried your best to be respectful with the label that you used, they will correct you, which provides you with the correct label, and then you give them that label. So it still works, because you're still activating the right part of the brain. And so when you understand the psychology, it helps you to have more confidence in the process, because you recognize, "Okay, this is part of the process. I can understand it now." So try to find the most palatable description of the emotions that you see. For instance, you might see somebody being very defensive. This might surprise you. Don't say, "Hey, it seems like you're a little bit defensive right now." That— it doesn't work. The only time you do that is if you're recording the call and you send it to me because I like to laugh. That would be hilarious. Don't do that, okay? So you stay in this framework until it works. It might be 5 minutes, it might be 10, it might be 15. But just wait until the emotional temperature starts to drop, and then you can move forward. So once you see them starting to calm down, then you can move on to step 2, which is getting curious with compassion. And so in this step, what we're doing is we're asking open-ended questions with a compassionate tone. Now before I get to the question funnel, have you ever been accused of yelling when you did not think you were yelling? I hear a lot of guilty laughter. Yes. So I've got news for you. You were yelling. Okay? So yelling is not about volume. Yelling is about tone. You sounded like a jerk. And this is why it's important to understand this. Think about if we're in a room and somebody yawns. What happens next? Other people yawn. It's a weird human thing, right? And for some of you, even me saying the word yawning, I got you. I got you. Right? Even saying the word yawning triggers it. Why? Because of mirror neurons. So mirror neurons are nerve receptors that reflect back the emotions that we see. So in other words, vibes matter. If I'm coming into this conversation with negativity, if I am yelling in this conversation, what happens? Their mirror neurons see that, they reflect it back to me. Then my mirror neurons see that and they say, "Are you— do you have an attitude with me?" And now things spiral. Spiral out of control very quickly. So we need to be making sure that we manage our own emotions so we carry the right energy into these conversations. And so as we're asking these questions, what we want to do is use the funnel technique, the question funnel. So we ask really broad questions, and then we get more specific as the conversation goes on. And my goal in the conversation is to get the other side speaking more. I want them speaking 70% of the time. And I'm only speaking 30% of the time. Reason is because then I'm getting more information, the other side is feeling heard, and just from a practical perspective, if I am speaking less, I am far less likely to say something dumb. Right? It's going to be less likely for me to make a mistake. So think about, for me as a mediator, sometimes when they would come to me with these challenges, they would be litigating for maybe 18 months. Like, this is a lawsuit. I read the case file. I know what's happening. I know why they're here. But I want to hear it from them. So I would ask, "How did we get here?" That's my first question. "How did we get here?" Broad question, because sometimes they'll say things that aren't in the case file. And so as I'm listening, I'm listening for specific things and watching out for specific things, and then I'm— that what they're saying is guiding my curiosity. So I'm going to start paying attention to pace, volume, tone, repetition, and body language. That's why you need to go to Linda's session, because she's going to teach you body language so you'll actually understand what cues that can guide your curiosity, right? So if you're understanding the way that I talk, I kind of talk at a medium-fast kind of pace. But if you're having a conversation with me and you ask me a question and I'm answering the question, but once I get to a specific point, you see me just starts to slow down a little bit, see the volume go down a little bit, I don't know exactly what it means, but I do know that it means something. My next question is going to be on that thing that I was talking about when that pace changed, right? So what you're paying attention to is the deviation in these things, and that is what guides your curiosity. And as you go further down the funnel, You switch from gathering information with the questions to becoming a little bit more persuasive with the questions. They can be slightly more leading, right? But you have to earn your right to get there. And then last step, this is where it becomes easy. This is where it becomes fun. We're using joint problem solving. So it's not me versus you, it's you and me versus the problem. We're going to work together to try to find a solution. I am laughing. I've got 18 minutes. You want a brief story? You want a brief story? Okay, cool. So like I said, it's not me versus you, it's you and me versus the problem. I'm laughing because I used this on Monday to negotiate my way into the Vatican. I was in Rome. So we wanted to get into the Vatican, we bought tickets, it was really tough. It's like, "Oh, all the tickets are sold out for Monday. I need to figure this out." I refreshed the page and I said, "Oh my gosh." A ticket's available. It's a tour in Italian. I don't speak Italian, but I'm going to take it, right? So I got the ticket. So we go to the Vatican, we show them the tickets proudly, and they say, your tour is for tomorrow, sir. That's why the ticket was available. It was a different day. And so I was like, oh my gosh, what am I going to do? And I bought the ticket for a friend. I'm like, I don't want to look dumb in front of my friend. So they said, go talk to that guy over there. They, they were not having it. So I gathered myself as I was going over to the other people. And so I figured it out. I got what I'm going to say together. So I walk up confidently and I was like, we have a problem.

Okay.

No, I don't have a problem. You're part of this too now. We have a problem. Okay. I'm going out of the country tomorrow. We've never been to the Vatican. We need to get into the Vatican today. How can we make that happen? Right? It's not me versus you. I don't know you, sir, but you're part of this too. We're figuring this out. And so they chatted with each other for a little bit. And they said, well, if you buy general tickets for today, you can get in. General tickets were sold out, right? But they said, if you just do it now, we can do it, right? We bypassed a whole 2-hour line. They took us to the front. We bought the tickets. They helped us to skip the security line. They did not need to do that. And we got into the Vatican. Loose in the Vatican. It was great. It was great. Yes. So you can negotiate your way into places where you don't belong. That's the long short of it. So what you want to do is you want to utilize future-focused problem solving. Okay? So with future-focused problem solving, what you're doing is you're orienting yourself into the future. Because in the past, resentment, anger, Judgment, that lives in the past, based on what has already occurred. And so what you want to do is change the grammatical tense of the conversation. I'm not here to relitigate the past anymore. I'm here to work with you to create a better future. And now sometimes people might want to go back to the past. They might want to say, "Hey, you did this, that was wrong. They did this, that was wrong." And what I like to do is sacrifice the past in order to win the future. I'll say, "Hey, listen, you're absolutely right. Mistakes were made in the past, and now what I want to do is work with you to make sure that we don't find ourselves in this situation again. With that, what should we do next?" Right? So I'm constantly focusing on the future, and that helps us to be more productive. And we'll wrap up with— oh, one last thing too. As we are gathering information, we want to avoid using egocentric persuasion, but instead use empathetic persuasion. So you might be looking at this and you're saying, "Kwame, fire, fire, hope? That doesn't make sense." That's the point, right? With empathetic persuasion, we're gathering information, and then we're persuading with precision. So with egocentric persuasion, what I do is I think about the things that I find persuasive. I think about the things that substantiate why it is that I'm right in this situation, and then I say those things to you because obviously you think the exact same way I do. That doesn't work, right? With empathetic persuasion, I'm understanding where they're coming from. I'm listening, I'm gathering information, and I'm persuading on their terms. Very simple example. Let's say there's a car. Somebody wants to buy a car. Somebody might buy a car, that specific car, because it is very safe and reliable. Somebody else might buy that same car because it's cool and it drives fast, right? So you need to understand what really motivates the other person and then use that language to persuade them. When it comes to empathy, all we're talking about is understanding. Understanding how they see, think, and feel about the situation. What is their perspective? What are their emotions? And then what is it that they hope for the future, right? That's what we're doing. And then I'm going to persuade on their terms. And then lastly, I'll leave you with this: the IKEA effect. So they did this study where they found that people who buy their furniture from places like IKEA, they have a stronger emotional connection with that furniture because they can look at the furniture and see their efforts and see themselves in it. It is an experience I hope to never have, okay? But, you know, do your thing. Do your thing, okay? But I bring this up because this approach helps to bring in buy-in. So think about it. If I'm having a conversation, even if I know where the conversation needs to go, I want them to feel like they were part of the process because now they're more bought in. They're saying, oh yeah, I had a role in this. Yeah, I can see that I had some input, right? So after people negotiate with me or have tough conversations, They're not saying, oh yeah, Kwame convinced me. They're saying, no, I had a conversation with Kwame and then I chose this. I changed my mind. Because if you use this approach, then they can own it, right? Okay, well great, we have 11 questions and 13 minutes to get to them. Let's see what we can do. Yes, okay, well great question, next. Let's see, let's keep on going, all right. What do you do when total trust has been lost in a business transaction? Well, first of all, we need to take a second and evaluate our alternatives too, because before we even get into the conversation, we want to make sure that we're coming in with as much power as possible. Power comes from options. So there's a term in negotiation called BATNA, best alternative to a negotiated agreement. So going into the conversation, I want to make sure that I have a plan B just in case this doesn't work out. Because if there's a trust deficit, it's highly likely that it doesn't work out, so I want to make sure I have options, so when I come back to the negotiation table, I don't feel desperation that leads to powerlessness in the conversation. That's number 1. Number 2, we don't want to accidentally gaslight people. If all trust has been lost in the conversation and in the relationship, they know it, you know it, right? A lot of times we like to pretend like everything's okay. "Hey, John, how's it going? Really enjoyed meeting with you." It's like, you know we hate each other. Why are you acting like this? That's weird, right? And so what I want to do, using compassionate curiosity, I'm going to state the obvious. Great negotiators state the obvious. The thing that is the elephant in the room that people are a little bit awkward, feel awkward about and afraid to say, they just go out and say it, right? So I'll just say, "Hey, John, listen, I know in the past we've had our differences, and what I want to do here in this conversation is I want to get our relationship back on track. And in order to do that, I need to understand your perspective. So based on what you've experienced, can you tell me about how you're seeing this situation?" Now, when you see that, tracked on compassionate curiosity, what did I do? I acknowledged and validated the emotions by acknowledging and validating the situation, and then transitioned into getting curious with compassion. I'm not going to listen defensively, I'm going to gather all that information. Now, it is likely that your buddy John in this situation is going to say some stuff that you disagree with and is highly offensive. Now is not the time to argue. And one of the things that I like to do to help me to listen without judgment is I say, "Listen," in my mind, I'm thinking to myself, "I know what I believe the truth is, but I like listening to stories." I'm going to treat this as a nonfiction tale. What is your perspective? I'm going to listen, and then I'm going to reflect it back. Now, with the empathy loop, what I do when I disagree with the person is I would say this. I'll say, "Okay, so from your perspective, you believe blah, blah, blah." So I'm still checking the box of making the person feel heard, but not making them feel like I agree with them in the moment. If you're in a conversation, a heated conversation, and you agree with what the person said, Let them know you agree. You don't lose anything for that. But if you disagree, but you still want to make sure that they feel heard, just add that little "from your perspective" so they feel heard. So yeah, when all trust is lost, don't act like it's not. Just acknowledge it and then flow and be curious. Great question. How do you react with the person that thinks she is always right? Listen, we didn't need to gender this. That was unnecessary, bro. Okay. So, putting that aside. Again, in this situation, you don't need the person to fully agree in order to get on board with what it is that you want to do. Like, you can see the situation very, very differently, but then agree on the decision that needs to be made. We can agree to do the same thing for very different reasons, right? If a person feels like they're right all the time and they need to be right, then let them be right. So when it comes to negotiation, at the end of the day, great negotiators realize this: negotiation is the art of letting them have your way. Negotiation is the art of letting them have your way. You want to be right? You might be right, but we're going to get to a place that works for both of us, right? And so once you can just separate the belief that we need to agree on everything in order to agree on the conclusion, now we can be way more creative. I could be disagreeing with a person the whole conversation, as long as we agree on the conclusion, I'm fine. That's it. So once you realize that, then it makes conversations a little bit easier. So I hope that was good couples therapy for you. Okay. How do you handle it when someone clearly disrespects you and hurts you and then is defensive about you? Well, first of all, this happens all the time, right? So in these situations, a lot of times the person will do it, they'll feel completely entitled in what they did or said. And so at this point, we're not negotiating necessarily the behavior as much as we are negotiating the relationship. So this is about how you're treating me in this moment. So the person, since the other person doesn't think anything bad happened, most likely it is your responsibility to start that next conversation because there's no reason for them to start it because they don't think there's a problem. So we're going to use a simple framework called Situation Impact Invitation. And we can broaden this too because this goes beyond just disrespect. This goes to any time you need to start a tough conversation. So what you want to do is you want to use, you want to describe the situation using what I call naked facts. So these are facts that are stripped of all interpretation, judgment, or opinion. So no matter who you are, what you believe, or what side of the issue you're on, you could say, "Yes, that is in fact what happened." And then you want to talk about the impact. You're not going to generalize the impact. You're going to talk about the impact it had on you personally. And then you're going to invite them. And if you can sprinkle in a little positivity, there's a bonus point there too. And the reason why we approach it this way is because we want to enter the conversation with as little resistance as possible. Because if you describe the situation in a way that's opinionated, they can disagree, and now we're having an argument before the conversation even begins. If we disagree on the impact, same thing. So you might say something like this, "Hey, the other day we were having a conversation, and you said this. That really made me feel uncomfortable, so I want to have a conversation with you so we can talk about how we can treat each other going forward." Right? That's it. Smooth. Nice and easy. And then in the conversation, you're saying this. You're going to start off by saying, "Hey, in my relationships, I want to have a feeling of respect and mutuality, and right now, that's not what I'm feeling. And it would be really meaningful to me if going forward, you wouldn't do X again." Insert the disrespect. Now introduce the defensiveness, right? They're going to say, "Oh, you're being too sensitive. Oh, you shouldn't feel that way. Oh, I meant this." And so now we flow right into the compassionate curiosity. All right. So let me— correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like from your perspective, you don't feel as though you did anything wrong, right? Okay. And you did this because you felt entitled to it because you felt this at this time. Is that right? Yes. Okay. And I can respect that. And for me, in this conversation, I want to make sure that we can be somewhat on the same page. That did not make me feel good. And so we can have this conversation, but I wanna make sure that we can do it in the right way. Going forward, can you do this? I understand you didn't think you did anything wrong, and I can let you have that, right? So I don't think it needs to be a battle of what is respectful versus disrespectful. Just talk about the impact it had on you. So you might think it was okay, great. You might talk to other people that way, that's fine. When you're talking to me, I don't like to be talked to like that. So you can feel how you wanna feel, just change the behavior. I'm not judging, I'm not putting a value judgment on it, I'm just going to talk about the impact. That's it, right? So again, you want to just separate the judgment of the behavior from the behavior itself. And once you're able to do that, it makes the person more willing to adjust. Because if we say, hey, you were being disrespectful, now they feel as though if they adjust, they're acknowledging and admitting that they were disrespectful. And because of their ego, they might not feel comfortable doing that. Fine, you feel like you're right, feel like you're right. Just change the way that you treat me. That's what I really, really care about. Okay, good question. Okay, how familiar are you with the double empathy problem, communication between different neurotypes, and do you have tips to overcome it? That would require a book. I'm not familiar with the term double empathy problem, so I want to stipulate to that. But when it comes to different neurotypes, are we talking about Neurodiversity in general, I'm assuming. When it comes to neurodiversity, I think what we have to do is recognize that people process information and navigate the world in very different ways. And when you start to understand the different— when you understand neurodiversity, we might be talking about autism spectrum disorder, ADHD, those type of things. We need to recognize that because people approach the world a different way, we need to switch our communication type to help communicate more effectively. Same thing with personality, like the psychology of personality. When we understand the different personality types that exist, it helps us to be a bit more bespoke with the way that we communicate with people, right? And so when I'm talking about personality, I like to use the Big Five personality traits. We use the acronym OCEAN, openness to experience, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. And they've started to talk about neuroticism emotional stability, because neuroticism sounds like an insult. So just putting it out there. So when you are making those little micro adjustments to the person, we're recognizing how they process information, and then we're trying to slightly adjust our communication style in a way that can make our communication more palatable and easier to understand. And when the more we understand the different neurotypes and we understand the different personalities, the more we can avoid taking taking things personally, right? Because if the person is navigating the world in a way that is, that may be offensive without that interpretation, then we might take it personally. But if I can say, okay, this is not just the way the person is treating me in this moment, this is the way the person treats everybody, now I don't take it personally. I can stay more resilient and more focused in the conversation. So I think in general, everybody needs to study this to a certain degree. So you can make better reads. We're not labeling people. That's a big part. We're not labeling or diagnosing people in these conversations. A lot of times people don't wear a flag of what it is that— how they identify, but we want to do better at making these reads and making strategic adjustments in the moment. Where is the balance between oversharing, emotionality dumping on us, and staying staying to listen or healthily stepping out? Ooh, that's tough. And so for me, I have this goal in all my presentations as a lawyer, I want to go as long as I can without saying the word "it depends." But it really does depend on the circumstance. It's a matter of degree. And I think we need to focus on the term productivity, right? If we get to a point where we believe it is becoming unproductive, That's when we might need to emotionally step out. And here's the thing, there are consequences to becoming a very, very good listener. Because especially if the person is emotionally triggered, then you might be the only person who has listened to them on this specific issue, and now you're not their friend, you're not their colleague, you are now their therapist. And now they are just trauma dumping on you the whole conversation. And so one thing that I like to do is in those situations, I pay attention to Repetition. So if I'm listening, and then I start to hear that they are repeating things, and then they're cycling back over and over and over again because they still feel strongly about that thing, and I realize that we're getting stuck, what I say is this. First of all, I'll blame something other than myself. I'm going to blame time. I'm going to say, "Hey, listen, I've got about 10 more minutes, and I want to make sure that we can solve this problem together." So with that, And then I'm going to summarize. You mentioned this, and you mentioned this, and you mentioned this. Is there anything else you need me to know before we can move forward and talk about some solutions? So what I'm doing there is I'm signaling that, hey, I'm not cutting off this conversation because I don't want to talk to you. I'm cutting off this conversation because I don't have time, and I care enough about you in this circumstance to make sure that you can still feel heard and we can actually get to a meaningful solution. So that's the first thing. So it solidifies the relationship. And then I'm letting them know I was hearing them the whole time. And if they don't have anything to add, then we can push to step 3 of compassionate curiosity, which is working together to solve the problem. So I would focus on the key word of productivity. If you feel like they're dumping and it's gone beyond the point of productivity, that's when you just say, hey, let's blame time. I've got this much time left. Summarize to show that you've been hearing them, and then you can move forward. Forward to step 3. And now I have 1 second and zero. So listen, I appreciate all of you. Meet me in the back if you have other questions. Thank you.