Negotiation and Closing, with former FBI hostage chief Chris Voss

Curiosity is a superpower. I have sat down with people to find stuff out about them that they were intentionally holding back from me by just being curious. If I'm really listening to you, you're gonna make deals with me that you wouldn't make with other people. Today's guest is Chris Voss, the former lead negotiator for the FBI, the best-selling author of Never Split the Difference, and one of the most influential experts in the world on negotiation and human behavior. I've always thought the title of your book is very interesting. It's guaranteed lose-lose. You know, why don't we split the difference? That way we'll both be unhappy. Today, Chris is going to show us how to negotiate without being aggressive, how to create trust without giving up power, and how to use simple tools like mirroring and labeling to get better outcomes in business and in life. A Hollywood executive said there are three sides to every story. My side, your side, and the truth. Your job is to completely summarize all the pluses and minuses from their side. Do you think men or women are better negotiators? I think, um... Welcome to Keep It Brief. I am both terrified and incredibly excited to bring this new podcast to you. On the excited part, the reason that I wanted to create this podcast is I struggled last year when I went on this massive podcast because I felt like I was edited. There was components of the conversation that I really liked, I was proud of, I was excited to be able to get out into the world. And instead of it going the way that I wanted it to, it got edited. And this really made me start to think about, well, how important is it for you to be able to create something where nobody can ever filter you? They can't edit you. They can't change the narrative. You get to control your own narrative. And so for me, being able to create and share my own narrative is deeply rooted in this podcast, in the guests that I'm going to bring on board, in the conversations that I want to have and being able to be a little bit more unfiltered than my traditional content. And so that is why I'm excited. Why I'm terrified is this is a commitment. This is something new. This is something that I haven't done before. And for a lot of reasons, I've just honestly avoided. And so the exciting part and the terrifying part is all converging here right now, because this is the very first episode of a show that is going to be coming to you every single week with incredible guests. And the guests to me are important because I want to bring on people to the show who really understand something about what's happening in the world today and can connect that to whatever it is that they are an expert in. Because what I found as an operator inside my business is it is so easy for us to just dive into the work. you put the blinders on, you just show up for yourself and for your team every single day, and you chip away at making this dream of yours a reality. But then you realize, oh my gosh, there's this whole world that's going on outside of me. And I need to understand these things, but I don't understand these things. And I feel like I'm getting left behind. And what if my product and service isn't actually meeting the market because I'm so focused on myself. And so this show is going to be in a really cool format because I want to bring a briefing to you. Hence the title, Keep It Brief. The briefing is what's going on in the world right now. What's happening with AI? What's happening with investing? What's happening with the economy, with the stock market? What is really going on outside of what we're building each and every day so that we can better inform ourselves as to how to make moves and switches inside our business strategy to be successful? So the start of the show is always going to be about something happening in the news cycle today. And we are going to keep it brief on that section, but you are going to feel smarter at the end of that section because I don't know about you, but when I show up into rooms outside of my business, sometimes I feel like an idiot because I'm not really paying attention every single day to what's happening. So when people are talking about oil prices, when people are talking about CEO transitions, the latest app that just rolled out, that's changing the world with AI, I oftentimes don't know what's going on. And I've recently made more of an effort to get into these things, to understand these things, because they do actually have practical application into my business. I started listening to a couple of podcasts earlier this year, and they have transformed the way that we've incorporated AI into our business. And so I know that in small doses, this is actually helpful and beneficial to business owners to not just have your blinders on, but to actually understand what's going on and to feel smarter inside these rooms. So that's going to be the first segment. And then we're just going to dive on into interviewing the guests and connecting with what's going on in the world to the guest's expertise. And this is going to kick off right now with our very first one. So welcome to the briefing. There's an unprecedented wave of CEOs that are transitioning out of their roles and into either board roles or out of the companies altogether. Warren Buffett transitioned out of Berkshire Hathaway. Bob Iger left Disney. Doug McMillan left Walmart. And most recently, Tim Cook left Apple. Fortune literally ran a piece saying, Tim Cook's exit is part of a sweeping reckoning of CEOs across America, calling 2026 one of the biggest CEO transition years ever. The reason this is important is when I look at CEOs of massive companies transitioning, the first thought as an operator that I have is what would happen if I was no longer in my seat in my business? Imagine being the CEO of Apple. You're Tim Cook. And you know that in 18 months from now, you're going to be transitioned out fully of making the decisions for one of the largest companies that exists. Imagine the planning, the negotiations, the games that are being played at that level. And then you take it back to yourself as a leader of your business or as a leader of a team going into your office every single day and transitioning in 18 months from now. Most people, when they are faced with this, get completely stuck. And I know this because I work with business owners every single day and they feel so stuck inside their role in their business. They can't see how they can make more time for themselves. They can't see how they can add more people in order to make more money so that they can spend more time expanding and growing their business. And they can't see how they can exit. And this all becomes a problem because what ends up happening is the business owner feels trapped. And my experience, whenever I felt trapped, is recognizing that in that feeling of angst and frustration that you can't be the person that you want to be, you can't do what you want to do, there is a skill set that you're missing. It's simply a skill set because there is somebody else who is running the same type of business and probably an even more successful version of that business who has figured out the skill that you haven't yet. And for the majority of people, the skill that they don't currently have is the ability to negotiate. See, I remember my very first time negotiating for something. I didn't even know that I was supposed to be negotiating, but I decided when I was 20 years old to buy a new car. Up until 20, I had been driving my grandma's 1993 Buick Century and it mortified me to pull up to places in this car. So much so that if I was going to a movie with my friends, I would literally park at the very end of the movie theater parking lot and wait awkwardly so that they would leave so they didn't see me pulling out of the theater in my car. So I finally had enough money to be able to buy a car. And when I went to buy a car, I just thought that you showed up and paid the price that was on the sticker. I had no idea that you negotiate a purchase. I called my dad mid-purchase and he asked me, how much are you paying for the car? And I said, oh, what the sticker said. And he paused and he said, Natalie, you never pay what the sticker says. I was like, I have no idea what that even means. What do you mean? This sticker says $21,000. So I have a down payment and then I'll pay it off in installments. And he said, what research did you do ahead of time? I was like, what do you mean? What research should I do ahead of time? I showed up to the parking lot, saw that there was a car available, bought it like I would buy anything else. He said, Natalie, leave the dealership and call me when you're at the nearest Starbucks. So here my dad is talking to me about all the different things that I need to be researching in order to understand what cars have recently sold at that price, what cars are available at a cheaper price with different mileage. All of those details are actually part of a negotiation that I didn't realize I was having. What that lesson taught me is that we're negotiating every single day without even knowing it. Based on these statistics, I know that I'm not the only one who struggles with this concept of negotiation. Listen to this. 55% of workers never negotiate their salary, even though 73% of employers are willing to. 53% of people who don't negotiate say it's because they don't feel comfortable asking. 48% of people who avoided negotiating said that they were afraid that their employer would decide not to hire them, a fear that rarely materializes. UCLA found managers withdraw offers after counters far less often than candidates believe. According to CNBC, 85% of people who try to negotiate their salary are actually successful, despite the fact that most people don't even try. Which is why I'm bringing on Chris Voss as my very first guest, because Chris Voss is the expert in negotiation. He previously worked in the FBI as a hostage negotiator and has taken that set of skills and applied them to everyday life. And as I've dove into his content, whether that's his book or his masterclass, I've really understood these small tweaks, these tiny reframes that allow the person that's negotiating to actually have the upper hand without feeling like they're negotiating without the other person getting defensive, just by asking great questions and understanding how to control the conversation. And our guest today is going to get us dialed in so that when you end this podcast, you can instantly start to use these tactics. I'm so excited to have Chris Voss here to talk about negotiations. And we're going to take a little bit of an interesting pivot on this because I'm excited based off of the conversation that we just had around CEOs, the CEOs that are transitioning, this mass wave of CEO transition that's taking place in America right now, to connect the points of how does somebody negotiate their way out of a role that they're currently in, that they feel trapped in? I'm assuming that Tim Cook, Warren Buffett, and James Quincy might not think that they're necessarily trapped in the moment. But at some point, they made this decision that they wanted to pivot into something else. and this is so relatable because so many business owners do the same thing. They are in a role, they have a $5 million business and they want to have a $15 million business or they want to sell their $15 million business to go off and spend more time with their family. So with that, I want to open this up with a quote and get you to respond to this quote. I love this quote and I want to hear what your thoughts are. The quote is, the most powerful people in business don't win because they work harder, they win because they negotiate better. What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, that's true. But then it gets down to, like, how do you negotiate better? How do you accelerate the deal? Nothing affects deal timelines like relationships. There are certain cliches. But then what really makes a difference? How do you accelerate it? Or what the biggest thing is, what are you doing inadvertently that's slowing it down that you think is just the normal, ordinary course of business? And there's a lot of things that people do to slow things down dramatically, the biggest one is asking questions where the word no moves things forward as opposed to yes. Now, what does that mean? You say things like, it's now a bad time to talk instead of have you got a few minutes to talk. You say things like, do you disagree instead of do you agree? Now, why does that accelerate things? because the yes momentum, momentum selling, yes-able propositions, it's a 1,000-year-old strategy that's been weaponized against us. The minute I start asking you questions where the answer is yes, you've had somebody trap you with yes before. The yes momentum is actually referred to as a series of microagreements or tie-downs, which then you have to say yes to the big yes. So you were trapped. by yes you get tied down a little bit at a time a little bit at a time a little bit at a time somebody tried to corner you that's been done so much that even if somebody's not trying to do that you're like a battered child every time battered child every time an adult raise their arms to hug them they think they're getting ready to get hit and they flinch because they're they're pre-battered were pre-battered with yes like and a couple years ago i'm a girl i'm in a relationship with i got i got a shirt that i'm thinking of getting rid of i before i get rid of it that day i let me throw this baby on see what it looks like and she's oh i like that shirt and i'm so i'm thinking like okay well it's not going in the trash and at the end of the day i'm taking it off closet or trash and so i say to her so you told me earlier today you like this shirt and she literally says if i say yes what am i letting myself in for now that just wasn't that con con context it's every interaction so people say well i gotta get people to say yes there's no way around that well the stupid thing is everybody in my company the first thing they learn they walk into my office they go it's now a bad time to talk not do you have a few minutes now the answer to is now bad time to talk the instantaneous reaction is always no no no what is it now when you say no you feel safe and protected which means you focus faster which means you get things done faster every time every time if have you got a few minutes to talk i'll be like i don't know what's a few minutes i mean let me check my calendar you know i a few minutes usually 45 i get 15 minutes on the calendar all that is clutter as opposed to dialing right down what kind of differences it make here's some examples one executive who's in executive recruiting and a good recruiter finds people who are not looking for work because they're great candidates and he said typically so he's cold calling and typically 300 cold calls to get three candidates hey would you like to hear about an opportunity where you can make more money? You have broader horizons. There's more personal development. That's a yes oriented question. Yep. 300 calls to get three candidates. He switches to, are you against hearing about? 75 calls to get three candidates. Now think if time is money and it is, and the people in your company, the difference between top-line revenue and bottom-line revenue. If they were to become that much more effective, you cannot increase your top-line revenue by a dollar and think of all the extra dollars that are not funneled off by the unnecessary friction in the operation. And then if you want to sell, the bottom-line revenue is what really matters because you're selling your company at a multiple of EBITDA. You can have a massive impact on EBITDA without increasing a single dollar of top-line revenue. One company that we trained, the CEO came to me and he says, I assess that my whole organization is 50% better at listening based on your training. Imagine the impact on bottom-line revenue. 50% better. So how would a CEO measure someone's ability on their team to listen better? that's the great question you switch to the skills and you start seeing the acceleration in your life now we switch to a model where i got more people my direct assistants uh that helped me run sort of my life my everything my calendar everything they're in person with me now we got a championship team which means we're demanding operation which means we work better in person everybody that works better with me in person they're not in my office a week and they they're walking in they're saying it's now a bad time to talk all their questions switch from yes to no now are they doing that because they're trying to make me happy no they heard it among everybody on my team and they started to experiment with it in their personal life and everything in their life accelerated and so they're like they're doing it just because it's become natural everything everything is faster ballpark what's what's the difference um i can i can quote result stats the executive that went from 300 calls of 75 to get three outcomes we had another company that they changed they had their sales team change closing questions from yes questions to no questions, they went from a 12% close rate to a 60% close rate. The original stat that I had, there was a student in my class at Georgetown that was calling for donations for Republicans via phone. And it's another version of sales. Ask three yes questions, ask for the money. And it was the second time that Obama ran, the timeframe was second Obama run for office at down for dollars for the Republicans at night. First question was, would you like to see the Republicans back in the White House in November? A yes-oriented question. Switched it to, have you given up on taking the White House back in November? Split test that night, the yes script versus the no script. They come in in the morning. The no script has a 23% higher success rate than than the yes script i make people when we do or in person we do an annual summit it's our it's our big two-day event in the first half hour i make everybody send out a text to whoever's ghosting them have you given up on now give them the whole block of instruction because you get a response to that it doesn't matter how long somebody's been ghosting you within three to five minutes of them seeing it. It has to go out like that exactly word for word, word for word. And so I say, before you send it, because you're going to think I'm lying. To prove me wrong, you're going to send the text while I'm talking. You're going to get an answer in three minutes. You're going to freak out, and you're going to go back to the communication and cause them to ghost you in the first place. your system is designed to give you the outcome you've obtained they're ghosting you your communication was designed to get them to ghost you so they're ghosting you for one of three reasons here are the three reasons and here's how you handle the response number one you're just not top of mind and it's a deal they should have made and you're giving them time because you know they want to make the deal and you're assuming there's glitches but they're just dealing with a confusing world and their wife yelled at them or their husband yelled at them or the dog bit them or their car broke down and in the chaos of life you as a legitimate priority has gotten caught up and so when they say no i haven't given up on oh my god this is what i want to do let's get back and let's do it, 20% of you in the room are going to make the deal on the spot. One of our attendees, a good friend of mine, Mick Hunt, made $200,000 in business in the 10 minutes after he sent the text. Incredible. Two deals. Because it was top of mind. The other side just forgot. They're dealing with the chaos of life and they knew they needed to make the deal. They made it like that. That's about 20%. 20%, you're never going to make the deal. You were the fool in the game. You were a competing bid. You were due diligence. 20% of the time, you're due diligence. You need to know that because you stop wasting the commodity of time on that person. And they're going to come back to you and they're going to tell you. And now we've moved on. Now we've made the deal with somebody else. 20% you will stop losing money on because you're going to stop wasting time. You wish you could have made the deal, but it's not a sin to not get the deal. It's a sin to take a long time to not get the deal. Now, the middle 40% needs nurturing. I'm sorry, the middle 60%. So that's where you contributed to them ghosting you. You were pitching. You were explaining. Reagan said if you're explaining, you're losing. You were focused on what your number one value point was when, in point of fact, what you've got listed as number five is their number one. But since you were pitching, you didn't give them a chance to tell you what was important to them. So your response to the middle 60% is, it probably seems like I haven't been listening to you. there's a bunch of stuff here that's important to you that i have missed and you feel i haven't taken these things into account this is a series of observations which is in what my what what my phd friends would the term that they hate it would be a swag a scientific wild ass guess We don't like those well, you got it. You got a swag. Oh you we do like those We like the academics don't like swags because they can't define them But the real-world people gotta take swags all the time. That's right. You throw that out there You let the other side respond one of those labels is gonna hit it exactly or the other the other crazy thing is When you throw a scientific wild-ass guess out there and you miss They correct you with the truth and it's a way i could ask you a question try to get you to tell me the truth and if you tell me you're going to regret it because i prided out of you with a question but if i made an observation that was was wrong you'd be like no no this is what it is and you tell me the truth and you wouldn't regret it because you corrected me and it felt so good to correct totally i can feel it now it feels great yeah that's why people give advice So that's that middle 60%, just based on one question built around the word no. And that's what creates all this friction in life that's unnecessary. But until you see a faster way, you just don't know what it is. It's beautiful. I attended a course at the London School of Economics on negotiation, and part of the course was reading your book. and I remember the second or third day of class, we were asked to go down the Harvard route of figuring out the, was it BATNA? Best Alternative to the Negotiated Agreement. And I sat in this class trying to be like a tough girl. And there were these guys who were really interested in negotiation. And I definitely felt like I had the least amount of knowledge and experience in this room. And I did pretty well. I think I was like third or fourth. But what I learned in this process was people who were willing to negotiate through lying, through being sleazy, through positioning themselves as these really great negotiators, nobody ended up wanting to be partners with them later, even if they happened to have won the early on negotiation. And the reputation just continued for them throughout the rest of the class, which they ended up actually doing worse. And my ability to sit there and to read the room, even if I didn't place first initially, it ended up getting me into a group that long-term was a better route. And at the London School of Economics, they were very into this BATNA concept. And I know that you kind of, from my understanding, you've pivoted the BATNA concept into more of this tactical empathy. Could you explain, first of all, for the audience who might not know what BATNA is, what that set of philosophies are, and then what tactical empathy looks like instead of needing that BATNA and walking away from a deal because you have it? Basically, it was a Harvard concept, best alternative to negotiated agreement. And everybody loves acronyms. And then my academic brothers and sisters love academically sound strategies. Now, the Harvard folks, you know, I learned a lot from them. They taught me a lot. I'd go back there, a lot of brilliant people. So there's a few things that I disagree strongly with them on. Well, I don't want to sell short how much I agree with them. Batten is one of the things I disagree strongly. Because you take yourself hostage. How? Well, look, what if I don't have a great alternative? Oh, my God, I can't say no. I'm trapped. I'm a hostage. So what would a best alternative be for someone who is not familiar at all with this concept? If you don't have it, it's literally an alternative to getting a deal done. It's like in a business, if I am fine, if I want to sell my business, let's say, I want to sell it and get X multiple on EBITDA, my alternative to selling it with the buyer is me saying, well, I can just keep running my business forever. Is that a good summary of that? Oh, you can keep running the business. I mean, like, why do you want it? And when people, the guys that are buying businesses, they know this emotional vulnerabilities there and they exploit the hell out of it. So they're going to construct a deal that looks on paper like you're getting a multiple that the guy down the street got. Most of the multiples are your brother-in-law got it, your cousin got it, somebody else got it, and your competitive nature is you just got to get that multiple. So you've taken yourself hostage. Now, the M&A guys know that. So they're going to construct a deal that looks like you're getting a multiple based on an earn-out that is just going to suck the life out of you. It's going to be blood money. They know you're going to toss in the towel. they know that you want the multiple and you want to move on and they know that if they give you the multiple and they construct this earn out that's painful when all you wanted was to move on then in a real short period of time you're going to toss in the towel and you're like hey you know I got enough as it is I got I got two houses I can fly first class I don't got to fly private you know I just I swan out and you're gonna bail on a multiple so they they know that so first of all what is your baton abased on and most of the time it's a psychological construct that's based on competitive I haven't seen it confirmed but what do we really have to do like what do you have to do i haven't i haven't seen it confirmed but i i heard that nelson nelson mandela said he was in jail by choice and i read i read his book long walk to freedom i didn't see it in there i wouldn't doubt if he put in a speech but in point of fact he could have left jail at any time he could have committed suicide now how does a guy who was that great survive for that long in jail without being destroyed by it he had to internally have somehow made some sort of a choice and freedom is through choice and he had to have said to himself look i can get out of this at any time It'd take me two seconds to the drop a hat. I'm out of here So what's the original point? How you taking yourself hostage? Are you are you and again you're taking yourself hostage so bad enough for hostage negotiators is real simple You know, you got a white walk the tightrope without a net We never had in that So you get used to walking a tightrope with no net and you realize this net underneath the tightrope the batna is purely psychological construct it hasn't changed my ability to walk this tightrope the absence of a baton doesn't change your emotional intelligence unless you unless you let yourself take yourself hostage it doesn't change the wisdom and acumen that you bring to the table it doesn't change your ability to instinctively sniff out a lie or to know a proposition that's just impossible to implement. That's what a seasoned business owner brings to the table. So not having an alternative is really a psychological construct. One of my colleagues, Israeli hostage negotiator, Israeli Defense Forces, Modi Kristol, teaches business negotiation now. We crossed paths at Harvard, and he made the Harvard guys really mad because he didn't call it BATNA, he called it WATNA, the worst alternative to the negotiated agreement. and he's just driving crazy so they love that yeah oh they yes there's no water it's patina and you know monty and i'd sit around and have a beer and go like these guys need a bad you know i don't know what they're doing because we just got used to it you know there's no net i can still walk this tightrope there's no net i love that so when you think about the business owner who is in everyday negotiations with private equity or somebody that is looking to acquire their business, how would you recommend they psychologically prepare for one of the most important negotiations of their business? The emotional attributes that lead you to be at your peak in negotiation is curiosity, playfulness, and gratitude. Because they're all highly positive, you're 31% smarter in a positive frame of mind to start with. so you're smarter you process information faster you see patterns quickly it's it's working your way to the what steven kyle would call the mindset of flow which it was the brain at its peak performance and you process information you see patterns faster and you have more emotional endurance in a positive frame of mind each one of those also brings you into the moment because you have to see everything that's in the moment. And the older you are, the more you compare your past to what's coming at you, which means the less you're in the moment. And so the real challenge for anybody over the age of 25 is how do I stay more dialed into the moment so I see the opportunity in the moment, so I see something in their gut instinct tells me we're on the right track or something in my gut instinct tells me this is not the right person. When you're more in the moment, what might have been yellow flags are now clearly red flags. And so these keep you in the moment. They keep you in a positive frame of mind. They keep you from taking yourself hostage. You know the old adage, this is not happening to me, it's happening for me. Well, then when you say, oh, why is this happening to me, you're starting to lose mental capacity based on fear. fear fear is um a natural born survival wiring in our head that requires attention hygiene if you will to keep under control because if you if you go to your default mindset you're negative then they you know once bitten by a snake you're scared of ropes the pessimistic caveman survived the optimistic caveman got eaten by the saber-toothed tiger i think that's a pussycat I'm going to go pet it. He doesn't have any descendants. So the challenge is, how can you dial into the moments you process now better? You gauge the offer. Are they trying to exploit my emotionality here with a multiple that I'll never get? Or are they actually trying to nurture me into a better deal that it's not going to suck the life of me earning it out? You've got a massive amount of information to process in the moment, in the midst of a negotiation. So those three things. Curiosity is a superpower. I have sat down with people to find stuff out about them that they were intentionally holding back from me by just being curious. Because you can't resist my curiosity. And so when you're in any given negotiation, you'd be like wow you know okay all right you know that's fascinating what's behind that I mean how does that work how do we implement it you know I can see the possible you know if you're bamboozling me you're not going to be able to withstand the scrutiny of my curiosity it's going to break down really quickly because you're going to start to think about it like okay I could see that but how do we get from point a to point b and if you're bamboozling me with terms that you hope are going to play to my emotions and not my ability to actually think, you're never going to have second or third steps there. And the curiosity also feels so good on your side. If I'm really listening to you, you're going to make deals with me that you wouldn't make with other people. One of Michael Perrienti is a defense attorney in Las Vegas who's like a committed black swan guy like he loves our training he went from worrying about going out of business before the pandemic to he's flying private now every now and then he gives me a ride on a private jet just out of gratitude and so he's uh he's defending a client and a prosecutor's trying to hang his client now what do lawyers do they make arguments what are people in negotiations to. They make arguments. So Michael just gets deeply curious with the prosecutor as to why the prosecutor really is trying to slam his client. Doesn't make a single counter-argument. Doesn't dispute it. Doesn't plead his client's innocence. Nothing. He's just like, wow, you know, okay, yeah, you know, so what's driving that? What's behind that? cut the best deal that that prosecutor had ever given out never made a single counter offer what's the point curiosity is irresistible and you don't want to beat the person you don't want to outdo you don't want to win over the person that's demonstrating curiosity so even if we're in an adversarial negotiation if i just get deeply curious about where you're coming from you can't help yourself how do you pivot the curiosity into closing a deal and i asked this because i had rock star 10 out of 10 parents growing up and one of the reasons clearly my parents will thank you one of the reasons i think my parents were phenomenal is they forced me to ask questions to adults so we'd be at this dinner party and they would say like there's mr bob go up to mr bob and ask mr bob three questions and so i'd walk over to mr bob and i'd say how's billy doing he'd be like billy's great like is billy playing baseball like yeah and i walk back to my parents be like i don't know what else to ask he'd be like well what could you ask well i don't don't know what team he's on. They're like, okay, go ask Mr. Bob what team Billy is on. And so they'd make me do that. And it created this kind of natural interest in asking other people questions. But one thing that even today I struggle with is taking that natural curiosity or that interest through question asking, and then actually being able to pivot it when you almost do have to become the tough guy for lack of a better word to move the deal or the situation to a close so you want the other side to feel like they moved it there it's guiding someone to your outcome but that they feel it's theirs so you start with all right so if we do this it seems like we could draw to conclusion by and then see what they're going to say. Give them the opportunity to discover your outcome or even better. Never be so sure of what you want that you wouldn't take something better. Give them the opportunity to reveal something better or to say something to you that reveals something better to you. Again, I'll use an attorney, Jeff Sklar, who's here in Los Angeles. He learned our stuff a number of years ago. He rediscovered it recently we just gave jeff a global negotiator award he says now i love to engage with another attorney so that we can discover mutual aha moments and he's it's no longer adversarial making an argument against the other side now he's having the best time he says I feel like I'm a student in my craft again. And I don't get on the phone to argue. I get on there for those mutual aha moments. And then we're both then, to your point earlier on, along the school of economics, people aren't avoiding them. They want to make deals with them. You know, they didn't feel beat or tricked or deceived. And that's a great example because as soon as you start tricking, beating people or deceiving, they start avoiding you. You know, they get, and I'm at another gathering of business people, this guy's coaching CEOs. And he says, yeah, but there are tricks to negotiation. And I said, okay, so how do you feel when you find out somebody used a trick on you? Yeah, I don't like it. Well, that's to your point. People stop making deals with you. They start avoiding you. You don't know what you left on the table because they don't come to the table in the first place. Your reputation precedes you. Jeff has got people happy to talk to him because the last time they talked to him, they didn't know what it was, but there was this mutual aha moment that they were delighted by. They made a better deal than they imagined. They wasted less time. Their clients were happier, and they're looking forward to talking to him the next time. It's a win-win. Yeah. Which is really what you're looking for. I've always thought the title of your book is very interesting because I still find myself today in certain situations and things that are not super important. Are you willing to admit that you split the difference? How dare you? I can't believe I'm even saying this out loud to you. I know. I can't believe I'm saying this. You know, this is like Father Chris would put up a little wall, bless me, Father, for I have sinned. I split the difference twice this week. Exactly. That's how it actually feels because as soon as I say it, it's, again, in something fairly trivial. But I do understand your philosophy around never splitting the difference. I'm curious to have you be able to share with the audience what your philosophy is so that you can school them and present company included on why that's just a terrible way to negotiate. It's guaranteed lose-lose to start with. And there's the psychological reaction to this. Like, let's say, let's pretend that you could actually split the difference. Daniel Kahneman, Prospect Theory, Nobel Prize in Behavioral Economics, 2002. So that's not bad criteria for an expert. Losing $5 makes you feel like you lost $10. So let's say we were $20 apart, and we each agreed to meet in the middle. We're going to split the difference. We're each going to give up $10 to cut the deal. i felt i gave up 20 how's that manifest itself if there's any implementation involved here i'm gonna let you get hurt by stuff i could save you from i'm gonna keep problems from you i'm gonna say you know what you dug 10 out of me when i didn't want to give it up so i ain't telling you about this prop i'm not telling you about the delays I'm not telling you about the hurricane that I know is coming I'm gonna let you get hurt and I'm gonna have to pay you back if I lost 10 I'm gonna have to pay you back equivalent of 20 now I'm paying you back and now you're getting hurt and so it triggers a downward spiral back in the day when everybody's reading newspapers they had one panel cartoons okay and there was one called the lockhorns husband and wife and the husband said you know why don't we split the difference. That way we'll both be unhappy. So why is that an analogy? In my negotiation strategy, I want us to have a long-term relationship of trust where we both prosper, which means I negotiate with my girlfriend, she negotiates with me openly because we want a long-term relationship of trust where we both prosper. And doing stuff that guarantees that we're both going to be unhappy. There's no long-term relationship. Trust is quickly eroded, and neither of us prosper, and we finally get fed up, and we go the other direction. We never want to see the other person again. I want to make a lot of deals with people that are delighted to talk to me. And I want to be able to be honest with them. So when I lay something out, they know I mean it. And Masterclass, great partner. and there have been times when we've been close but not there and i've said this is what would make me want to knock myself out for you for the next 30 years and they're like you got it because that's what they want a business partner they can ask anything of me and i'll show up and i'll give them 150 percent it's an interesting reframe because that really should be how all relationships operate if you're in a relationship like a hostage situation of course that relationship is being thrust on you in a way that you're not actually wanting to do business with the person but the situation is forcing it right but most of us day-to-day aren't actually in situations where if we really were able to be creative We couldn't work our way out of having to deal with the boss, the coworker, the vendor, the private equity group, because you should in life, I think this is a should, be able to create the relationships that you want to have and be able to get rid of the ones that you don't. And so this whole concept and almost preconceived notion of negotiations and never splitting the difference or feeling inclined to split the difference is really getting the core and the foundation wrong for the bedrock of the relationship to begin with. Yeah, this is about getting the foundation right. And also the hidden meaning of never split the difference is, what if you're completely right? I've got to be willing to accept that. what if everything that you want is so much better than what i had in mind that i should take all of it i gotta be open to that you know never be so sure of what you want that you wouldn't take something better one of my favorite negotiations in georgetown between a husband and a wife over christmas tree and the husband is writing up the negotiation and i made people only do real world negotiations every class i taught take my skills into the real world we're not doing any pretend stuff. And so it's almost stereotypical. Husband wants an artificial tree for all the practical reasons. And a wife wants a real tree and she just not having it. And he can't come on, you know, it doesn't catch on fire. We only have to buy it once. We know we're going to have every year. Yeah. The, the, the dog doesn't want to market. The cat doesn't climb up into it we don't got needles all over think of how practical and how smart this is no no no so he finally emotional approach now he uses the skills to try to get his way and he's trying to think somebody has trouble articulating why they won't come off of a position you know some sort of deeply held notion you know what's deep let me dig into the past and so he says to her uses the label it seems like it seems like he had real trees grown up and she says yeah and the smell of a christmas tree reminds me of all the close moments i had with my family and my brothers and sisters every holiday how close we felt and how great we felt as a family and i want that for our children. Guess what they bought? That. They got the real tree. The real Christmas tree. He was willing to be open to a better idea, even if it was completely the other person's idea. Now that you bring this up, it makes me want to ask you help on a personal negotiation, because I have a husband and we are not disagreeing about Christmas trees, but we are disagreeing about closet space. Okay. Which I think is a fairly normal marital discussion argument. We're not quite to the point of arguing, but he wants more closet space and I want him to have less closet space. And so the current approach, I want you to grade this or give me your thoughts on this. The current approach that we have in our marriage when we're really trying to navigate something difficult. This isn't particularly awful, but you know, it's still a framework. One of us has to ask the other person at some point, would you rather be right or would you rather be happy? Which tends to settle things because in that moment, does the closet space really matter to your Christmas tree example? Does the Christmas tree, does it really matter? One of us is going to be right. One of us is going to be happy. But as I think about that frame, it's a little bit like splitting the difference because then one person gets less closet space and is not happy versus the other person is happy and gets the closet space. So what are your negotiation thoughts on A, how I get more closet space? It's very important. But B, this concept of the other person, especially when it is a relationship that has a good foundation, a spouse, a child, somebody that you love, a friend, taking the knee because you know that it will ultimately let the other person be happy and their happiness is, in most cases, your happiness. Yeah, yeah, right. It's intertwined. So in any disagreement, sort of the structure is, like, before, I disagree. Here's where I think you're coming from. And then if you said that your job is you can't present your perspective until you've gotten the words, that's right, out of the other person. So you've got to summarize, as a Hollywood executive said, there are three sides to every story, my side, your side, and the truth. So you're not summarizing the truth, you're summarizing their side. You're not summarizing your side. you're summarizing their side their side is not going to be the truth any more than your side is the truth right your job is to completely summarize all the pluses and minuses from their side you're not allowed to put forth your proposal at all until they've said that's right Now, what happens every time is about half of the deals are made on the spot. The person only needed to feel heard. Now, what happens when you feel heard? More open. Because you get ahead of two neurochemicals, oxytocin and serotonin. mm-hmm oxytocin everybody knows as the bonding drug or the love drug what most people don't realize most people don't realize two things about that it's always a one-way bond you're getting a hit of oxytocin you're feeling bonded to me i'm not feeling anything but our feeling of bonding is so strong we're oblivious to the fact that it's not having any effect on the other person the other thing about oxytocin is it inclines you to tell the truth hence the real reason why pillow talk after intimate encounters tends to be ridiculously honest oxytocin is also the truth drug serotonin is a drug of satisfaction which means you're less demanding you want less you feel more satisfied with the status quo which is why about half the time, if you get a good that's right out of the other person, they've got both neurochemicals, the deal makes itself on the spot. The worst thing that happens is you move closer together and there's more collaboration and there's more understanding. So there's never a downside to fully summarize into the person where they're coming from until they feel heard. and then the durability of that makes it worth the extra time it's the delay that saves time you could have been an argument for weeks and you either draw closer or solve it in 20 minutes because the other person doesn't feel hurt respected understood and the neurochemicals that you're looking to trigger which by the way all humans have you're born with them there's a lot of discussion about does this stuff work on social paths well social paths have neurochemicals social paths are created after they were born tactical empathy relies upon the structure that you were born with as a human there's a lot of other things guilt regret that comes as an interaction with the basic equipment that you were born with as a human and then you interact through the world. Like, for example, the FBI profilers, when trying to figure out where sociopaths came from, sociopathic killers, one of the explanations was a child at age six does something wrong, is severely punished. And then a month later, they do the same thing wrong and a parent ignores it. The child's takeaway is there are no rules. Well, the point of that with what i just said is it happened after they were born the creation of what becomes sociopath psychopaths any any of those things it all happens after you're born you're still born with basics as a human the neurochemicals of oxytocin and serotonin are original equipment with human beings so in this closet negotiation if i was to say i understand that don't say i understand oh okay why aren't we saying i understand because unfortunately that's shorthand for a dismissive phrase even though i'm understanding even though you are that's again it's a little bit of the yes momentum you can mean yes respectfully but they've been conditioned another way so i understand tends to be i usually it's all right so i understand where you're coming from now listen to me very true so people have been conditioned that i understand precedes dismiss dismissal dismissal so what you're saying is it's a better way here here's how you see this to say like that here's how you see this here's how you see this you want more space because because your golf polos have become excessive because you can't pick out clothes and you should have thrown that stuff away years ago and it went out of style in the 70s and you still got a leisure suit with bright purple shoes that John Travolta wore in that movie 5,000 years ago, and you can't let it go. And you got a white suit with a black shirt. I feel like you've been listening to our conversations. So instead, I'm saying, oh, man, I lost my talk track. How am I opening this conversation? How does he feel about this? He's playful about it. No, but how does he really feel deep down inside? I think he feels like I don't give him enough space. That's part of what you say. And why does he feel like he feels like you don't give him enough space? At some point in time, no matter how much you love each other, which is clearly a lot, the other person takes it as a value judgment. For sure. You know, you feel that what I want isn't important. You know, I act like your choices in clothing don't matter. What are they saying in their head that you're afraid that they're saying? Well, if you're afraid they're saying it, your gut instinct is really good. It's actually picking up what's going on. So the counterintuitive thing is you say it out loud. Say the thing out loud. You know, you feel like I'm acting like you're not important. You feel like I'm acting like my life is more important than yours. Again, you feel like empathy is not agreement. When you say you feel like in no way, shape, or form did you say that you agree. In no way, shape, or form did you say you were guilty of that. to say you feel this way is actually as far as they're concerned the truth and it's not agreement on by you on at any stage which is why the the when you get good at you know before i give you a different point of view here's how you feel about this and that's why i become so powerful and it's not it's not a dream when i was i'm working terrorism in new york we got the largest terrorism trial in the history of the united states wow and pre-guantanamo bay nobody needed guantanamo bay we got true muslim witnesses from the middle east voluntarily testifying against a man with legitimate muslim credentials so there's no question about whether or not these guys were actually true believers in the Islamic religion from the same part of the world. And the bad guy who had committed crimes and had tried to cause mass murder also had legitimate Muslim credentials as a cleric, a graduate of Al-Azhar University in Egypt, which is where the legit guys go. So no question, all of them testifying voluntarily. We don't got to hammer on anybody. I'd sit down with them at the very beginning. I'd say you believe that for the last 200 years there's been a succession of American governments that have been anti-islamic and They go Yeah, that's right. That's right And I and then I I would never follow up, but we have a First Amendment and are you any of it away? I just lay it out there and let it hit him and I I and I was sorry by saying you believe which is I never said I agree in no way shape or form that I ever say I agree no way shape or form that I ever try to explain it away they would be so shocked that I could articulate their point of view that every one of them that we needed to testify would ultimately testify so powerful I think the reason why it's not more prevalent in life is you're the one getting ahead of the oxytocin, which means somebody watching it misses it. Like they don't know what happened in the moment. People don't see it happening in front of them. I do this all the time because I'm deeply curious about people. And other people would be watching a conversation and pay no attention to it. Or the other thing that happens to me occasionally, I'll be so curious about you, you'll bond to me in a much deeper way than i know which means if i haven't checked in on you for a couple of months you start getting mad at me i got i got a colleague's friend i find out through him she's upset with me and i'm like what did i do and then i remembered we had a conversation about six months earlier that I got some deep personal information out of her and I hadn't talked to her in six months. And so all I did was I sent her a text. I said, look, I just want to remind you, I think the world of your husband. And that was enough. But I had, you know, she's, I got this stuff out of her because I'm curious. And then she felt neglected. That doesn't take a lot of maintenance. It actually takes less maintenance in a relationship. You know, if you send somebody a one-line text every six months, that's not high maintenance. Definitely not. And you don't want the whole world mad at you, but having this skill of curiosity, I think, can be incredibly potent and powerful in a positive way. But then it does, because of this thing that you're describing where it's invisible to you, but it's very connecting for the other person, put you in a position exactly like that. where all of a sudden you have people who want more or think more of the relationship than you do, potentially? They feel, yeah. I'm hesitant to say think more of it, but are probably more bonded to me than I realize. I got another guy that did that weird social gathering not that long ago the next morning. And we celebrate. I actually started with two other guys, started a bourbon company. Cool. And so one might imagine we sit around and drink bourbon sometimes. Makes sense. And the next morning this guy is like, oh, man, you know, I had a conversation last night. Oh, my God. You know, I just really feel good about being able to share that with you. And I'm thinking, like, what the hell did we talk about this night? Holy shit. Holy shit. Now I remember. Now I remember. The thing. Yeah, the thing. How's that going? Did you have an update? get a little bit more detail on it you earlier started to go down this path of labeling and i only know that you were labeling because i understand labeling because i've heard you talk about this before i'm curious if you could explain to the audience what are the person listening if you could explain to the person listening what the power of labeling is when you're navigating a conversation that can be challenging yeah it's a tentative inquiry uh it's a verbal observation and the the two basic bread and butter skills in a black swan method tactical empathy that everything is built off of are labels and mirrors and people tend to be really good at one or the other it's like being right-handed and left-handed most people tend to be good at labels a few people tend to be prefer mirrors and whichever one you prefer you can work magic with it now a label is just an observation of an emotion or a dynamic it's a verbal observation it seems like it sounds like it looks like it feels like and you want it's a tentative inquiry which the other side finds very inviting like if you if i'm talking and you go like like this I could think you're angry with me. I could think you just thought of something you forgot to do and your significant other's going to yell at you. Now, I don't know which one it is. So I'll say, seems like something just crossed your mind. And you'll be like, yeah, you know, I did that once before and it didn't work. Or, nah, I just remembered I was supposed to bring eggs home last night and I forgot and now I'm in a doghouse. Like, you don't know what went through somebody's mind. So a label is a way to tease out what went through their mind in a way that seems very inviting. And why is that helpful for people? You're going to give an accurate response. And I need to know what just crossed your mind. You know, that physical move that I just mimicked, like something just crossed your mind, it's called an affect shift. And one of our clients said, I label every affect shift. It seemed like something just crossed your mind. seems like you're thinking about something, seems like that's important to you, you want to label it in a way that's generic so that they can correct you and bring you in. And the most important thing about labels is I could say what just crossed your mind, and the word what causes deep thinking. So you will stop and think and consider it, which takes up mental energy, which you might not have, which is why every CEO out there is sick to death that Mr. CEO will keep you up at night because they've been asked that a thousand times. And any time after lunch on any given day, they're just like, look, I don't have the energy to answer that question. If you've got solutions for me, you don't. So the what question causes deep thinking, which is exhausting. for whatever reason the label you'll just start talking so the difference is it seems like something just crossed your mind versus what just crossed your mind or if you ask me a question if i have any sense i'm gonna know i'm gonna want to know what's behind the question before i answer i'm gonna answer but i want to know what's causing the question i could say what makes you ask or i could say it seems like you have a reason for asking now me being my own lab rat i'm on my way back from dubai probably about two years ago and i'm changing planes in seattle so the point of that is i'm jet lagged i'm tired and i sent a text to one of my colleagues with a question now he's been trained to say what makes you ask but instead he hits me with seems like five reasons like off the top of my head with no effort whatsoever with no mental drain and then i realized if he just said what makes you ask my response text would been answered a question i would not have had the energy to tap into the whole succession and so the labels tap in tap into your thinking in a way that you don't feel as obtrusive it's inviting it doesn't suck your mental energy and it starts with it seems like it sounds like it looks like or even it feels like there's a guy that's been studying my training and he studied started studying jim camp's training back in 2002 he's a salesperson with the big tech companies and he's been making 100 million dollar deals for google amazon microsoft the big players he likes it feels like because that's how he dials into people he likes to he likes to get your energy he likes to hear your tone of voice he likes to look at your body language your facial inspection and really i think there is something to in-person energy and i think this particular person is great at feeling energy and so he'll say to somebody you know it feels like and you'll hit him with the answer and he's enormously successful in enormously high finance deals with this approach he's completely non-threatening he's the sweetest guy out there god knows how much money he's making and being non-threatening is is one of the keys to getting the other side to let the guard down that's great you just mentioned body language what do you see in a business context that similar to the feels like instantly becomes not threatening when somebody holds their posture or communicates physically in a certain way well real curiosity is not threatening that's also why it's irresistible so you know there's a there's a couple things that demonstrated tentativeness and curiosity one thing i found is that head nodding while someone's talking, the universal sign that you're really interested. And there aren't that many, but head nodding, if somebody turns their head and does this, which is an affect of genuine curiosity, that really tends to draw people out. So whatever actually indicates that people are actually listening, different people might adjust it different ways. that's the only one that tends to not be misunderstood almost every almost every other affect is it could be one of three things like if somebody looks angry um i i pitched jack welch to come and speak the negotiation course i was teaching at usc it was a one sentence interaction i was at a book signing no introduction he didn't know who the hell i was i said it's a ridiculous idea for you to come speak to the negotiation course i teach a usc one sentence looking for no he immediately looks furious i mean i thought he either had a stroke or he was going to have security throwing me out he looked so angry that was his thinking face wow and when he finally answered me like i'm standing there horrified he says this is my personal assistant's name this is a twitter account we have set up to communicate with her i will call her and tell her who you are i think we're going to be in los angeles in the fall if we are we're coming to speak to your class five points of implementation that's why he had this you know i he i've been accused of having a resting serial killer face wow instead of a wretching wretching bitch face it's a resting serial killer face yeah i don't know which is worse probably a serial killer face well i've had people tell me i was scaring them but you look angry when in point of fact you're thinking or what's the third alternative he could have had gas that's the third alternative that's the third alternative somebody looks angry they could have gas so you're thinking they're mad at me wouldn't point of fact they're having trouble hanging on to the the bad eggs that they ate for breakfast you just don't know that's exactly why you got to be careful about your interpretation of body language and that's why other than attentiveness whatever you see on the other side is probably one of three possibilities and it seems like something is just on your mind is how you get at what the possibility is. I'm thinking this through. You may be mad. I just don't feel good. Now you didn't make a guess on, you didn't put your chips on the wrong color. Do you think it's worthwhile for people to become more aware of their body language so that it's not incumbent upon the speaker or the person they're negotiating with to ask the good question to get what's going on with the individual communicated if you're genuinely curious you don't got to worry about your body language so that's the main thing yeah what's what's your what's your inner attitude it's then you don't have to disguise it and if your inner attitude is negative and you have to disguise that that takes energy that detracts your ability to think and that's why honesty is less requires less energy friend of mine was undercover in the fbi first time he went undercover for a week he said man it was exhausting you know that's that's masking your your inner intent you're trying to act like when you're somebody's friend when point of fact you're an opponent if your negotiation is i'm really an opponent no matter how i act if i really want to take advantage of you if i want to get the best of you you got to to burn up a lot of energy hiding that interesting i had a public speaking course in college and i loved the professor she was phenomenal and i was just in awe of the way that she communicated in the the real-time stories that she made so applicable to the material and a third of the way through the semester i went to the office hours to get clarity on some of the the content And she gave me the clarity, and then she said, you know, one piece of feedback that I think will benefit you for the rest of your life is don't look so serious all the time. And I said, what do you mean by that? And she said, until you had this exchange with me, I didn't even know if you enjoyed the class. Wow. And here in my head, I'm like. You're having a great time. Yeah, I think she's just the shit. And she thought that I didn't like her. And so I've had to teach myself to look as I feel because it's actually not natural for me to look interested even when I really am. And I wonder if other people have that same challenge. You know, again, you're probably when you're really processing because you're completely engaged, that's probably when the, you know, you don't really, people can't tell that you're just so thoroughly engaged. I also like this reframe of if you think that you're an opponent in a negotiation, you are going to exert all this additional energy that's likely counterproductive to the negotiation instead of just trying to find some way to get through to a desired result on both sides. But I do personally, and I think many people do, is I help them through negotiations across employee issues and all sorts of things. I think they think that there is an opponent and therefore they have to mock up being something that they aren't in order to be tough. Yeah, that's one of the unfortunate perceptions of the word negotiation to begin with. And everybody wants to get better at it, but not everybody wants to admit it. Or the aura that it has, to mention Masterclass again, what I have loved about it, what they've loved about it is its demographics, it's through the roof with women. Now, all of our other external demographics on negotiation, like 90% of the book buyers are men. You look at our stats on our social media channels. It's always like almost 90-10. Now, were I simply altruistic, that would bother me because the world's half female. And then more and more females are involved in business. But the flip side of it is I also know that women pick this up faster than men do. Emotional intelligence-based negotiation. we could have a long conversation whether it's nature or nurture i think it's mostly nurture women are nurtured to be emotionally intelligent sooner than men are and i think that's why women have a head start on it but it's always been frustrated for me that more women didn't jump in and so in master class one of the things that got back to us is not only is it their best-selling class but the demographics are through the roof with women which they're delighted by also i'm like at last so what's the original point you can study master class by yourself at home you can get better at negotiations without having to you know have the guys tell you you got to beat them you know you can you could learn influence without being surrounded by people that think it's combat and so it's an opportunity to study something that has the the feeling of beating the other side when you don't want to beat the other side. You don't want to be known as a person that beats people. But you want to get better at this, so you got to feel like you got to study at home when nobody's around. Do you think men or women are better negotiators? I think if you're coachable, then at the top level performance, there's no difference. why do i think women pick it up faster unscientific study in all of my classes you had to write a paper about a negotiation outside of class to qualify to pass not to pass but to qualify to pass and then i put a deadline on it that if you got it in by a certain point in the class, you got extra points. Now, you're only going to write a paper about a negotiation if you tried the skills and it went well, because you're going to be embarrassed. You're not going to write a paper about how you screwed up. None of my classes, the demographics, there was never more than a third of the class female. Maximum, always two thirds male more than half the time the first paper would be from a female now if you look at the numbers first paper from a female should never be more than a third that's just dead even if everybody picks it up at the same rate but if only a third of them are women and more than half the time the first papers from a female my unscientific brain tells me that women pick it up facet of that. I like it. I think women are phenomenal negotiators. We're just told that we're not or we're not. Or you got to be tough. Exactly. You got to be one of the guys. You got all this nonsense that makes people mediocre. You've been phenomenal. I would love to know where people can find you to do something with the work that you do. BlackSwanLTD.com is a website we've got an in-person event coming up in las vegas professional deal maker day may 15th we've got several this year in vegas we're holding it in vegas not so you can go to the casinos and blow your money we're not on the strip we're at a hotel that's away from the strip it's actually a JW Marriott that's on a golf course. You feel like you're at this great golf course resort. And we're doing it in Vegas because about half my team lives in Vegas. So we can provide more people, more training, more support for a phenomenal event if we do it in our backyard. Amazing. So that was BlackSwanLTD.com. Chris Voss, thank you for being a part of Keep It Brief. whenever i struggle with anything i look the word up and so when i was thinking about my own negotiation journey as i was preparing for this podcast i looked up the word negotiate i was like why would i have trouble with this if i actually knew that this is what it was listen to this this is from mary webster it says to arrange for or bring about through conference discussion and compromise think of how important that is to arrange for when you're negotiating you're not screwing someone over. Nobody is losing in a negotiation. You're arranging for what you want to have happen. If you have a label for yourself that you're not a good negotiator, that you don't know how to get what you want, that negotiation is bad, you'll just take whatever the deal is. Remember this definition, to arrange for. In your life, it is vital for you to arrange for things to go the way that you want them to go. If you don't arrange for those things, somebody else is going to arrange them for you, which is why it's so easy for many to just become complacent because somebody else is arranging for them. But when you're negotiating, you're arranging for yourself. You're putting the pieces in the right order in the right places in order for you to have a win. I'm going to take what Chris just taught us and ask you this question. Do you want to miss another episode? Of course not. Therefore open up the platform right now and hit subscribe so that you never miss another episode of Keep It Brief.

In this episode of Keep It Brief, I sit down with Chris Voss to break down the negotiation frameworks every business owner should actually know. We unpack why chasing “yes” kills deals, and how one simple shift, getting the other side comfortable saying “no”, helped a recruiter cut 300 cold calls down to 75 while producing the same results.

Chris also explains tactical empathy, why phrases like “it seems like…” open people up faster than “I understand,” and how labels can lower resistance in high-stakes conversations. We get into why “splitting the difference” creates lose-lose outcomes, the psychology behind bad compromises, and how the best negotiators build deals that hold long term.

Finally, we break down the three emotional traits that drive peak performance in negotiation: curiosity, playfulness, and gratitude, and why your mindset impacts your ability to spot red flags before you walk into the wrong deal.

Comment Brief 1 on my latest Instagram post for a PDF of my notes and takeaways from this episode!

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Information shared here is for educational purposes only. Individuals and business owners should evaluate their own business operations and identify any potential risks. The information shared here is not a guarantee of success. Your results may vary. Copyright [⁠CardoneVentures.com⁠] (⁠https://cardoneventures.com⁠) 2025