all right so our next speaker amazing speaker you're going to love this session um Carla Xander where are you Carla because she gave me the book so you can thank there she is so you can thank her for uh for our next speaker here but uh let me read a little bit of a bio um before becoming an author and a consultant Chris Voss was the lead International kidnapping negotiator for the FBI where he worked on approximately 150 kidnappings worldwide in his 24-year career he was also a member of the New York City joint terrorist task force for 14 years and served as the lead crisis negotiator for the New York City division of the FBI now today he is a consultant and he's CEO of a firm called The Black Swan he's the author of the book never split the difference negotiating as if your life depended on it and thanks to our um wonderful sponsors of Barrett the copy of the book will be at the Barracuda uh table for you to pick up when you uh at the end of the session um and he teaches International negotiations in the MBA programs at the University of Southern California and Georgetown University and what I'll tell you is um as you might you guys know I get to speak with learn from interact with a lot of speakers authors famous folks if you will and I I think more and more it it becomes more difficult to impress me and I don't mean that to be arrogant I'm just saying that after a while it's you kind of have seen it all but when I got Chris's book and I started to read it I was I mean instantly I was hooked it's one of the best books I've read in a very long time on marketing on sales on negotiations and um you know started watching some of his podcasts I have my whole sales team studying his book we went through it chapter by chapter not just let's read the book and discuss it chapter by chapter reading it breaking it down how are we going to apply this today it is a tremendous book my my sales team loves it we love it and I think you're going to get a lot out of his presentation so um help me welcome Mr Chris Voss I don't think we have a video right no video all right help me welcome Mr Chris Voss what you going do when come you what you going to do what you going to do when for Youk you all right thank you all right that was a very warm introduction thank you very much your return to Sor was not part of our negotiations nor our agreement so I must do nothing and secondly you must be a pirate for the Pirates Code to apply and you're not and thirdly the code is more what you call guidelines the natural rules welcome aboard the Black Pearl Miss Turner all right so welcome aboard the Black Swan all right so you guys are dealing with sales challenges right what's a hostage negotiator got to tell you about sales and marketing well I sold jail sentences and we had buyers so let's walk through some of this first let me show you this video both carrying on a verbal love affair with the word hostage listen you do not hold people hostage or engage in Ransom taking to get 100% of your way they're trying to hold veterans Hostage to force Obamacare on the American people you cannot negotiate with a hostage situation we've got a group of folks who think that they can hold uh America hostage the president somehow wants to keep uh this hostage they've taken hostages no President should be held hostage holding our government hostage holding the US hostage hold the entire country hostage hold them hostage don't hold anyone hostage they took hostages hostage taking stop taking hostages they had to take the country hostage whether or not it's it's it's correct to to kind of use the hostage terms uh by politicians when you see this as somebody who's negotiated a lot when you see what's going on in Washington what jumps out to you well there's two things about that you know on a personal note I I like that they use the word because then it gives me a chance to be on your show and they you know I haven't been able to focus on anything his company is called the Black Swan group that is the baddest ass name I have ever heard I love that now what is the Black Swan group that's like the coolest what is that oh thank you very much uh a Black Swan is something unusual that has a great impact and we like to think that the way we negotiate has a great impact see all right so how often do you get a chance to tell a joke that makes Anderson Cooper laugh right all right but there's a communication lesson in there there's a marketing and sales communication you know what a lesson in there a couple actually um you know what what what might that be any idea what that might be there's a neuroscience lesson in there too all right so I don't make that remark in context you know I like it because it gives me a chance to be on your show I guarantee you Jeffrey tolbin does not give me the best commercial my company ever got the Black Swan group that is the baddest ass name I ever heard I mean how valuable is that in the moment and what inclines people to do that I guarantee you that if leading up to the show before the segment goes on Jeffrey Tobin is sitting around with there with those guys and he says you know Black Swan group that's kind of badass I'm going to say that when we go live Anderson Cooper would have looked at him and said no you're not you're not saying that this is CNN the CN CNN does not stand for comedy we're not telling jokes here the producers would have gotten his ear say je Jeffrey just stick to the script you know we got a definite agenda here stick stick to it but I'm sitting there off camera in a moment I'm hearing hostage this hostage that hostage this this is straight line I just got to hit you know I can't I can't help this so humor within context never be so sure of what you want that you wouldn't take something better create moments create an environment where good things happen which is all about what all hostage negotiation is like how we going to get to the our goal how we going to get there I don't know but I do know that if I create this great process I've had enough time in this process to know that delightful things that favor me are going to happen so some of you like to be funny all the time you know there's a hostage negotiator I you know I don't I don't call into the bank and say hey anybody in there from Iowa cuz I grew up in Iowa you know how'd you guys get here today you know what was your drive like none none of that stuff the kind of stuff that gets into people right away in a very good way so but humor be careful with it but within context in appropriate context you know I call on the bank say hey did you hear the one about the one armed hostage negotiator you know I'm not going to say that but within context in a given moment now here's a neuroscience lesson this is how you begin to make things happen that are to your advantage but you don't know exactly what they are because that's scary it's interesting to say never be so sure of what you want that you wouldn't take something better we get people all the time saying okay so what are those things and I say I don't know let it happen and it scares people it's going to scare you all right so the Neuroscience lesson that's what I love about Neuroscience these days because Neuroscience is now backing up the stuff that we started learning in hostage negotiation back in the 70s before Neuroscience existed Neuroscience lesson you're up to 31% smarter in a positive frame of mind 31% you know many of you work very hard to be dispassionate if you just passionate in your business you're holding yourself back you're not as smart as you could be your mental capacity is restricted 31% that's no small jump within that 31% moment you can create that appropriately at the right given time something occurs to Jeffrey tubin where it gives me something extraordinarily valuable which we' played over and over and over again 31% here's a wacky thing about that too cuz they do all these crazy experiments in Neuroscience they they took some people and they said take a pencil hold it in your mouth don't let your teeth touch it what are you doing you're smiling only you don't even know it they want to find out if there's a hard wire between the nerves in the brain and the Nur the nerves in the face and the neurons in the brain and there is you can put yourself in a smarter frame of mind very quickly you know a lot of and I'm living in Southern California these days my accent has got to confuse you as to where the heck this guy is especially if he said it's a small town boy from Iowa son of Richard and Joyce V Mount Pleasant Iowa but I'm living in California these days I don't know how many people here live in in Southern California but they're always talking about gratitude I'm so grateful to be here you know as a Midwestern gy I'm like please stop all right you know enough but in reality when you put yourself in in a grateful frame of mind you're smarter I'm getting ready to get into a negotiation with a a business counterpart I don't like I don't like them I don't trust them but being a hostage negotiator I got no problem navigating a relationship with somebody I neither like nor trust that was how I made my living that doesn't rattle me but I'm getting ready to get on a phone with this person and I I'm running through my skill set and I'm trying to do my preparation in advance very brief preparation and I can't come up with anything and I'm and I I just keep seeing myself getting angry with this person and while I was driving I stopped and I thought you know the only reason why they're trying so hard to continue this relationship is because we're good and they're making money off of us and this is a result of success and I said to myself you know what I'm lucky to be in this conversation at all it's a sign of success and I felt an instant change in my brain's ability to react and I came up with the things that I needed and I calmed down and I finished my drive and we had a successful interaction so interesting crazy little hacks that'll make you smarter in the moment all right so let me uh let me tell you a little bit more about some of the crazy stuff that I did as an FBI hostage negotiator I ended up as the FBI's lead International kidnapping negotiator any citizen any American citizen that got kidnapped anywhere in the world world it was my job to come up with a negotiation strategy that was designed to both get them out and give us the ability to do a follow on and go after the bad guys right afterwards that was my job I was in charge of every American citizen that got kidnapped anywhere in the world so you might ask yourself all right so how busy is that guy who has that job lead International kidnapping negotiator well it's a great big world and there a lot of Americans doing stupid stupid things so at any given point in time there'd be anywhere from one to four Americans that are being held someplace so I'm working one day and we got a kidnapping in Haiti now before the before the earthquake in Haiti kidnapping in Haiti of American citizens was a revolving door some of you are saying to yourself right now I I never saw that in the news I never heard about that I didn't I heard a lot of stuff about Haiti I didn't hear that and I actually had a reporter once say that to me like hey you guys you've worked well over a 100 kidnappings in their entirety in a period of years how come we don't hear about it well number one what's what's attracts the media what's the number one rule if it bleeds it leads we're doing a good job nobody's getting killed media is not terribly interested in that number two the other interesting thing which I'm sure impacted it then I Ts that are getting grabbed they're dual Nationals the bad guys do not know that they're grabbing Haitian C or American citizens this is one of the cool things about the United States of America I'm an I'm an unabashed Unapologetic Patriot now I realize this is not a perfect country but there are millions of people trying to get here for a reason this is a wonderful place one of the very interesting things about this country growing up in Iowa that I never knew that I took for granted do you know how many countries around the world that if you're born there you're automatically a citizen do you know it's argued that there are only two developed nations in the entire world the US and Canada not one country in Europe one or two in the Middle East Australia you get born in Australia you think that entitles you to citizenship no they'll laugh at you born in England they'll laugh at you United States we have this concept and it's largely it's largely concept of the Americas North and South America there's a Latin term for it I think it's called J forgive my pronunciation means right of the soil you're born in the US you're born with the Privileges that American citizenship ship confers which are substantial how does what does this have to do with Haiti what this has to do with Haiti is Haitian moms understand the greatest gift they could possibly give their child and their child's literal first birthday is a GI gift of American citizenship and all the rights and privileges that confers so no shortage of Haitian moms are finding their way into the United States legal illegal so the child is born an American citizen that's why so many dual Nationals are getting grabbed at Haiti so it's a wonderful idea that's unique to us so anyway there's a kidnapping in Haiti one day and it's a 12-year-old boy's grabbed 12-year-old boys an American citizens parents are not now the other thing that I had to learn about h hostage negotiation is an any rule in negotiation doesn't matter what it is to you doesn't matter matters what it is to them so kidnapping it's a horrific event to us and the family to the bad guys on the other on the other side it's another day at the office said job it's what they do for living you guys see the movie denzo Washington Man on Fire who do he talk to in that movie The Voice the voice was the kidnappers negotiator that was his job get a good voice let's let this guy negotiate he's good at it division of labor what's going on in Haiti at the time the business model in Haiti and I had to learn this as a business model that they would have a division of labor they'd be different guys doing different things they'd have a price point and they'd have the amount of time that they allocated in order to sell the commodity which happened to be human beings horrible to us to them it's just a commodity's business they got people that are in charge of grabbing the commodity they got people in charge of transporting the commodity they got people in charge of holding the commodity they got a separate person in charge of negotiating about the commodity and they got some other people that let the commodity deliver the commodity to the client and they got a boss that watches all this happens and gets mad at them if they screw [Laughter] up so the business model in Haiti at the Times a great business model what are they doing they're carjacking a car with more than one person in it this is called pre-qualification because if they're driving a car they got money especially if they're in Haiti you driving a car in Haiti you got enough money for a ransom you got enough money for a car and gas you got enough money for ransom they're pre-qualified grab it with more than one person in it cuz you let one person go instant notification you don't have to worry about marketing your client already knows you're in business with them right notifications are met they were in a car together they probably know how to get a hold of guy's family let him know he got kidnapped and then here's the kicker that I always loved what happens if you grab the one person and the family nobody likes you still got a car you get paid it's a great business model so this this 12-year-old boy not UNC common gets grabbed in a carjacking dad's uh not an American citizen he knows that his son is goes to the US Embassy and says my son's an American citizen he got kidnapped you're supposed to help me Embassy says the FBI is going to be there to help you out now I don't know what went through his mind when he was told the FBI was going to be there to help him out I can only imagine probably about 15 minutes later he was he thought he was going to hear a on the front door and these guys would be there they might even have FBI hats on but instead about 15 minutes later he gets a call from some guy in Washington DC named Chris Voss and he literally says to me you're in Washington DC how you going to help me how long do I have before this guy hangs up the phone 3 seconds probably you encounter a potential client I'm here to tell you they are saying to themselves how you going to help me everybody you deal with in your business says that to themselves on the opening encounter and you know how much time you got to to keep that conversation going do do you guys know how long it takes to make a first impression 3 to 10 seconds do you also know what actually makes a good first impression do you really know trust and competency you got three seconds to establish trust and competency notice neither none of th neither of those are where you from how long you've been necessarily how long you've been doing it how likable you are how friendly you are trust and conf competency now what do I do with my 3 seconds with this Dad not unlike what you need to do now the reason why I know what to do right because I've done it wrong before remember the first time I was in a Philippines on a kidnapping I'm going to tell you guys about in a little while I get walked into a room that literally everybody other than the president of the Philippines is in cabinet secretaries head of the police Secretary of Defense president only reason president wasn't there is because his personal adviser was and the head of our office in the Philippines brought me in for this kidnapping very high-profile kidnapping of an American and they basically said to me how you going to help us who are you how do we know you know what you're doing and I make this mistake of trust trotting out my resume which you most likely will do as well you tell people you resume I said I've been an FBI agent so for so many years joint terrorist task force New York City Attorney General's award for excellence investigation FBI agents award for distinguished and exemplary service not only have I been trained at the FBI in Scotland Yard but I now write the book that the FBI teaches from I not only read it I write it and I can tell you that they were suitably unimpressed they may as well have yawned in my face it become became a contentious and heated negoti uh negotiation over whether or not I was qualified to be there at all I remember we walked out of there again I'm a small town boy from Iowa so the head of our office says those guys were disrespectful they challenged your qualifications and I said how cool is that when was the last time you got to argue with the Secretary of Defense of an entire country cuz I'm PR my well that impressed me I thought it was cool so I don't do that with the Haitian dad here's what I did they said all right right Haitians are not killing kidnap victims these days I realize that's really stupid because they kill each other at the drop of a hat but they're not killing kidnapped victims and today is Thursday and Haitian kidnappers love the party on Saturday night if you say the things that I want you to say and follow my guidance we will have your son out by Saturday morning he said tell me what you want me to do and we had a son out Saturday morning what did I do what was it that I did first of all I didn't try to get him say yes do you want help not once that I try to get him to say yes not once but what I did was I told him I knew what he was looking for what he was looking at cuz the first question your cents ask you is do you understand what I'm faced with do I got to I don't care if I like you I don't care how long you've been doing this do you know what I'm looking at because I need to know whether or not I can explain it to you I don't even entirely understand it myself how long did it take me to say that to that father as about 8 seconds worth of dialogue wasn't it not a 20 minute dialogue I laid out to him exactly what he was facing and I offered him the slightest insight to the environment for a solution notice I also didn't offer a single answer to how we were going to get his son out that's intentional don't provide value in advance CU then people are encouraged to try to do it by themselves if they if it makes sense to them and if it doesn't make sense to them they say you're an idiot one of our strategies was to put kidnappers on a call schedule to schedule the calls to make appointments for calls with terrorists and social passing kidnappers imagine that I'm going schedule 11:30 call and they're going to call at 11:30 and you're saying to yourself right now that's stupid he can't do that yes I can but I don't need the father saying to himself that's stupid how you going to put a kid how you going to set an appointment for a kidnapper to call me but I know how to do it and I don't need either of those problems of him trying to do it on his own or him saying that my ideas are stupid I just need to let him know trust in competency remember what I said before competency is established when you let somebody know you know what they're faced with when you lay it out like that and trustworthiness is lost when you try to get people to say yes did you wonder what the title of this presentation meant why yes is the last thing you want to hear did you mean like well of course it's last we want to yes at an agreement or is it the last thing is it like stop doing it well it stop doing it that's what it's about and I'm going to show you how to do it but it's going to be hard it's going to hurt you to stop it I'm going to give you I'm going to give you a feeling right now how hard it's going to hurt to stop doing it I need everybody to stand up please everybody stand up all right get a nice solid stance feet about shoulder width apart nice solid balanced stance 90 degrees with each arm fist with both hands right thumb up left forefinger out now switch switch back do it again speed it up come on quicker some of you right now are going like and I know in the back couple people are going like come on move all right sit back down thank you for giving yourself a round of applause for doing [Applause] that now did you need to be Elon Moss to figure out what I was trying to get you to do no so it wasn't complicated what it was was awkward and that's what's going to stick in your in your in your way let's talk a little bit more Neuroscience those of you that when you were doing this like and it did like almost hurt your head here's a cool thing that's actual feeling of creating a new neural pathway in your brain this is an exciting thought a new neural pathway and each and every time you try to create a new neural pathway is an actual chemical change in your brain and there's a neuroscience saying that says the neurons that fire together wire together now getting you out of yes trying to get people to say yes trying to get trying to hear yes is going to be hard because that neural pathway is built and you know how to ask them questions and that neural pathway fires and you come up with a yes question and stopping that is going to be as difficult is this change because it's going to hurt and that's why you'll abandon it that's why you quit and give up cuz you're like if it hurts this much every time I'm not doing this anymore but here's the good news everybody knows what the the learning curve looks like right well that's the very beginning of the learning curve and we Ram into that baby and it's hard and it's hurt and it's difficult and it hurts your brain you don't realize that in very short order you're going to get over the crest and on the other side and your skills are going to take off you quit because you think it's always going to be this hard I heard an interesting talk about a year and a half ago John Foley Blue Angel pilot he talked about building habits and you know if they don't build the habits their Jets crash into each other those guys die and he said they'd done some research on it he called it grooving a habit in the brain he said it takes about 63 tribes 63 tries which correlates to what anecdotally we believe a lot of people it takes about three weeks to learn a habit it's going to be awkward to get out of getting people to say yes for you it's going to be awkward you stick with it try a few times each day and you'll find that you're going to get there because yes getting someone to say yes just give you an example somebody calls you on the phone you pick up the phone voice on the other in the line says have you got a few minutes to talk you all say this when you call people on the phone all of you do you hear it have you got a few minutes to talk what's your gut reaction when someone phone rings you pick it up have you got a few minutes to talk right you don't like it anxiety distraction here's what that question actually entails cuz you're going to run us through your head number one if I have a few minutes to talk do I want to talk to you if I have a few minutes to talk and I want to talk to you do I want to talk about what you want to talk about there's not a man alive or woman probably for that matter the most important your significant other most important person in the world calls you up on the phone and that voice says can we talk and you say to yourself well I know I like talking to you but I don't think I want to talk about what you want to talk talk about next question you ask yourself is how long is a few minutes my next young younger sister calls me on the phone when she's got an hour drive ahead of her and can do you have a few minutes to talk also by the way her intention is she talks the whole time and and that isn't gender based because I got a A friend of mine a male friend of mine who's an attorney he works out a whole long list of things to talk about in a conversation no phone call with him is ever less than 45 minutes he wants to work through his agenda and he calls on the phone and says if you got a few minutes to talk it's 45 every time so that's going through your head also when someone says have you got a few minutes to talk and finally the last question is how do I get off the phone getting yes out of people is the single B biggest corrosion to your relationships the rest of the day observe conversations see if you don't see somebody trying to get a yes out of somebody else and see if you don't see the person they're trying to get a yes out of leaning back just as an example at a conference I was at probably about two years ago speakers conferences everybody has conferences speakers have conferences too we're people too so what does speakers say to each other at conference what are you talking about that's what we want say to each other we talk cuz we talk and I'm at I'm at the bar uh at the hotel that evening and a and a lady from the the group that I'm in in Los Angeles at the time we sit down she says what are you talking about and I said I talk about how uncomfortable getting yes out of someone makes them how bad it is for relationships how defensive it makes people all the time she goes I don't think that's true I haven't experienced that at all and while we're sitting there the waitress comes up and she looks at the waitress she says I'll have a VOD on and the waitress goes away and then and then she looks at me and she says all right I know that my husband and I have a business that's all about wine all we talk about in our business is wine we talk about what wine I have with this food what wine I have with this occasion what wine to have this with this party I know our business is all wine all the time she said I like vodka martinis okay like all right so she says so what was it that you were talking about and I was sitting there and I go like do you like vodka martinis and she goes well yes see you spent 3 minutes telling me that you like vodka martini the first time I tried to get you to say yes to that you get defensive on a confirmation I'm talking about this with my son about a year and a half ago we we're also we're coming out of this building we just given a training to a company in New Jersey and we're in there and it's a secure space so they got security and he says you know I don't think that people are always reluctant to say yes I mean he says he says I don't think it's as big a problem as you do and we walk up to the security guard to give our badges back and this guy is and it says Alli Security on his uniform so the guy's at his job on duty he's seen us already he's got a sign on him says he works for Allied security and I look at him and I say do you work for allight security and he goes why you ask and I just looked at my son and I went what do you want from me so you should be worried about this it's probably the biggest single contributor to people not returning your calls I'm a th% convinced that this is they will initially tolerate it early on but eventually they stop calling you back I don't know how many people you have that are non-responders we were uh counseling a CEO with the sales company and we gave him a solution to nonresponses he said I'm 12 for 12 with what you gave him if he's got 12 everybody in his company's got at least 12 that's an exponential Factor you have employees however many non-responders you have they have at least that many what's that costing you you know how many non-responders we have zero really what are you doing different let me lay it down for you who's this guy Jack Jack Welch sort of a rock star of CEOs wrote the book winning wrote the book Jack was the CEO of GE while they were the most competitive company on the planet under Jack Welter leadership did extraordinary things when a jack W's most recent book is called the real life NBA his co-author his wife Susie they in Los Angeles about 2 years ago on a book signing I want to get Jack to come and speak at the negotiation class I'm teaching at USC at the time how many people asked Jack wels to say yes that day how many people try to get Jack Welch to say yes to something at that book signing You're me what do you say to Jack Welch give me your value proposition how do you know he values anything you have how you know he's smart enough to Value anything you have what are the problems here how much time have I got with Jack Welch you're me how much time do you have with Jack Welch let's talk about the problems two to 300 people in a book signing what happens that a book signing there a line of 300 people you get up to the before you get up to the person there cuz they they everybody's going to want to chat up Jack Welch right and if everybody stands there and talk to him for 5 minutes the thing goes on all day so they don't want that you get close to Jack welz somebody says what's your name they write on a piece of paper so that theoretically they don't he doesn't get your name wrong which is part of it but it's also so you don't have to tell him what he doesn't have to say what your name is he does have to talk to you if he doesn't ask you your name they keep you moving keep the line moving problem one problem too Jack Welsh is a legitimate celebrity is he not they don't know who I am they don't know that I have I'm not carrying a gun which I am they don't know that they haven't put me through a metal detector they don't have my ID they don't know that I'm not somebody that shorted G stock at the wrong time and Jack Welch made a public statement and I lost a family fortune over a bad bet I could be there to HT Jack Welch Jane Fonda was at a at a book signing a number of years ago a Vietnam veteran once he got close enough to her spit right in her face I'm going to get within arms length of Jack Welch he has security people they have reason to be afraid that I might hurt him and action is quicker than reaction so I'm going to get arms length they can't stop me from doing what I'm going to do they could make me pay for it afterwards but they can't stop me and they know that I could walk up to Jack Welch I could come up to Jack Welch and I could take his face right in my hands I could kiss him on the lips which is horrifying this gentleman right here right now they don't know what I'm going to do knowing all this knowing I got time for one thing to say I walk up to Jack welson and I say is a ridiculous idea is it a ridiculous idea for you to come and speak at the negotiation class that I teach at USC and he looks at me and he looks up into the left and his face just freezes in this scowl and he doesn't move and I think to myself I just killed Jack Welch he's Furious he had a stroke and he died and he's going to fall over right in front of me and they're going to blame me and they're going to tackle me and I'm going to say I'm an FBI agent and they're going to say say we don't care you just killed Jack Welch so when initially when he doesn't die I'm relieved but when he still doesn't unfreeze now I figure pretty soon he's going to start going security security instead finally he looks at me and he says this is my personal assistant's name this is special Twitter account that we have set up to to communicate with her I will call her and tell her who you are and what you want I think we're going to be in Los Angeles in the fall if we are we'll come in and speak at your class think about how many answers I got in succession we like to say that a we call this a calibrated no we use it all the time we don't even bother with yes calibrated no is worth at least five yeses think about that return on investment cuz think of all the decisions that I would have had to try to get would you like to do this who's your secretary how do I get in touch with you can I have permission to talk to your secretary are you going to be in Los Angeles as a fall think of all the things that he thought through and answered and gave me the house to the how to get him done the house without me saying another word so your first the first thing you need to do the typical watch the questions you ask people each and every question that you ask you're going to find a vast majority of them are innocent confirmation questions confirmation yes but it's killing your relationships so just switch the beginning of anyone those questions to is it a bad idea is it ridiculous are you against do you disagree we never ask anybody do you agree we say do you disagree no is protection no makes people feel feel safe no makes people feel comfortable you know there's a saying and it's understanding what your data is really telling you because there's a saying the kids are good at negotiate with their parents especially teenagers because they won't take no for an answer like when my son is now my director of operations and my best coach my best negotiation coach when he was 17 and he used to say Dad can I and I'd say no but then I would I found myself watching this I would always say all right having said no feeling protected and safe I'd say all right what was it that you wanted and I'd hear him out so it's not kids are good good at negotiating with parents or the kids don't take no for an answer kids have learned that once a human being has said no they're imminently more persuadable they feel feel safe and protected and secure and are willing to listen having said no it's not a parent child thing it's a human being to human being thing and it's an interesting distinction because that makes it useful in your life so again it's looking at the data and understanding what it really says and not some people say hey you know what playing basketball makes you tall uh no you're looking at your information and you're misinterpreting it so the idea that kids are good at negotiating because they don't take no for an answer from their parents it's human beings on human beings so I should have you scared of your habit at this point in time by the way your addiction to yes you've got an addiction to yes you didn't know it was going to be one of those meetings did you hi I'm Chris hi Chris you guys know those meetings right you're addicted to yes it's a problem it's killing your interactions it's killing your relationships it's causing people to no longer want to talk to you because they feel trapped and this first simple method is just flip out of yes into no it's stupid but it's human nature we're coaching somebody on a phone and they say to me like I don't know what to do they're in no mode I go that's all they say they're in no mode I like perfect just change your questions like that's stupid I know it's stupid that doesn't mean it doesn't work we had someone in a training in a hospital Corporation they had a head nurse that was turning down a scenario that a program they want up to implement in the hospital she gets up and walks out of the training because she kept saying to this head nurse is it a good idea to do this do you agree that this is a good program do you agree that this program solves your problem she's trying to get her to say yes she gets her on on the phone and she says are you against implementing this program and says no as a matter of fact here's what we could do and lays it out she walks back in a room and she says you're going to be shocked I just got an agreement on something by switching from yes to no on a program that we've been trying to get implemented for two months think about the impact on your profit if you could speed things up that quickly all right so at this point in time some of you are saying like Okay what if no's not enough as powerful as it is what do I do now what if that doesn't work well there's and everybody wants the magic fairy dust that you can sprinkle on somebody to get an agreement can I just sprinkle this dust on them and they'll agree well there is it's a little bit counterintuitive it's a little bit different we don't bother with yes if no is not enough here's what we're going for and you're going to be a little surprised by this because the magic words that you want the other person to hear that you want the other person to say that you want to hear you want them to say it you don't want to you need to hear it as opposed to hearing yes is this that's right you want to trigger a that's right not a yes from your counterpart and you trigger it with a simple summary of the situation and how they see it and if there's negativity about you particularly specifically recognizing that negativity and not denying it with like I don't want you to think or the yes but no deny on simple observation especially the negative stuff and that's going to be hard because what you're used to doing is laying out a case for why people should do business with you and you get the worst answer you could possibly get you know what the worst answer you could possibly get from someone and it ain't no the worst thing anybody could ever possibly say to you is look you in the eye and say you're right you're like hold it wait wait wait wait I love it when people tell me I'm right cuz I am I know what I'm doing so I really love it when they tell me look at me and say you're right let's flip it around the other way you're in a conversation with a colleague uh anybody that is just talking to you talking to you talking to you for whatever reason you want to preserve the relationship either because you're a nice person because you need to for whatever the reason is but you want him to shut up and go away you look him in the eye and you know what you say to him you're right right and they get this big happy smile on their face and then they go away happy as clams and they come back to you a day later a week later cuz you didn't change anything that you were doing and they start in on you again yak yak yak yak yak yak yak and you look him in the eye and you go you're right and they leave again now nobody would ever do that to you would they just cuz you do it all the time nobody do that to you you know who the world's greatest practitioners of your RAR if me give you an example I did this talk probably about three years ago guy comes up to me in the afternoon after the break CU I love it when somebody's comes up and says I got a that's right and made the deal on a spot it was awesome I can't believe it worked so this guy says hey hey hey I already did what he said I already used it it was great I love it and I'm I'm standing going like all right cool cool I'm going to hear another deal he said I was texting back and forth on the phone with my wife she's always giving me a hard time about being at these conferences she says you're there partying you're staying out late at night you know you're having a good time you're drinking and I say no sweetheart I got to I got to go I got to network in my industry I got to get to know people I got to learn I got to you know I got to I got to get better at what I'm doing and this time instead of trying to lay all the reasons out for her I just sent her a text back that said you're right she sent me back three hearts and two smiley faces she never did that before and I was like no no no no no stop stop stop stop that is not what I wanted you to do this say it we're great she shut up and let me alone so look um use your powers for good and not evil okay as we move forward here you got to get a that's right let let me give you let me lay it out a little bit because what a lot of people will often say is because what you talk isn't what you're talking about empathy and isn't that wen't tired and played out haven't I heard of empathy for years and years and years I don't care about it anymore empathy is not sympathy and that's why we call it tactical empathy we know more about this we know how the brain works you know who the greatest practitioners of empathy are sociopath two questions does social pths use empathy and does it work on them I'm here to tell you they use it and you know why they use it cuz it works social pths don't care about you they just want to influence you in the laziest way they possibly can laziest and most sustainable because they don't want to have to go P come back to you every day to reconvince you and they know to avoid this Geral wheel of reconvince nothing nothing shortcuts that and is is more durable than empathy point one point two does it work on sociopaths let me lay it out for you let's talk about money not a little bit of money lot of money $10 million 10 million $10 million American grabbed in the Philippines on a case I was telling you about a little bit ago American somewhat doing something stupid this a guy that's got him make no mistake this guy is as bad as they come this guy's a sociopath this guy's a murdering raping head chopping killer that's not a coincidence he's got on a black bandana sunglasses a black T-shirt camel pants and a 45 strap to his side because he thought it made him look good and he was a heavily photographed guy he was old always photograph with the sunglasses on he thought it made him look more dashing thought he caught a more impressive figure the media's literally got him on speed dial no joke and he has them on speed dial they call him on the phone they have a translator ask him questions in talik which is his native language he answers in English because he wants his voice on CNN he has told reporters that there should be a movie made about him and there is no shortage of blood on his hands this guy is a sociopathic killer Relentless and he's got our American and the demand for the American is $10 million but not in Ransom because this is a smart guy it's War damages for 500 years of Oppression in the south of the Philippines from from the Spanish to the Japanese to the Americans to the violations of fishing rights to the economic harm that's been committed on this region of the Philippines for well over 500 years not only not not only that they're not Filipinos in this part of the world they're moros they're separate and independent nation that's being held down by a puppet government that's propped up by the United States of America let me give you another piece of information about these guys do you guys know why the US Military has 45 caliber automatics exactly right to kill this guy's grandfather we had 38s and we couldn't kill his grandfather with him we were shooting him with him and it wasn't knocking him down and keeping him down he's from a warlike culture that Prides itself on being great warriors and we needed 45s to knock this Guy parents down and keep them down so he comes from this tradition so we get involved in this negotiation and I get into the Philippines and what I really am is an international negotiation coach I coached negotiations in every culture on the planet I need you drop me into a country and I'm in in 6 to 12 hours I'm coaching a negotiation you might say that's pretty cool there a lot of countries in this world a lot of languages how many languages does Chris V speak and I've been talking to you long enough now for you to realize the answer to that is barely one what I need to find is somebody's coachable and a guy that I find as coachable is this guy up here on the left side of your screen now this guy is a patriot he's one of the few people on the planet that I would put the life of my son in his hands and he's a Filipino Patriot and he is the commander of the police's saaff the special action force the Philippine national police is equivalent of Navy Seals and these guys are bad to the bone also when I first met Benji who about two years ago retired as the number three General in the Philippine national police at the time he was a caral when I first met him he' LED his guys on 30 rescue missions personally and he and his guys didn't take handcuffs some of you realizing that that means that that he led his guys on 30 firefights that year oh by the way it was August it was only August and he'd been in 30 firefights Benji was is bad as they come and he's not entirely sure that he's comfortable with this warm fuzzy stuff that we're trying to get him to do very coachable guy very smart great learner and he's back and forth because he doesn't understand we call it empathy now then it's tactical empathy now we know how the brain works we know how to get in there and just dial things up and dial things down a little bit and it's a subtle stealth way and I can remember late one night we we're working with them CU we'd worked 247 when the American ambassador summer residence up in the mountains and I see this snarl coming over Benji's face and I look at him and I realize I got to get the equivalent of that's right out of him and I got to articulate without denying what's in his head so I see the snarl and I just look at him and I say you hate saaya don't you saaya is a bad guy's name he said you hate saaya notice I didn't say I don't want you to hate saaya I said you hate him he said I tell you I do he is murdered and he is raped he's cut the heads off of people who were helpless while they were down on their knees and he's murdering by chopping off their heads he's come on our radios while we're bombing his position and said these mortars are music to my ears and the only way he comes on our radio is if he's standing over the body of one of my colleagues I hate him and with that I got it out of him and he dropped in to being a great negotiator and he started to get on board with this tactical empathy approach that I'm telling you about and I tell you on the side the Japanese uh the American ambassador summer residence in the Philippines is supposed to be haunted and we're up there late at night and we're coaching in a library I sent them home I sent everybody else to bed and I'm in the library by myself and I'm like I ain't scared of ghosts I ain't SC scared of ghosts so I'm going to read a couple books I'm going to sit here I'm going to read some books I sat there for a while and I read the books I said all right I'm I'll go to bed now and what I didn't realize was there was a series of about three really long libraries these large cavernous rooms and the light switch is on the wrong side of the room so I got to turn the light off and then walked through a completely pitch black room to get to the next room and each time I shut off the light and I went then I get to the next room it wasn't cool it wasn't cool got to walk slow turn off the next light and go I finally got through all three rooms and I get to this top of the stairs and I hear do flam downstairs now I have just cleared the entire downstairs and I looked down there and I looked down a picture black and I think you don't need me down there I go to bed so I I never saw anything actually crazy but I will tell you when I get up the next morning I'm in the kitchen and the housekeepers would not stay in the house they stayed in an off building and I'm standing in the kitchen one the hous keepers jumps in and sees me and then she goes so you know I don't know what these guys saw in this place but as you can see I was not scared in the least while I was there so anyway we get back into the negotiations with saaya and they are not Cutting Loose at this $10 million Ransom demand so I said we're going to get saai on a phone and here's what we're going to do we're going to get a that's right out of them now fortunately this is not a hard sell because our negotiations have been going on for so long instead of people saying to themselves like what you're thinking right now like what good is that going to do that's what's getting in your way right now you're saying to yourself all right fine what good is it going to do we'd been negotiating long enough that nobody's giv me static over this my answer would have been I don't know it's just going to be good which was fine because we hadn't had anything good happen in a long time so two days later my guy gets the Terrorist on the phone and he says you know what you're not asking for ransom for Jeffree Schilling you're asking for war damages for 500 years of repression from the Spanish to the Japanese to the Americans to the atrocities committed under blackjack persing in the early 1900s to the economic harm and it's unjust and it's wrong and you're not asking for anything that you don't feel you're completely entitled to he laid it out he went Point by Point by point and if you're not laying it on thick in these instances you're not laying it on thick enough and that's what I told him lay it on thick you have to feel like you're laying it on too thick and when he finished up the social path on the other end of the phone went silent for a moment and he said that's right and then they sat that together in silence for a couple more moments and my guy said let's talk again in a couple of days and the social pass said okay and he hung up the phone and we went from $10 million to zero in that conversation The Ransom demand never came up again after that conversation not dime one was ever asked for again as the kidnapping finished playing it out we went through a couple of other twists and turns in the case and on Monday Thursday the Thursday before Easter the American walked away the kidnappers have become sufficiently disorganized but not angry at us they loosened up their security the American was out the swamp he said I I could walk away why do I stay he walks away farmer sees him walking down the dirt road recognizes him there aren't that many black Americans walking around the south of the Philippines you must be Jeffrey Schilling I am they alert the military the military flies down in helicopters pick them picks him up they take him back to Manila they hold this press conference and they say we have rescued the American Jeffrey ceiling and he's sitting there with the president on one side secretary defense on the other talk about this daring rescue mission daring rescue mission they gave a ride same way I got rescued from the airport Yesterday by my lift driver but Jey didn't say anything so they flew him out came back to the United States everything was fine and back in the Philippines about 3 weeks later I connect back up with uh with my guy he says you're not going to believe who called me on the phone I don't know so it really cuz the terrorist has still got my guy's undercover cell phone and knows him by his undercover name what'd he say he said have you been promoted yet cuz he knew that my guy had to be either with the police or the military he knew he had to be a government guy didn't know for sure which but he knew he had to be a government guy called him on the phone said have you been promoted yet I have no idea what it was that you said to me on the phone I was going to kill the American whatever you said worked they should promote you hangs up the phone you guys know that Robert daero Billy Crystal movie analyzes where daero says to Crystal you you're good you you got a gift yes you do you're good that's a terrorist calling my guy saying I felt respected by you he's also saying I deal with you again think about that he got nothing and he calls a guy back up on a phone to show his respect and indicate that he's open to continue talking the next time that they crossed path he felt that understood respected two people who had they met on the battlefield would have happily fought with knives to make it more personal but through that sense of communication that willing to deal with people this transformation of triggering somebody to say that that's right is insane had one of my students in my class at Georgetown she's a pharmaceutical salesperson she got a doctor on a route that is not buying a brand new drug that she knows his patients need she schedules an appointment with him cuz she got no trouble getting appointment she goes in and talks to him he's typing on his computer when she's talking he's on his cell phone he's taking notes he's just barely T he might as well be sitting there with his hand up to her face she schedules an appointment she's got one goal one goal only she's going to get a that's right out of them she prepares for the that's right she knows what she's got to say to make it sound like it's against her that's the key do not be afraid to say the things that don't sound like they're in your interest what would you imagine how do you imagine a pharmaceutical salesperson looks to a doctor imagine the things that's going through his head about how she's she doesn't care she's only working on behalf of some company that wants to make money she sits down with them and she says you know you're not going to listen to any pharmaceutical sales rep whose only interest is to make money a pharmaceutical company that's trying to maximize their P their profits regardless of your patients wellbeing she says your patients aren't just patients to you they're people and you feel responsible for their lives your job is to give people another Christmas with their family she said he turned and looked at her as if he was the first time he'd ever seen her and he said that's that's right she made the sale notice again what she articulated not one Denial in there not one attempt to get a yes you want to save your patience don't you don't you want to give your patients another holiday with their families don't you want to extend their lives I don't want you to think I'm just a pharmaceutical sales rep she let it all out unflinchingly fearlessly and he said that's right and she made the sale we see this happen Time After Time After Time when people get out of this yes nonsense and really more than anything else know is know is the Boost but that's right is where the money is made that's right is where the relationships are built that's right is when someone feels a bridge a connction with you because that's right is what we say when we the person that we've just heard has just spoke spoken the complete truth it's a it's a little bit of a double whammy creates an epiphany moment in the other side and it's them saying to you I feel empathy from you and if you have any doubts whether or not it will work it worked on a sociopathic terrorist so besides a book most most of you guys are going to get a copy of the book if you want to know more only if you want to know more my company has a newsletter comes out once a week send a text to that number FBI empathy all one word don't let your spell check autocorrect it and put a space in there this is the this is a gateway to everything we have we've got some training products that we charged for we got a training coming up in New York in may we do open enrollment trainings but this newsletter is a once a week Tuesday morning short sweet how to get better at a specific aspect we got a lot of people that like this because it's free it's complimentary former colleague of mine he's going to sign like a federal employee because he used to like to say if it's free I'll take three so it's free it's good price it's excellent information in the in there that will help you become a better negotiator each and every day and you're not going to use up all you decision capacity trying to read through this thing it's it's a short site digestible article so I like to say I like to share a short video with you really quickly and and then I'll be done so what I mentioned before and I alluded to it a couple times is preparation preparation is important our preparation process is not extensive it only takes a few moments in in any given negotiation but I have a video to show you about preparation that's critical about preparation our entire approach to negotiation a proof of Life video that's what they're called the ultimate good news bad news story if you're ever unfortunate enough to see one today high today's high stakes Rescue Mission in Columbia ended a drama that has been dragging on for years Chris Voss is the former FBI lead International kidnapping negotiator and he worked on the all right so in terms of preparation what preparation issues do I have here my hair's sticking out on the side I don't know if you can see it Welling enough but I got my hair sticking straight out on the side of my head now this is the first time that I was on Anderson Cooper and I went in there I was really excited again Chris Voss son of Richard and Joyce Voss Mount Pleasant Iowa small town boy I'm going into Anderson Cooper I want to find out some cool stuff like I've heard that they have this thing called The Green Room and do they have a green room and is it green so I go in they take me into the Green Room they have a green room it's not green but it's kind of a cool place they really nice to you they give you coffee water interesting people in there you go from The Green Room you know where you go after that makeup and I remember the first time I was sitting in a makeup chair at CNN and I'm thinking like my father's rolling over in his grave right now his son his son is putting on makeup Midwestern guy would not understand that at all so you go through makeup and anything take you to another room and it's actually the room where they're going to film you you're not in the studio with Anderson Cooper you're in a room it's a large closet a large dark closet with a light that's lines right in your eyes you're supposed to look right below the light that's the camera say talk to that that'll be Anderson imagine that's Anderson and then there's a monitor down to the left and they say we got a monitor here and it's going to go live when we go live and it'll be the Live program do you want that on I'm going to say yes leave that baby on I never saw me on TV before I want to watch me on TV leave that on so we've just gone live and I'm looking down at the Monitor and I can see that my hair is sticking out and I am perplexed and to make it worse the monitor is a mirror image so I don't know which side of my head the hair is sticking up but I'm going to go negotiator right I generate options I got to figure something out I got to figure out which side of my hair is at because what are my options what could I do it's all this is racing through my mind can I go I can't go like two hands because I'm going to feel like you know one of the Three Stooges also I can't lick my hand because that would look bad if I did that so first of all I got to isolate the problem so this case from the beginning until his retirement just last year he joins me now Chris this has got to be kind of [Applause] I don't know why I thought moving my head around was going to help maybe it would wave and I could feel it you see from the look on my face I'm thinking like n that didn't help so now I'm thinking I'm trying to decide what to do a remarkable day for you to be so Anderson Cooper's hair is perfect why do we got to why do we got to do a comparison why do we go got to go side by side you know I guarantee that the time the producers going like hey hey hey hey let's go split screen let's let's make sure everybody knows voss's hair is thicking out and I look up and I see this and you see how thoroughly disgusted I am at the comparison so now I'm sitting there I'm trying to decide you know how long is this going to be can I make my move it's like double Dutch jump rope right where you're trying to decide when you can jump in how can I get in how can I get in I got to go I got to go cuz my mom is watching this everybody everybody she goes to church with they're going to be like your son can't even comb his hair it's an embarrassment to our town so I got to deal with this I'm thinking about it when can I make my move closely involved in this and to [Applause] finally you see the look of disgust on my [Applause] face see it come for forish damn it that didn't work so what I'm here to tell you though is I finished the segment you know they didn't ban me from CNN because I made a mistake with a proper preparation with the proper approach then you can make mistakes it'll it it'll soak up problems in your communication so I'm going to I'mma leave you with this everybody stand up please everybody stand up remember I told you before about the Men in Black right remember that little red flashy thing everybody look right up here all right after today everybody that you deal with is going to feel respected and understood and appreciated and looked down for by your application of tactical empathy they'll feel better and you'll be surprised at the number of results that'll come your way because of it thank you for spending time with me today it's been a pleasure to be here