MasterClass Live with Chris Voss | MasterClass

Chris thank you so much for joining us my pleasure Davis has said this is really cool I gotta tell you it's an honor to be part on the inaugural kickoff of this this aspect of masterclass yeah it's so it's a new for those of you who aren't aware master class live as a new asset that we are going to be creating that provides a way for our users to interact with our instructors in a live setting and also give them new ways to engage with our content beyond our live streaming videos are downloadable workbooks and our many apps so Chris Voss is the former chief hostage and kidnapping negotiator for the FBI he also taught negotiation at Georgetown and USC Business School's and launched his very own masterclass on negotiation at the end of last year I am Davis Carter I am a senior creative producer here at masterclass and I also had the privilege of overseeing the creation of Chris's class and like I said Chris thank you so much for being here yeah my pleasure this is gonna be fun I'm looking forward to it well you know we're gonna sing a couple songs crack a couple of jokes we'll have a good time right exactly right have you got your beer there that we talked about having this after 5:00 someplace right exactly right exactly right um so you know we think this is a great opportunity to provide people with some inspiration and a positive distraction in these challenging times and on that note one of the things that I thought was really interesting is that we recently learned that your lesson on tactical empathy is actually currently the most watched chapter on the platform and I thought that was kind of an interesting window into the times that were we're living in right now yeah you know that is interesting I appreciate you sharing it with me too and you know tactical empathy you know for those of you if you haven't had a chance to watch the core or read the book you know it's probably really hard to tell what the title of my book is you know it's are saying them what the other side's perspective is that's empathy yeah it's easier said than done you know because what does she disagree well you should really be able to say you know what if they're wrong you should still be able to say the perspective and the tactical aspect that we added to it why we use that term is when empathy was first sort of came back into common language you know it's been 30 40 years really we didn't have neuroscience to back up how the brain works and we got it now so if we know how the brain works why not tactically take advantage of that it's it's good for people it works those are the two reasons why you should engage in a negotiation skill number one if it works and number two if it's good for people that pass both sniff tests so I'm happy to hear that people are engaging that for better communication yeah yeah and in kind of like speaking of the world that we're in right now it's I kind of wanted to start this conversation by taking a look at the situation that everybody is dealing with and how that might impact the way that we're engaging with other people but also the way that we're negotiating with people and I guess like my first question for you would be does this change the way that we should be negotiating well not I don't know that it changes the way we should be it probably changes the way we are yeah I mean you know there's some real bad habits out there you know one of those bad habits is you got to get your point across and people focus on that first here the other side out first the well you should be negotiating is it you actually go slow to go fast here the other side out first you'll get the chance to make your point quicker where they're able to listen you know this is sort of an adaptation of advice from way back when of Stephen Covey's he said seek first to understand then be understood mm-hmm well well this is seek for us to demonstrate understanding in order to be understood so yeah we should be doing it are we doing it now it's mostly an argumentative Society these days you know battling counterpoints who nobody nobody mmm-hmm and it's almost like I find myself thinking like this steaks feel really high right now like everybody's kind of on alert and so it seems like you know they're there I guess they're more tightly wound and it's even more powerful now than it could have been four weeks ago or you know three months ago and more important yeah well we're in the middle of a shift I mean this is in this hardship is going to create great things on the other side for example I was talking to somebody the other day you know the younger generations quote the Millennials 20s 30s or much more comfortable with technology that some of us all as folks older folks in that you know technology is here to enhance everybody's lives all generations are being forced by having to stay at home to adapt to technology and with that let's make our communication more effective let's hear each other out you know let's use negotiation really is a means for drawing closer together for establishing better relationships so you know I think this this shift that we're in the middle of as painful as it is and the cost is going to be high in the interim when we come out on the other side we're gonna be in a better place well that's encouraging and I'm curious when we were talking last week you mentioned that some of your clients of the Black Swan group have been coming to you and saying and looking for advice for how they should be approaching their negotiations in the world we find ourselves in and if you're open to sharing and I'd be really interested to know like what kind of problems they're coming to you with and what your advice has been to them yeah well people are people looking to pull out of deals are scared you know what does this look like going forward you know the uncertainty is is is ridiculously it's even traumatic mm-hmm you know not knowing when something is gonna be over how far this is going to go those are some of the highest stressors that there are so you know I'm telling people will chunk it out a little bit you know first of all articulate the other side's fears you know and I you know I'm gonna I'm will use adult language here you know not bad that a little bit you know I got a client called us up and said you know this is show and I said alright so that's the way to describe it because it cuts to the heart of the matter it's what everybody's feeling so when you talk to the people that are scared to death and feel like they're in the middle of a you know manure show to come and down a little bit more say that exactly say you know this is this is a show you're scared to death you don't know when this is going to be over there's nothing that works faster and more effectively to drive in a stake to the heart of somebody's fear other than just recognizing it it's it seems kind of intuitive but its enormous ly effective in that and that's what coaching people to do you know help them clear their heads by facing this head-on and in an unflinching and fearless fashion that's really interesting and I was as I was preparing myself for this I was kind of always trying to think about what your your answers might be and I was like I actually don't know what people will be coming to them with but that makes a ton of sense that the accusations audit which is one of the tactics that you talk about a really important one right now it's it's a robust application of the accusations on it and again when we talk about in the course is what are the fears that the other side has about the situation what are the fears were the accusations they might make at you about you toward you and just our circulate them you know doing audit make an inventory list them out and start your conversation that way and it's ridiculously effective on how fast it accelerates communication it's actually really effective it's get you to where you want to be really quickly mm-hmm that's really interesting thank you for that I appreciate I wasn't sure I was gonna be able to get you to talk about the Black Swan consulting that you're doing because I know it's tends to be with people that are very high-profile so thank you very much for that you know everybody could use it I mean we we try it's one of the brilliant things about masterclass I mean what we blown then blown away with by being you know me and my team it's always you know you want to go fast go alone you want to go far go as a team mm-hm you know masterclass is such an accessible ridiculous value the amount of instruction that you guys put out there for the subscription price and a high quality of it I mean I I love doing the shoot with you guys you guys made me feel like a movie star and then we got treated at that world before was a lot of fun production values are through the roof it's insane well thank you yeah and we were sure to have a YouTube playing whenever we we broke 43 pets just to keep the energy high you guys know I'm a big fan of YouTube yeah we did our research that's that's our job so I have another question that has to do with the current state of affairs and we aren't going to spend this entire conversation talking about it just because you know it it will pass as you've said but it is top of mind for a lot of people but um while we are on that topic I'd be curious to know what you how you might approach negotiating with somebody who for example is having a hard time convincing a loved one that I need to heed warnings to shelter in place for example how might you approach that yeah well I mean what's driving people to not to not want to stay sheltered in place I mean we have a fairly current term FOMO fear of missing out mmm that's not a new idea you know fear of loss fear of missing out he's been driving human behavior since we've been organized no Daniel Kahneman won the Nobel Prize in 2002 for prospect theory which is basically built around fear of loss things twice as much as an equivalent gain so how do you deal with that people don't want to stand because they're afraid they're missing out so we ask questions what and how questions not to get answers you know we call them calibrated questions principally what and how questions we ask them to trigger thought to trigger deep thinking that again the Daniel Kahneman will refer to so you know you ask somebody how long do you want to be laid up sick when you get sick how long do you want to be laid out what's it gonna cost you to get this let's say that you're even in an age group but that's calculated to survive you're just gonna get sick you're gonna get over it mm-hmm Alan how many of those symptoms do you want to flicked on yourself and you read people talking about losing their sense of taste and sense of smell for periods of time how long you want to go without your sense of taste you know lose questions and not to get an answer out of somebody it's to ask them and don't ask it in an accusatory fashion I'd probably even said it a little accusatory just now it would be more like how how long do you do you want to be sick you know that's deferential that's curious how long are you willing to be sick how much risk do you want to take in spreading it to you you'll survive but how how much do you want to risk your loved ones you know ask questions to get people to think about what they're doing and that's the design of those questions to what and now question mm-hmm yeah that makes makes a lot of sense and that was one of the things that I found I mean of the many things that I found that were so enlightening about your tactics was when I imagine myself on the receiving end I was like I hope you're right I would think entirely differently about that thing if somebody said like you're crazy what are you doing going outside like why are you putting people you know like in danger you know they stopped doing that thing like that just as the natural human condition and you're gonna be have your guard up and you're gonna be resistant to that yeah and you know if I could interrupt here real quick because you touched on in the inadvertent mistake that people gonna make a lot when you use in your example asking someone why are you doing that why always makes people feel accused it makes them feel defensive mm-hmm so you stopped asking people why yeah I mean she ain't nice to what instead of like why are you doing that even if you don't like it you're gonna say you know what's causing you to do that mm-hmm it takes this thing of accusation out of why and so be really careful about asking somebody why because the defensive nough said it's gonna trigger is probably gonna damage the interaction if not the relationship mm-hmm absolutely but when you're asking somebody like what you know what's it gonna take you know or those the how questions it really does it prompts introspection on their part yeah so that's it makes sense and your tactics proved effective in yet another context okay human interaction it only works where people are involved okay just then got it my other question that was that a lot of people were finding themselves in new dynamics a lot like parents that are now home at home with their kids 24/7 which I enjoy yeah there they are the other the hostages now and that's why I'd be curious to know what you think what advice you would have for those people that are now in a constant state of negotiation with their kids or loved ones than they you didn't used to be yeah you know a lot of it is kind of the same stuff that it's the interesting thing about this when we were talking about how human beings are wired this also includes pretty much anybody who's cognitive wiring is in place which is kind of from about age 3 on you know they're developing more and more cognitive abilities and even from the very beginning you know the neuroscience wiring is there you know I you know as an example I talk all the time about you got mirror neurons and in your in your head and you know if I smile if you can see me if you can hear me I can hit your mirror neuron so I can trigger reaction so if I smile at you you know you're gonna you're gonna hit I'll hit your mirror neurons and you'll start to smile and so one of my favorite neuroscience experiments you know I'll be sitting on a plane and be lady next to me with a baby you know I like all right so this kids supposed to have mirror neurons let me smile at this kid and see what see what happens so I'm you know I'm sitting there grinning at this infant you know giving them smiles and kids smiling right back and you know mom thinks I'm this great guy and a flight attendant thinks I missed one oh this guy is really nice you know he likes kids and I'm like the brain science experiment here just make sure yeah I'm conducting lab experiments mm-hmm but anyway get you know get back to your kids at home you know parents this is your opportunity again to shape your kids thinking I mean what and our questions are designed to shape thinking you know don't tell them stuff you don't ask them what are they trying to achieve make them think about what they're doing how is this affect what you want you know they they they don't want to eat they want to play with their iPad you know well so make the iPad make the evening the condition and get into the iPad how am I supposed to let you play with your iPad if you haven't finished your dinner mmm it doesn't matter what they answer them what matters is you made him think you're giving you your kids thought exercises mm-hmm you're helping preserve their autonomy you're helping them become better human beings and grow and their thinking processes I mean this is an opportunity to just take a little bit slower approach with your kids and actually get farther faster by taking the seemingly indirect approach yeah and the the preservation of the autonomy is another thing that I thought was was really fascinating and something that resonated for me as well thinking about it when I was like oh yeah when I'm when my autonomy when I feel it's in danger my guard goes up or you know and I'm yeah that in it so it's a being able to formulate your communication in a way that preserves that is so powerful yeah and it that's a human nature response to it I mean you're not doing that because your age your gender or your ethnicity mmm human wiring were wired for our autonomy you can't you can't point to a civilization in the history of mankind that was content being slaves you know and and we're broadcasting from a country that's founded on autonomy give me the liberty or give me death you know that's not an American response it's a human response people will die to preserve their autonomy and so in changing I guess like honestly accusations but directives into questions that's how that's one of the ways that we can help kind of navigate that and not butt up against people trying to preserve their own autonomy exactly yeah yeah good power what question is is is one one of the great ways to do that got it well cool well thank you I think there's gonna be a lot of questions flying around at homes later on today after people watch this and putting things to the test now and I you know it's tough it's tough so current to me I get it you know one of my favorite examples of a question you know because at the start of the book we I thought we talked about you know you learning to use a question how am I supposed to do that now he used and kidnapping negotiations and and I used it the examples of the start of the book is me negotiating it you know sort of a mock negotiation with Robert Newton who's a head of the program on negotiation or Harvard and bringing through I mean Robert moon who can do smart smart guy just like everybody else at Harvard clearly that's whether they're you know but I you know you hit him with how am I supposed to do that and this my kidnapping negotiation and he was he was flummoxed by it so everybody kind of learns that so I get an email a mom is negotiating with her 13 year old child 13 year old boy he wants mom to buy this video game pay pay for the whole thing he says mom misses a video game this is how much it costs I want you to buy and instead of just saying now she just said how am I supposed to do that it goes okay I'll pay half immediately he cuts his price by 50% and she says this is so cool I'm gonna keep saying how am I supposed to do that till I where am I and she asks him about four or five times and finally the kid goes mom are we really that poor I mean it just becomes completely worn out and exasperated and she's kind of you've got one of my back pocket yeah that's awesome well so shifting gears from you know the world that we find ourselves in like I said you know it is it will pass and so I'd love to take a little bit more of a positive lean for just the next few minutes and also for those of you who are just joining this is masterclass live we are here with Chris boss who is the former chief hostage and kidnapping negotiator for the FBI and he is also a master class instructor and he taught a class on the art of negotiation thank you for joining us yeah my pleasure and let me throw out just a little fine point you know I was a lead international kidnapping negotiator the guy that ran the unit while I was there was Gary ness there he was he was unit chief a bunch of his work for my my my thing was principally was international kidnappings and I learned a lot from Gary and I'm appreciative of everything that I learned from them gotcha thank you very much I appreciate that I've got a I'm gonna have a note for Wikipedia on the title yeah well Wikipedia right you know that yeah it's true is they do their best there but yeah well I know in my research I know that I have your full bio but I was like writing you know as I was writing up all my talking points I was did a quick check and I will be sending you know to Wikipedia but they would appreciate it thank you so I would love to just quickly talk meaning for like the next five or ten minutes about your experiences sense masterclass and what that's been like and I kind of I think like what's been your favorite part of having your class out in the world yeah you know the people that recognize me from master class are about learning you know and that's cool a Brit has brought me into contact with so many interesting people if they say hey I saw your master class you know interested people are interested these are interesting people they're interested in the world they want to learn you know they're worth having conversations with us if somebody's is taking master class yeah this is somebody that I'm gonna want to sit down and have a cup of coffee with have a meal with have a drink with that what whatever they're doing they're cool they're in the learning they're cool and I really enjoy that meeting more interesting people and that's been one of the really fun things about having it was awesome and have you have you learned anything about yourself or negotiation as a result of this process well yeah you know I I like to think of learning all the time so I gotta I gotta hand it to you guys though you know you tease the story out of me in at the end of the Masterclass know about when I get picked on as a kid that I hadn't discussed with anybody else before and the fact that that you know that was buried in there so deep and the effect that it had on me because I knew I hated bullies I just kind of forgotten why mm-hmm which is also giving me an opportunity to think a lot about that and think about how that's adjusted me and in how you know what's my best reaction to someone that I feel is harm to me in the past mm-hmm and you know it's sort of yeah I think it's really helped me in processing things like they get better as a human being so it was another aspect of it that I really enjoy and this is my shelter in place at work we have I think delivery a front door sorry about that but and so for those at home who might not have seen your class would you mind sharing that experience with them yeah well I get you know I get I get cornered by this guy as a kid two different times and it was the first time that I can ever remember being cornered by anybody and it was the most scared I was ever in my life and were the kids that were watching he was this big guy and you know it was a bully and and at the point in time that he was threatening me with you know I would I broken a law I was gonna go to prison I was gonna be a little executed you know putting these horrible images in my head simultaneously you know at that at that time you know back in the dark ages before the internet you know I grew up in a small Midwestern town and you know the the signal to come home was you know my mother she didn't you know they'd turn us loose on the neighborhood we were fine so she comes out of the front door and she blow a whistle and then come home and it was dinnertime and I remember hearing the whistle blow and a kid wouldn't let me go I was horrified I was horrified I didn't know how to deal with it I think I think a couple of other kids to that point in time at him let him go let him go and for whatever reason let me go and then he cornered me in the community pool a couple days later and started bullying me again I started to cry and I think when I was crying the you know they the lifeguard overheard what was going on and she blew the whistle at him said hey leave him alone and you know I'd forgotten about all that and so you know going back to it and thinking about it again in process again you know we learned and sometimes some of the stuff that we learned from our scars and we just assumed that had not have had those scars inflicted on us but it takes us to where we are so I'm happy with who I am today and I'm you know to heal you got to go from grief to gratitude and in a bizarre sort of way I'm actually grateful that stuff happened to me yeah well thank you again I mean for sharing it with us we were really happy that you felt comfortable enough to do that both in your class and here it's actually introduced a that about scars being a part of who we are because I have a tattoo on my arm that essentially it's Latin but it translates to scars are okay because they show that you've done stuff it's cool that's the sentiment behind the translation I'm gonna get out there in a world and get scarred up a little bit exactly but fortunately yeah um agreed well thank you on a lighter note for the next little bit I would love to have you answer some questions that were submitted by your master class students so these are PA hey be careful cuz you get ready to make me cry here you know there's no sign of baseball you can't make me cry on camera all right you got it so these we put out an alert just a little while ago to your students and letting them know that we're gonna be doing this master class live event with you and we the response was pretty overwhelming it's been really really exciting to see how many people were interested in following up with you and having this additional interaction with you and so unfortunately we can't there were so many that we can't answer all of them but we're excited to to do this and to have you share even more of your mastery with us in this way um yeah of course um so the first one that we're gonna ask is it's from Nikolas and he has a question about mirroring his question is um how do usually respond when a mirror goes nowhere sometimes on me or someone and they'll just say yes like didn't you hear me the first time and that's one of my biggest hurdles so as wondering could you one just give a kind of a quick Cliff Notes version of what the mirroring tactic is and how you might navigate this sort of a situation yeah the Marin tactic is just principally repeating the last 1 2 3 words of what somebody's just said this is completely separate from what we've learned in body language and body language mirroring is like if you put your hand to your chin your right hand to your chin then I put my right hand to my chin and I start to marry you and theoretically were in sync hostage negotiators when there is all about the words and it's 1 2 3 ish words principally the last 1 2 3 is words you might you might pick you know 1 2 3 from the middle of conversation interesting interesting thing about the last one of three words you know it's it's often when someone's trying to collect their thoughts at the end of the situation end of the sentence end of what they've just said and that's why it's such an opportune time to repeat those because it helps somebody sort of gather up their thoughts it connects thoughts they'll typically go on using different words they don't like like one of my favorites one of my favorite stories when my son married me my son bran is president my company runs our operations and phenomenal negotiator phenomenal and uncredited co-author of the book hmm so we're talking we're doing a training session and I asked him if he's got the notebooks ready and you know his picture in his head of the notebook he senses that he's seeing something that has had different than I am and so he says to me what do you mean by notebooks you know and I just react with you know like an American overseas I'm gonna say the same thing again only louder notebooks you know like that should by saying it louder the same way it it has more meaning and finally he just mares me and he goes no books and I go yeah three-ring binders was a completely different thing yeah so you know it helps people reward now to get to the question you know Nikolas Nikolas my first thought on that is your tone of voice you know you might be mirroring with a downward inflection and what's a downward inflection what I'm doing right now is a downward inflection your voice tails down at the end the first thing to do is marry with curiosity and I just hit you with the curious tone of voice and so mare was curiosity the last three words you know I can say the last three words but I were deflecting or I can say the last three words and those land completely differently the curious tone of voice genuine curiosity inquisitive is much more encouraging and your percentage chance of them going on instead of the one-word answer is much higher with the inquisitive curious tone of voice now should that fail you you know we teach people to shift to a label what's a label saying it seems like it sounds like it's look it looks like putting a label on an emotion or a dynamic so the dynamic in the moment is if someone gives you a one-word answer they're communicating to you that what they just said was blatantly obvious or maybe it seems like they're communicating to you they think you're thick or you're little slow to catch on mm-hmm I'd follow that mirror up if one would answer my first label might be sounds like you think this is so obvious that I'm just kind of thick from that catching on I might shift to the other companion skill to draw it out because if somebody gives me a one-word answer they're communicating either one or two things what they just said to them was so blatantly obvious that it needs no further explanation or principally they may also be communicating to you that they don't trust you yet and they're keeping the walls up mm-hmm so I might also say sounds like you just don't trust me yet or seems like kind of hard to earn your trust because when you do trust you trust completely and that's why you're keeping your guard up you know I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna tentatively gently sort of probe around the outside of this with mirrors and labels till I get past their guard and I reward them for dropping their guard by continuing to be very respectful and deferential so that they don't regret dropping their guy mm-hmm that's really that's really interesting and it was um I think you know when we were filming your class there was a we were talking about the importance of flexing these muscles of using these tactics a lot to get more comfortable with them and I think it is sometimes easy for I even for me to like lose sight of the fact that a lot of the tactics that you talk about are meant to be used in tandem right and so I'm not necessarily an isolation where you're like in this conversation I'm in a mirror of this person and just repeat you know look for probe for more information by repeating what they're saying you know that if you do meet a roadblock with one you can often pivot to another which is I just think it really makes them even more versatile so that's great yeah the mayor's in LA it was a great complementary and actually labels are great at complimenting all the other skills you know and when we were doing our in-person training we spent a lot of time on mirrors and labels just to build people's agility in a moment you get good at mirrors and labels your agility in a moment it's gonna be really high mm-hmm cool well I hope that answers Nicholas's question thank you the next one that we have is from angel and her question is what advice do you have for women when using the late night at them DJ voice when I try using this technique it feels like it sets the wrong tone so do you have any tips for specifically for female negotiators and if you don't mind it just to kick things off as for it like for those of my know what the what the late-night FM DJ voice is well a late-night FM DJ voice is what I'm doing now I mean it's it slows down its downward inflecting now you know because myself and most of my team are male not all of us for most of us you know we are we demonstrating and women will say alright oh well fine that's easy forgot to have a deep voice well it's not necessarily a deep voice it's really just downward inflecting and slowing down and you know the female hostage negotiators that we taught and fully half of the negotiators that we taught we were women and we're exceptionally good at it some of us actually believe that the women are better than the men mm-hmm you know they learned they learned it it takes some practice angel you probably thinking there's probably a bit of awkwardness in your head and you haven't practiced it enough so you need more small stakes practice for high stakes results you know with your Starbucks barista with your lyft driver with the waiter or the waitress in the restaurant your small stakes practice in you can do the late-night FM DJ voice just slow down and download and flex your voices just got a drop at the end it's a little more the Clara t'v so you think gentle you know your inner voice betrays your outer voice you want to be thinking gentle slow and easy inside in your head and it'll come out more in your voice and then experiment in different circumstances to learn that improves design figure out when you want to use it but the only way you're gonna figure out whether or not it sets the right tone is by test driving it in as many small stakes conversations as you possibly can and if you feel like it's at the wrong tone then just be prepared to smile right afterwards and and so what is the the objective of the late-night FM DJ voice like I so I know that it slows things down but what is what is its other utility well ejective great question first of all I'm hitting your mirror I'm actually slowing your brain down I mean it's a neuro chemical reaction we learned it in hostage negotiation we thought it calmed people then it does as a secondary benefit because their brain slows down so what it does is it tends to calm emotions mm-hmm it also tends to make the other side feel very sure about what you're saying and so we use it occasionally occasionally in business negotiations now if I get a term that I'm just not gonna move on the term like if I got to say no to you with the late-night FM DJ voice I'm not gonna say no I'm gonna say adjust doesn't work you're gonna feel it there's no movement on that time mm-hmm and you're not gonna be a feel attacked by it simultaneously you're not gonna feel cornered my objective is to show no movement no flexibility without it being offensive without you feeling attacked without you reacting negatively mm-hmm so while it was a default voice for the hostage negotiator in business negotiations overall it should be used about 15 to 20 percent of the time max interestingly enough to put up on the circumstances for example real estate negotiations every conversation in a buying and selling of a home when hopes and dreams for the future on the line every conversation is a difficult conversation agent to agent conversations are difficult conversations it really should be the default invoice in negotiation such as real estate buying and selling homes where all the conversations are difficult conversations the late night FM DJ both should be a default tone of voice as opposed to you know your desire for it to be happy circumstance when you close it'll be happy and you know a lot of real estate agents want to be happy and perky all the time well it's kind of productive until you calm people down and people got it there's a lot of stress in real estate I mean there's no shortage of surveys that say it's one of the five most stressful events in anybody's life so a little more late-night FM DJ voice and in those types of arenas wonderful thank you very much so our next question is from Andrea and she said I just started my role as a Key Account Manager but due to the coronavirus I'm unable to travel and develop relationships both internally and externally which my job is highly dependent upon what do you recommend and I think this is a it's a certainly applicable now but I units it's broadly applicable even in times where we're not dealing with what we're dealing with where people need to try and develop these relationships but not might not have the avenues that they're looking for yeah well I'm here's your opportunity you get to get better at telephone calls and emails but how do you get better at telephone calls and emails first of all your your being forced to go email again you got to cut your emails down write shorter emails not longer I mean you hate reading long emails and you probably write them so you're trying to get a lot done in an email get less done in your emails the last impression is that the lasting impression you know we call that in my company we call that the Oprah rule you know because Oprah and her people live by that you know I and friend of mine Cindy Maury he's been Oprah's book her forever Cindy's a wonderful person and she said you know their internal philosophy often in the entertainment world they say it's in a limo on a taxi but with Oprah and her people it's in a limo on a limo you know they realize how you're treated at the end is extremely important they determined that whatever your experience has been with them and their production company in whatever fashion you're gonna feel like you've been treated well from beginning to end now back in about 2008 I run across some Gallup poll data is shared with me that human beings we don't remember things how they happen we don't remember I'm chronologically movement we remember the most intense moment and how they ended my best impression is the lasting impression what does that mean what that means in your phone calls and in your emails first of all make them shorter secondly you know whatever Rosie language positive first impression you're gonna try to make at a bare minimum be determined to repeat that at the end mm-hmm you know whoever you're talking to you might start out by saying like hey you know what we look for the product of long-term relationship we want to be partners with you for the next 30 years mm-hmm make sure you say it at the end the last impression is a lasting impression just because you said it at the beginning the first impression is immediately wiped away by all subsequent impressions mm-hmm the last impression is a lasting impression in your phone calls and in your emails make that pot those positive greetings at a bare minimum repeated at the end now the other thing I do on those phone calls and emails there's a cold call of people instead of starting out by saying like hey I love you you wonderful start out with a little bit of an accusation so know what's going through their mind what's going through their mind is they're probably wondering why they took the phone call so start out by saying like you know right now you're probably wondering why you took this phone call you know right now even though you're at home your busiest attack you're overwhelmed by the circumstances and you're really worried about how long this phone call is gonna take start articulating what's going through their mind as they're starting the phone conversation or as they're reading the email mm-hmm you know the CEO of node found that for the timing excuse me they got they changed the beginning of their emails by starting out in recruiting programmers in Silicon Valley by saying what the guy is gonna be looked thinking if you open the email mm-hmm and because they're open rates because programmers are in ridiculously high demand they're the rock stars in Silicon Valley you know they're the divas everybody wants so they change their emails to right now you're probably asking yourself why you're reading this email which is what somebody's gonna be thinking in their open rate and they're read rate went through the roof so start out your emails and your phone calls articulating what you know is going through their mind and you're gonna find and don't deny it just just say it that's the massive two millimeter shift from the denial to simply saying and you're gonna find that your your phone calls while you're stuck at home your phone calls in your emails are gonna be far more effective got it yeah so so accusation taught up up audit up front and then great lasting impression at the end to kind of make those more either justice to optimize that the communication when you are able to have it that's right look what you just did you get a that's right out of me yeah yeah pat on the back so the next question that we have is from Dmitry and his question is in business negotiations have you ever encountered somebody who knows your tactics how do you go about the situation when somebody says I know what you're doing you're now all the time I mean first of all we use it's not whether or not somebody's using a tactic his tactics it's why they're using them mm-hmm we use them on each other in a company all the time like I nobody's tried to get me to say yes inside of my company like five thousand years because yes there's a horrible response everybody says are you against you disagree would it be a bad idea you know we're driving for no all the time because it preserves people's a time now if somebody says I know what you're doing easing Yoshii ation techniques on me you know mance is probably gonna be sounds like you don't trust me because if I'm using those tactics on me on you you're you're afraid you're worried that that yeah I'm not in a position why I've earned your trust yet you know one of my favorite stories because I've always been into labeling I started this back in nineteen Andes you know when I volunteered on a suicide hotline again before the internet the dark ages before cell phones and so I've been a fan of this stuff all the time so flash forward to about 2006 I'm still in the FBI I'm talking to other hostage negotiators and we're having a disagreement I said one of my buddies a negotiator I said you know it sounds like this is really important to you because don't do that stuff to me don't you dare use that hostage no don't use that on me and I just hesitated for a second I said sounds like that bothers you it would yeah you don't really does so you know just just be authentic you don't try to take advantage of people and if somebody's got their guard up they're telling you that their guard is up and that you haven't earned their trust yet and continue to be deferential and gentle and and as long as you're not trying to cheat them then it's okay if you're trying to cheat them you know use your prize for good and not evil and I can sniff pretty fast when somebody's trying to cheat me and they'll use my tactics on me and I'll say have you given up on giving us a 50% discount on your training my answer then will be yes and it's I think I think if the people the intent you know is really is an important thing and also because if people have you know taken your class or or read your book and taking it to heart you know they'd know that you're your objective is negotiating to a better outcome not win lose like I'm taking everything therefore you're getting nothing great long-term relationships great long-term relationships we will prosper together and in 20 years when we talk about it let's say why the last 20 years were awesome thank God we were partners that's you know a core value that that I operate on everybody my company operates on wonderful well thank you for that so here's a question it's from Teresa and she says um how would you advise job seekers to respond to what are your salary expectations this is hands-down the most challenging question for us even though employers are not technically allowed to ask for it it's still prompts you to reveal it yours yeah well you know you can you can reveal it but say you know I'd be happy to share that with you but let's let's pick let's pivot to the side for a moment because you know regardless of the salary regardless you know they can pay you if a lot for a job that you're miserable and that's blood money you know salary is a ton mm-hmm salary pays your bills it doesn't guarantee your success set the salary off to the side for a second and say you know what does it take to be successful here find out if there's a fit look this is as much of an audition for them as it is for you you don't want to take the wrong job just like you don't want to be in the wrong relationship you can always get back to salary you can always ask that question you can always come back and tease it out I guarantee you there's a couple things on the other side they got a range in mind number one they are restricted to some degree also they may not be able to pay what the market bears but the upside for the job might be worth well in excess of what the market bears I mean I would go I'd work for minimum wage for Warren Buffett you know who's gonna are you gonna be around what are you gonna get get the chance to do I work from a minimum wage tree LAN musk I get Elon Musk coffee if I can hang out with them and learn from them so what are the other things involved how much is the job gonna grow you all right so now let's say you all these things have been passed and you want to get back to Sally my first response is you know sounds like you guys probably already have a range in mind I'm gonna tease out from them I'm gonna do everything I can to tease out the salary you know if I'm not willing to settle for like my previous job and they're not supposed to to ask you what you made in your previous job anyway mm-hmm but I can say look I can tell you what I made in my previous job that you're determined to know that and I can also tell you that I'm not gonna accept that here so that's gonna impact your decision-making on this then I'll tell you but it's you know it's it's a it's a non-starter from the beginning a lot of things that have to be talked around talked about around salary that you can do respectfully mm-hmm and if they what if they won't let you do it I'm here to tell you that is not the job for you you know I'm gonna be your dad here for a second should you be in an abusive relationship personally now should you be in an abusive relationship professionally no if they won't let you explore around that and they're determined that you have to give a number I'm here to tell you not only is it a bad job for you but that company is going the way of the dodo they're gonna go out of business your experience there is not going to be valuable your time there's gonna be wasted there's a reason why at least 40% of the fortune 500 is going to be gone in ten years because there are a lot of poor business practices out there you don't want to work that don't Lee self to be a hostage to bad mm-hmm and that's yeah that's really really valuable insight and I love also what you were saying about ways to pivot because it's there are ways that you can come to tease it out without having to answer that question well they shouldn't be asking it in the first place but they're always being kind of turn it back around on them you know like it sounds like you guys already have a range in mind or it sounds like like I can tell you but I can tell you that it's kind of irrelevant because it's I'm not going to accept it here um that's really that's great I'm gonna be doing that my next salary negotiation which okay cuz I'll get it yeah well you know you're in a great place but I got to tell you what you know my company we're looking to hire people I need to know what you're gonna be comfortable with like I'll need to explore both previous compensation you had because I know that previous compensation I've got to do that I've got to do better than that because you got to pay your bills and if for some reason we settle on a number that's lower than what you've been making I've just cheated you and I've put you in a position where you're gonna be anxious in a job you're not gonna be successful so I'm looking to hit a range where you feel like you're being really well-paid and that there's tremendous upside like my company pays bonuses you know we love we love a base plus bonus mm-hmm you know I need to make sure that you could pay your bills and then I'm gonna share the upside with you but I'm also gonna want to make sure that you're comfortable with that because there's a certain amount of uncertainty in bonuses you don't know how much you're gonna get and I got to feel you out for how comfortable you are with the uncertainty factor would you rather have a fixed number that overall is gonna be less than what you might have gotten with bonuses but you don't want to worry about what you got I mean when I was with the FBI it was a good salary it wasn't a great salary but I never had to think about how much was coming in the door which led left me free to Excel you know in the compensation package of my company we want to tailor to you as much as we possibly can because I need to make you successful and if I don't make you successful I failed you mmm-hmm thank you understood hopefully Teresa can put that to work so for our last question it comes from Ali Risa and her question is so I really enjoyed my experience in your class my favorite movie and negotiation is Dog Day Afternoon excellent what movie would you recommend and is your favorite to allow me to improve my negotiation skills oh wow all right so well don't Day Afternoon was yeah it was a great film certainly interesting based on a true story actually came out well you know the guy who was the bank robber and dog day was still in jail which was a crazy crazy thing mm-hmm so improving your negotiation skills at you know in general overall like I want shark tank for you know as opposed to movies and I like watching the interaction Lord Grenier it's got a great tone of voice I mean she got a phenomenal voice I mean she has mastered both the downward inflecting and smiling tone of voice simultaneously he's ridiculously powerful I like watching more Cuban in that Mark Cuban who's sink comes across as you know a tough hard-nosed negotiator actually he's constantly testing people mm-hmm you know and then for him the negotiation is a testing process Cuban realizes that if he does business with you that ultimately you're gonna have to be his ambassador and you he doesn't want business partners that can either be pushed around who don't think on their feet or who are rude mm-hmm and Cubans not a bully at all he's testing people in the negotiations and you watch people who can push back on him politely and he kind of goes like ow cool he wants to do business for those people so you know I take out of movies and I put you in one of the shows that I watch for real life skills and I and I and I really like watching the shark tech interactions a lot mmm that's awesome I'm gonna go I gotta go do that too well thank you Chris that wraps up our time I want to again say thank you for for coming I would with us for our first ever masterclass live I'm psyched that you got to be our inaugural instructor ah this this was an honor I mean what you guys are doing you literally making the world a better place you're putting on some ridiculous quality instruction you're putting on entertaining instruction I mean the idea that the Chris Wallace is on the same platform as Martin Scorsese is just insane to me that's the sign of the Apocalypse but the fact that you guys got him and Gordon Ramsay and Steve Martin yeah everyone Howard you know the other superstars brilliant minds I mean I love what master class is doing I mean I'm enormously grateful to be part of it thank you and and on that note with the master class live sessions that we're going to be doing in the future they are going to become a regular thing for us and for the time being in front of the paywall so not exclusive to subscribers just because of the way that things are right now it's something that we want to make available to everyone but again Chris thank you so much I will leave it at that I hope everybody had as much fun as I did I did ha take care of your buddy yeah

Channel: MasterClass

Views: 179,502

Rating: 4.9153237 out of 5

Keywords: masterclass, master class, masterclass live, masterclasslive, chris voss, negotiation

Id: 18Dv4nW9veU

Length: 55min 7sec (3307 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 01 2020