The Power of Emotional Intelligence in Negotiation with Former FBI Lead International Kidnapping Negotiator Chris Voss

Transcript:

Alan Olsen

Hi, this is Alan Olsen and welcome to American Dreams. My guest today is Chris Voss, Chris welcome to today’s show.

Chris Voss

Alan Thank you very much happy to be here.

Alan Olsen

Chris You have an amazing background and you know for the listeners can you walk us through your how you got your path of how you got to where you are today?

Chris Voss

That’s the Securitor’s route man you never know but small town boy from Iowa. COP in Kansas City, FBI agent, FBI, New York City joint terrorist Task Force, came a hostage negotiator with the FBI. Loved the work, loved it loved it. I was on SWAT before I was a negotiator. I thought SWAT was fun negotiation and and I’ve been so much more aligned with who I am. After SWAT wasn’t just negotiation was more, you know, crisis response, using words to make a difference, right.

And it was just emotional intelligence became the FBI, lead international kidnapping negotiator. work with great guys, Ray boss’s former boss Gary Nestor. I started applying it to business and personal negotiations while still with the Bureau went to Harvard Law School’s negotiation course talk my way into that. And they were great and supportive and ended up writing a book about applying the principles of hostage negotiation.

To business and everyday life never split the difference. And it’s led it’s category number one, the business negotiation sector on Amazon for seven ish years.

Alan Olsen

So Chris, there is a point of time when most people don’t say, I’m going to work for the FBI and be the hostage negotiator. Okay. To a list delve into that. How did you transition to going from the position you were hired in port to this lead negotiator?

Chris Voss

Well, you know, I mean, some of the best things that happen to me has came as a result of bad stuff. Like I always wanted to be a law enforcement since my mid teens. And I always imagined myself being part of the SWAT team. And I’m kind of a medium size guy. So college I’m like, How do I how do I add to my skill, set martial arts, take martial arts, and tore my knee apart in martial arts. And that eventually, is what really took me out of Swat. I was on the FBI SWAT team in Pittsburgh, rage of money again, and love crisis response.

And we had hostage negotiators, and I’m a sort of human being I like it when decisions are made. I’m a very decision time oriented human. And in crisis response, you got to make decisions. You can’t. Let’s think about it for 24 hours, you can’t do that. You got to make up your mind. So we had a hostage negotiators. I didn’t know what they did. Other than talk, I figured it couldn’t be that hard. How hard could it be? I mean, literally, I remember thinking I talk every day I could talk terrorists.

And, you know, a soft skill that people make look easy, is always more complicated and more in depth than anybody realizes. And when I got into it, I loved that. I mean, the idea that he would use words and what we now refer to as emotional intelligence, which is ridiculously powerful. I mean, sometimes it’s like putting a magic spell on somebody. Just create a bond with oxytocin, the feeling of being understood.

We got one of our clients, we had an our high level coaching group we had in Las Vegas the other day, said, released the drugstore in their brain, like neuro chemicals affect people’s decision making in a very positive way. And just kind of got into it. And me being fascinated with it. I mean, I hope you see now that I’m just fascinated by this stuff. is really what put me on this track and why I rose through the ranks to become more number one guy and international kidnap because I loved it. I was fascinated by it.

Alan Olsen

So give me give me a couple. Are you able to give me a couple stories you don’t need the name the names but some of the some of the tough moments of going through negotiations

Chris Voss

with us get in there bad. One of the things that my my bosses, when I became a hostage negotiator tried to impress on me is you know, hostage negotiators have roughly a 93% success rate, which means 7% of the time, not quite one in turn. It’s gonna go bad. And, you know, your batting average is really high when you start out and you get a little overconfident. You know, everything you touch you think, just based on the numbers, turns out good. And the first time I had one go bad, which was two kidnappings around the Philippines.

One was a spectacular success, followed by one that just was a massive train wreck and people get chilled. And I can remember my boss Gary Nestor, telling me we had the best chance of success. which is what I tell people now in business negotiations best chance of success is no guarantee. Sometimes it’s gonna go bad. And you have to realize that sometimes things are out of your control and you’re not going to make every deal and your, your real job is to spot the deals that you’re never gonna make early on.

That’s occation kidnapping and hostage negotiation. So sometimes it’s gotta go back.

Alan Olsen

Chris, can you tell us a little bit about your experience at Harvard working with and educating professors, they’re

Chris Voss

always mutual education. The the academics, they bring a lot to the table, the very smart people. And when I first got up there, you know, they wouldn’t test me out, see what I was about, understand whether or not ahead any game. And it’s one of the stories in a book. It’s what we start out with in the book on one of their top guys wanted to put me through a simulation and a slight a, you know, imagine you’re in a kidnapping, and we got your son, and I want a million dollars before buy son buys sunrise, tomorrow million dollars, by tomorrow, your son dies.

And they expected, you know, they’re used to academic approaches and eloquence, and reason and intellect. And he said, I’m gonna kill your son, you know, if I don’t get a million dollars, and I just said, how, how am I supposed to do that? And he just kind of blinked a couple times and said, No, no, you don’t understand where you know, we’re gonna kill you a sign of if we don’t get a million dollars by tomorrow morning. I just How am I supposed to do that? I mean, how do I know you’re gonna let him go?

I want how much he wants to pay? I don’t know. You gotta let him go. Just real gently like that. That a great how question is perplexing. When somebody is ready for it. I learned it from a drug dealer in Pittsburgh. That’s where I picked it up, you know, good. Good street level nuts and bolts, negotiator blue collar drug dealers, or blue collars. That’s where I picked that up. And it’s it’s not academic, and it’s ridiculously effective.

Alan Olsen

You know, the, it’s, it’s interesting that the introducing the human element into it and getting them to think it through. Yeah, I can see how, how that would be effective.

Chris Voss

Yeah, and you nailed it exactly. You know, how do you introduce a human element and get somebody to think it through no matter who is on the other side of the table? Because, you know, the entity on the other side of the table is still a human brain.

Alan Olsen

Let’s jump into your organization, the Black Swan group. And how did that how did that come about? Black Swans?

Chris Voss

Yeah. In about 2007, which is when I rotated out of the FBI, you know, they released me into the wild. I came across a book by Nassim Nicholas Taleb called The Black Swan. And he’s written a series of books, and I’m a huge fan of his thinking. Anti fragile is another one that I love. I mean, you’re not going to pick up a book by talent that you’re not going to get something out. And a friend of mine introduced me to it and Taleb had come across a black swan as a metaphor for the impact of the highly improbable.

You know, back in 16th century Europe. They thought it was impossible to have a black swan there were all black, white swans, and then they stumbled over black swans in Australia there was like, wow, this is this is crazy. This is different. And that’s where he picked up the metaphor and I loved that I thought it was brilliant that he picked it up the impact of the highly improbable and great negotiation is subtle. Nobody on the other side really feels the difference. And it makes all the difference in the world.

And I thought it was a beautiful metaphor for both business negotiation and business negotiators. They’re really good at it subtle, you know, not not pound you over the head with demand table partners chair kickers, that isn’t any good. That’s bad business long term. How do you do the little things that make all the difference in the world? And that’s why I decided to name the company the black swan group.

Alan Olsen

So typical client who’s your target here for the people that use your negotiating tactics,

Chris Voss

you’re the entrepreneur, the curious, ambitious person there I’ve got I’ve also got a masterclass our partnership of masterclass is phenomenal my negotiation course on masterclass. I’m very proud to say it’s I think their top selling course and then we’ve been prouder to say that it’s huge with with I love helping people get some more negotiation women have a tendency of pickup emotional intelligence based negotiation faster than men.

They’re not any better at it at the top performance level but they pick it up faster and it just it’s a it’s an effective approach and a badly so much I forgot I forgot

Alan Olsen

No No well yeah let me let me rephrase this you know where can business professionals best use your negotiating skills?

Chris Voss

Yeah what what got me off on the tangent to masterclass masterclass says that their ideal client is a curious ambitious 30 Something the cat, someone who’s probably and this is not confirmed, but when you hit your early 30s, you really start to catch your stride, you got enough experience under your belt, from your mid 20s on that you’re beginning to filter it in the ambitious person, by definition likes innovative stop, the ambitious person’s a little rest. They like to work they they want to work hard, and they love innovation.

And this is still as long as a book has been a still a very innovative approach. So if you’re curious and you’re innovative, and you realize that you need to study, which mostly defines the entrepreneurial mindset. Now, there are a lot of entrepreneurial people in corporations. A lot of corporate types of corporations who are not ambitious, and curious, in entrepreneurial. But if our the person who resonates most with this is curious and ambitious, they like new innovative stuff. They like outperforming people.

They like bucking trends. I’ve been listening to a number of interviews, that ARIA manual of endeavor and William Morris has given recently, I’m studying the guy for a variety of reasons. And he talks about his success and bucking trips, you know, being curious, working hard. But he looked the curiosity shows up over and over and over again. So you got to be curious, you got to be innovative, you got to be ambitious.

Alan Olsen

Now, Chris, can you tell us a little bit about your new book, The full fee agent,

Chris Voss

that well you know, I came across, or this guy came across me Steve Shull coaching real estate agents in California of former former NFL player. And Steve was always touched by the coaches that made him better. And he was a very coachable dude. So he decides through his Securitas route through live post NFL, to start coaching real estate agents in the you know, fighting grind. I mean, really work hard knock on doors, make all those calls, and very successful at with an incredible work ethic. And Steve says he ran across my book.

And he knew that emotional intelligence was the algorithm he was looking to unlock and started reached out to me and my son Brandon said, Let’s collaborate. And so we’ve been coaching real estate agents successfully for probably for six years, making their lives easier getting them out of the 24/7 Grind, helping them enjoy life. And finally, Steve, you know, we said let’s put out a book and the full fee agent. We put that out last November. Like every real estate agent, a good real estate agent is incredible bargain.

Maybe the best bargain or planet or 6% is not. They should never discount their feets, you know, finders fees in business is 10%. And a great real estate agent does at least that much work. So how do we apply the motional intelligence of the Black Swan method to real estate and that’s what that book is about. The people that are that are reading and learning the principles are making more money and have more time and are happier. That’s the key you are much happier. You’ll

Alan Olsen

give me a couple of examples of negotiating tools that you use you you use that of emotional intelligence, but can you kind of walk us through?

Chris Voss

Yeah, well, you know, Allah, let me ask you a question. Why in God’s name Am I on your podcast? I mean, I’ve you could talk to a lot of people. Why are you talking to me?

Alan Olsen

Well, because we’re outlining your pathway in life, how you got to where you are today. And you know, you have a unique set of skills that you know, you give back to the lives of others. So we’re, you know, you’re we’re listening to your story

Chris Voss

after a lot of other people that could tell you I mean, why me?

Alan Olsen

Well, because you’re, you know, you are unique to yourself. There’s no other individual like you Chris, and in the fact that you’ve been coming influencer, teaching master classes and walk threw, you know, in front of a lot of people in front of the stage, putting out books, obviously, you’ve learned something that you have to share with the world. I saw

Chris Voss

just black swan J, I just voice you a little bit. And I really broke. I’m going to put a modification on the Simon Sinek rule, you know, because Simon Simon wrote a book, by the way. One of the emotional intelligence approaches is a wise and accusatory work, why creates defense? And while you want to find out there, why the motivation, what spurs? What gets him out of bed in the morning? What are they wrestling with late at night?

To ask somebody why Chris defensiveness, so if I were to say, Alan, like, why’d you wear that shirt? You’d immediately feel defense? Like, which one will my shirt? If I switched it to? What made you wear that shirt? Now that takes a little bit of the sting of accusation off at switching from white to what? And then if I take it to the next level, that a black swan method, I’d say now it seems like there’s a reason you wear that shirt. And you feel good about that you’d be drawn toward you want to answer. Now what I did a second ago, though, I said, Why me?

That what I did was that tiny little tweak on why the defensiveness? Was you defending me? From me? And you start to outline the reasons why a collaboration between the two of us would be great. And that’s one of the critical issues on the black swan method. And what we taught real estate agents, because real estate agents are used for free consulting, and due diligence constant constantly, as are almost all business people out there. And if I said to you how and why me and you’d go on, like, well, that’s up to you. You got to sell me.

I am now in a position where we’re across the table from each other on a business deal. You’re using me for free consulting for due diligence. You got somebody else you’d rather go with you just double checking to make sure they you know, as much as you can, you’re using me for research due diligence, and you’re not going to close a deal with. And so that’s one of the things that we’ve learned in a black swan method I learned as a hostage negotiator, like global. I’ve negotiated literally in every culture on earth. And why globally, triggers an angry defensive response.

And people unless you do the surgical strike on the defensiveness of why should we do this? Now I have an understanding of what’s in your head moving forward, what your motivations are. And if you throw it back on me and we do this all the time, people called Black Swan group for negotiation training. And I’ll say, you know, why a Black Swan? And if they, they, if they respond with Well, that’s up to you, that’s your job to teach us. I’ll be like, okay, so you’re using me for due diligence.

You got a training provider that you really like, you just want to find out what is in a black swan method that you want your trainers who you already employed to teach. And it’s a it’s a it’s a nuanced approach to emotional intelligence in a way that doesn’t destroy relationships.

Alan Olsen

Thank you. You know, I just curious in your negotiation, obviously when journalists that’s a superpower All right. There you go. So these people that grab hostages and say the price is a million dollars, but they really haven’t thought anything through. When you use the technique of why do you often get blank stares of will? Can’t you give me the million dollars or you know in?

Chris Voss

Well, alright, so for talking kidnapping. So they’ve actually thought it and because human beings always do big fan Andrew Huber mineral water this podcast, he was talking about how we think of things and I would give it the acronym DPO duration, path and outcome. I don’t remember what the specific topic was, but the neuroscience that is their duration, path and outcome. Where do I want to be? How do I want to get there? How long is it going to take? Kidnapping is a business and that’s what I was taught from the very beginning.

They’re going to have an initial demand in mind they’re going to have a percentage they’re going to expect to settle on. They’re going to know how long they want it to take duration pay At an ACO because there’s you. And so when they make the initial demand, they want they’re, they’re using my reaction as a diagnosis for how much money’s there. And then they’re going to have to be put through a process. So they feel like they’ve gotten a good deal is all human beings do. And when they feel like they’ve worked really hard, they’ll settle.

And kidnappers globally are really good at figuring out how much money you have. And taking what you have, they could ask for a million, you got a million, they’re gonna get it. If they ask for a million and you get $5,764 they can’t they’re gonna take that because they’re they’re good at diagnosing how much you have. And that’s what the whole negotiation bargaining process is for them. It’s a diagnosis of information based on your reactions.

Alan Olsen

Well, Chris, it’s been an honor having you on the show today. And you know, that the full fee agent to where can people find that

Chris Voss

Find on Amazon, and we just got the audible of it’s read by my my, my colleague, Steve Shaw. So get it on Amazon. Amazon always says the best prices the best distribution. That’s what Amazon is about. So yeah, pick it up on Amazon. Thank you very much. I appreciate that.

 

 

Curtesy of Alan Olsen’s

Sponsored by: