Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone
256
Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone
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Overview
Getting through to someone is a critical, fine art. Whether you are dealing with a harried colleague, a stressed-out client, or an insecure spouse, things will go from bad to worse if you can't break through emotional barricades and get your message thoroughly communicated and registered.
Drawing on his experience as a psychiatrist, business consultant, and coach, author Mark Goulston combines his background with the latest scientific research to help you turn the “impossible” and “unreachable” people in their lives into allies, devoted customers, loyal colleagues, and lifetime friends.
In Just Listen, Goulston provides simple yet powerful techniques you can use to really get through to people including how to:
- make a powerful and positive first impression;
- listen effectively;
- make even a total stranger (potential client) feel understood;
- talk an angry or aggressive person away from an instinctual, unproductive reaction and toward a more rational mindset;
- and achieve buy-in--the linchpin of all persuasion, negotiation, and sales.
Whether they're coworkers, friends, strangers, or enemies, the first make-or-break step in persuading anyone to do anything is getting them to hear you out. The invaluable principles in Just Listen will get you through that first tough step with anyone.
With this groundbreaking book, you will be able to master the fine but critical art of effective communication.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780814436486 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | AMACOM |
| Publication date: | 03/04/2015 |
| Sold by: | HarperCollins Publishing |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 256 |
| Sales rank: | 146,916 |
| File size: | 643 KB |
About the Author
Mark Goulston, MD, FAPA is a board-certified psychiatrist, fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, former assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at UCLA NPI, and a former FBI and police hostage negotiation trainer. He is the creator of Theory Y Executive Coaching—which he provides to CEOs, presidents, founders, and entrepreneurs—and is a TEDx and international keynote speaker. He is the creator and developer of Surgical Empathy, a process to help people recover and heal from PTSD, prevent suicide in teenagers and young adults, and help organizations overcome implicit bias. Dr. Goulston is the author or principal author of seven prior books, including Why Cope When you Can Heal: How Healthcare Heroes of COVID-19 Can Recover from PTSD, PTSD for Dummies, Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone, Real Influence: Persuade Without Pushing and Gain Without Giving In, and Talking to Crazy: How to Deal with the Irrational and Impossible People in Your Life. He hosts the My Wakeup Call podcast, where he speaks with influencers about their purpose in life and the wakeup calls that led them there. He also is the co-creator and moderator of the multi-honored documentary Stay Alive: An Intimate Conversation About Suicide Prevention.
He appears frequently as a human psychology and behavior subject-area expert across all media, including news outlets ABC, NBC, CBS, and BBC News, as well as CNN, Today, Oprah, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Fortune, Harvard Business Review, Business Insider, Fast Company, Huffington Post, and Westwood One.
Read an Excerpt
Just Listen
Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone
By Mark Goulston
AMACOM
Copyright © 2010 Mark GoulstonAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8144-3648-6
CHAPTER 1
Who's Holding You Hostage?
Good management is the art of making problems so interesting and their solutions so constructive that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them. —PAUL HAWKEN, AUTHOR, NATURAL CAPITALISM
Right now, there's someone in your life you need to reach. But you can't, and it's driving you crazy. Maybe it's somebody at work: a subordinate, a team member, a client, your boss. Or maybe it's somebody at home: a partner, a parent, a defiant teen, an angry "ex."
You've tried everything—logic, persuasion, forcefulness, pleading, anger—but you've hit a wall every time. You're mad, scared, or frustrated. And you're thinking, "What now?"
Here's what I want you to do: Think of this as a hostage situation. Why? Because you can't get free. You're trapped by another person's resistance, fear, hostility, apathy, stubbornness, self-centeredness, or neediness—and by your own inability to take effective action.
And that's where I come in.
I'm just an average guy—husband, father, doctor—but a long time ago, I discovered that I had a special talent. You could drop me into just about any situation, and I could reach people. I could persuade defiant executives, angry employees, or self-destructing management teams to work cooperatively toward solutions. I could get through to families in turmoil and to married couples who hated each other's guts. I could even change the minds of hostage takers and desperate people contemplating suicide.
I wasn't sure what I was doing differently from everybody else, but I could tell it worked. I knew I wasn't smarter than everybody else, and I knew my success wasn't just luck because what I did worked consistently, and it worked with all kinds of people in every type of situation. But why did it work?
In analyzing my methods, I found the answer. It turned out I'd happened on a simple, quick set of techniques—some I'd discovered on my own, and others I'd learned from mentors and colleagues—that create traction. That is, they pull people toward me, even if those people are trying to pull away.
To understand this, picture yourself driving up a steep hill. Your tires slip and slide and can't grab hold. But downshift, and you get control. It's like pulling the road to meet you.
Most people upshift when they want to get through to other people. They persuade. They encourage. They argue. They push. And in the process, they create resistance. When you use the techniques I offer, you'll do exactly the opposite—you'll listen, ask, mirror, and reflect back to people what you've heard. When you do, they will feel seen, understood, and felt—and that unexpected downshift will draw them to you.
The powerful techniques you'll learn in this book can move people rapidly and easily, often within minutes, from "no" to "yes." I employ them every day to fix broken families and help warring couples fall in love again. I use them to save companies on the brink of meltdown, get feuding managers to work together effectively, and empower salespeople to make "impossible" sales. And I use them to help FBI agents and hostage negotiators succeed in the toughest situations possible, when life and death are on the line.
In fact, as you'll find out, you have a lot in common with hostage negotiators when it comes to reaching the people who don't want to listen to you. That's why this book starts with Frank's story.
* The Persuasion Cycle
You probably don't find yourself in the types of situations that hostage negotiators handle. But on any given day, who are you trying to persuade to do something?
The answer is: nearly everybody you meet. Almost all communication is an effort to get through to people and cause them to do something different than they were doing before. Maybe you're trying to sell them something. Maybe you're trying to talk sense into them. Or maybe you need to impress them that you're the right person for a job, a promotion, or a relationship.
But here's the challenge: People have their own needs, desires, and agendas. They have secrets they're hiding from you. And they're stressed, busy, and often feeling like they're in over their heads. To cope with their stress and insecurity, they throw up mental barricades that make it difficult to reach them even if they share your goals, and nearly impossible if they're hostile.
Approach these people armed solely with reason and facts, or resort to arguing or encouraging or pleading, and you'll expect to get through—but often you won't. Instead, you'll get smacked down, and you'll never have a clue why. (How often have you walked away from a sales pitch, an office meeting, or an argument with your partner or child, shaking your head and saying, "What the heck just happened?")
The good news is that you can get through, simply by changing your approach. The techniques I describe in this book work for hostage negotiators in the most desperate situations, and they're equally potent if you're trying to reach a boss, a coworker, a client, a lover, or even an angry teenager. They're easy, they're fast, and you can hit the ground running with them.
These techniques are powerful because they address the core of successful communication: what I call the "Persuasion Cycle" (see Figure 1-1). In developing the Persuasion Cycle, I was inspired by the ground-breaking work and ideas of James Prochaska and Carlo DiClemente in their Transtheoretical Model of Change and by William R. Miller and Stephen Rollnick in their creation of Motivational Interviewing.
All persuasion moves through the steps of this cycle. To take people from the beginning to the end of the Persuasion Cycle, you need to speak with them in a manner that moves them:
* From resisting to listening
* From listening to considering
* From considering to willing to do
* From willing to do to doing
* From doing to glad they did and continuing to do
The focus, central tenet, and promise of this book, "the secret of getting through to absolutely anyone," is that you get through to people by having them "buy in." "Buy-in" occurs when people move from "resisting" to "listening" to "considering" what you're saying.
Ironically, the key to gaining "buy-in" and then moving people through the rest of the cycle is not what you tell them, but what you get them to tell you—and what happens in their minds in the process
In the following chapters, I'll lay out nine basic rules and twelve quick techniques you can use to move people through different points on the Persuasion Cycle. Master these rules and techniques, and you can put them to work wherever you go in your career or personal life. They're the same concepts I teach FBI agents and hostage negotiators for building empathy, de-escalating conflict, and gaining buy-in to a desired solution—and when you know them, you won't need to be held hostage by another person's anger, fear, lack of interest, or hidden agenda. That's because you'll have the tools you need to turn the situation to your advantage.
* The Secret: Getting Through Is Simple
There's nothing magic about the approaches you'll learn in these pages. In fact, one secret you'll discover is that reaching people is easier than it looks. To illustrate that point, I'll share the story of David, a CEO who used my techniques to turn his career around —and to save his family at the same time.
What's the moral of this story? That the right words have tremendous power to heal. In David's case, a few hundred words saved his job, his company, and his relationship with his son.
But there's a second lesson here. Look at the two stories in this chapter, and you'll see that Detective Kramer and David used some of the same approaches to achieve very different goals. Detective Kramer kept a troubled man from killing himself, while David kept his company from firing him and mended the fractures in his family. The power of these techniques, and the others you'll learn, lies in the fact that they apply to nearly any person and any situation.
Why does a single set of communication tools have such universal power? Because while our lives and our problems are very different, our brains work in similar ways. In the next chapter, we'll take a very quick look at why our minds "buy in" or "buy out"—and why reaching an unreachable person depends on talking to the brain.
CHAPTER 2A Little Science
How the Brain Goes from "No" to "Yes"
What happens when two people talk? That is really the basic question here, because that's the basic context in which all persuasion takes place. —MALCOLM GLADWELL, AUTHOR, THE TIPPING POINT
I think like a doctor, so I loaded an earlier draft of this chapter with drawings of brain parts and discussions of how the brain works. When I finished, I showed it to Ellen, my editor, thinking she'd say, "Wow. That's great."
Ellen quickly glanced over all the brain stuff. And then she said, pointedly: "Ick."
I got her point. Most people reading this book don't care about neurons and neurotransmitters and gray matter and white matter. If you're one of them, you just want to learn how to reach people. You don't care what happens inside their brains when you do.
But here's the thing: When you understand something about how the brain moves from resistance to buy-in, you'll have a huge edge—because no matter what your message is, you need to talk to the brain. That's why I teach a little brain science to hostage negotiators, CEOs, managers, parents, and anyone else who needs to reach difficult people.
However, I heeded Ellen's wise advice and took an axe to my first draft. Gone are the brain drawings and dry anatomy lectures. What's left? Three crucial concepts that will empower you to see what's happening behind another person's eyes when you're trying to get buy-in. Understand all three—the three-part brain, amygdala hijack, and mirror neurons—and you'll know all you need to know about the brain science behind reaching anyone.
* The Three-Part Brain
How many brains do you have? It's a trick question, because the answer (as you probably know, if you took college biology) isn't one but three.
Your brain has three layers that evolved over millions of years: a primitive reptile layer, a more evolved mammal layer, and a final primate layer. They all interconnect, but in effect they often act like three different brains—and they're often at war with each other. Here's how each of your three brains behaves:
* The lower reptilian brain is the "fight-or-flight" part of your brain. This region of your brain is all about acting and reacting, without a lot of thinking going on. It can also leave you frozen in a perceived crisis—the "deer-in-the-headlights" response.
* The middle mammal brain is the seat of your emotions. (Call it your inner drama queen.) It's where powerful feelings—love, joy, sadness, anger, grief, jealousy, pleasure—arise.
* The upper or primate brain is like Star Trek's Mr. Spock: It's the part that weighs a situation logically and rationally and generates a conscious plan of action. This brain collects data from the reptile and mammal brains, sifts it, analyzes it, and makes practical, smart, and ethical decisions.
As we evolved, the newer regions of our brains didn't vanquish the older parts. Instead, like the rings on a tree, each new region overlays the more primitive ones. The middle brain overlays the lower brain; the upper brain overlays the middle brain. And all three have power over how you think and act every day.
To a small extent, these three brains work together. To a greater extent, however, they tend to pull apart and function independently—especially when we're under stress. When that happens and the reptile or mammal brain takes control, the human thinking brain is eclipsed, and we shift into primal brain functions. What does all of this have to do with getting through to people? Simple: To reach someone, you need to talk to the human upper brain—not the snake brain or the rat brain. You're in trouble if you're trying to gain buy-in from someone who's feeling angry, defiant, upset, or threatened because, in these situations, the person's higher brain isn't calling the shots. If you're talking to a boss, a customer, a spouse, or a child whose lower brain or midbrain is in control, you're talking to a cornered snake or, at best, a hysterical rabbit.
In this situation, your success hinges entirely on talking the person up from reptile to mammal to human brain—a technique I'll teach you later. For now, however, let's look at why the primitive brain can take over, canceling out all those centuries of evolution. The key: a region of the brain called the amygdala.
* Amygdala Hijack and the Death of Rational Thought
Your amygdala, a small area deep in your brain, flies into action if it senses a threat to you—for instance, if a stranger approaches you in a dark parking lot. This threat doesn't always need to be physical; "fighting words," a financial scare, or even a challenge to your ego can light it off as well.
Your frontal cortex, the logical part of your brain, also goes on alert in situations where you sense a threat. However, this higher brain region wants to analyze the threat, and you don't always have time for that. That's why your body gives the amygdala the power to throw a switch, either directing impulses to or diverting impulses from the frontal cortex.
Sometimes when you're really scared, your amygdala instantly shuts out your higher brain, causing you to act on primitive instinct. Most of the time, however, the amygdala sizes up a situation before making its move. To understand this process, picture the amygdala as a full-to-the-brim pan of water on a stove. Heat this pan of water gently, and it can simmer gently for hours. Crank the heat up to high, however, and eventually the water will boil over catastrophically. Similarly, as long as your amygdala stays on "simmer" and isn't pushed into boiling over, you can continue to access your upper brain, which empowers you to pause, reflect, consider options, and make smart choices. When your amygdala hits the boiling point, however, it's all over.
We call this boiling-over point amygdala hijack—a term first coined by psychologist Daniel Goleman, the originator of the concept of emotional intelligence. The term "hijack" is appropriate because at that point (if you'll forgive me for detouring momentarily into another metaphor), your brain's intelligent and sensible pilot—the frontal cortex—is no longer in control. Instead, the snake is flying the plane. Your ability to reason drops drastically, your working memory falters, and stress hormones flood your system. Your adrenaline rush will keep you from thinking clearly in the next minutes, and it may take hours for the full effects to fade. Goleman no doubt was keen on this concept because when you undergo an amygdala hijack, your emotional intelligence goes out the window.
If you're trying to talk facts and reason with a person who's in full amygdala hijack, you're wasting your time. But intervene before the amygdala hits the boiling point, and the person's higher brain can stay in control. (Think of this as adding salt to water as you heat it. When you do that, you raise the water's boiling point, and it can take more heat while staying at a simmer.)
Many of the techniques I'll teach you for dealing with angry, fearful, or resistant people do just that: prevent an amygdala hijack. When you do that, you'll be talking to the human brain, and your words will get through.
* Mirror Neurons
You cringe when a coworker gets a paper cut and cheer when a movie hero gets the girl. That's because for an instant, it's just as if these events are happening to you—and, in a way, they are.
Years ago, scientists studying specific nerve cells in macaque monkeys' prefrontal cortices found that the cells fired when the monkeys threw a ball or ate a banana. But here's the surprise: These same cells fired when the monkeys watched another monkey performing these acts. In other words, when Monkey #1 watched Monkey #2 toss a ball, the brain of the first monkey reacted just as if it had tossed the ball itself.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Just Listen by Mark Goulston. Copyright © 2010 Mark Goulston. Excerpted by permission of AMACOM.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Contents
Foreword by Keith Ferrazzi, xv,Preface to the Paperback Edition, xvii,
Acknowledgments, xix,
SECTION I The Secret to Reaching Anyone, 1,
1 Who's Holding YOU Hostage?, 3,
2 A Little Science: How the Brain Goes from "No" to "Yes", 14,
SECTION II The 9 Core Rules for Getting Through to Anyone, 25,
3 Move Yourself from "Oh F#@& to OK", 27,
4 Rewire Yourself to Listen, 36,
5 Make the Other Person Feel "Felt", 45,
6 Be More Interested Than Interesting, 55,
7 Make People Feel Valuable, 64,
8 Help People to Exhale Emotionally and Mentally, 69,
9 Check Your Dissonance at the Door, 77,
10 When All Seems Lost-Bare Your Neck, 87,
11 Steer Clear of Toxic People, 94,
SECTION III 12 Easy-to-Use Tools for Achieving Buy-in and Getting Through, 109,
12 The Impossibility Question, 111,
13 The Magic Paradox, 116,
14 The Empathy Jolt, 123,
15 The Reverse Play, Empathy Jolt #2, 132,
16 "Do You Believe That?", 138,
17 The Power of "Hmmm....", 142,
18 The Stipulation Gambit, 150,
19 From Transaction to Transformation, 155,
20 Side by Side, 163,
21 Fill in the Blanks, 170,
22 Take It All the Way to "No", 176,
23 The Power Thank You and Power Apology, 180,
SECTION IV Fast Fixes for 7 Challenging Situations, 187,
24 The Team from Hell, 189,
25 Climbing the Ladder, 194,
26 The Narcissist at the Table, 197,
27 Stranger in Town, 200,
28 The Human Explosion, 204,
29 Getting Through to Yourself, 209,
30 Six Degrees of Separation, 215,
Afterword, 221,
Index, 223,
About the Author, 231,
Keynotes/Workshops, 233,
Free Sample Chapter from Real Influence by Mark Goulston and John Ullmen, 235,
What People are Saying About This
"'Just Listen'
could be the definitive book on communication—today's generation's How to Win Friends and Influence People."
-Marty Nemko, Contributing Editor, U.S. News & World Report
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