A Former FBI-Trained Hostage Negotiator's Guide to Difficult Conversations

Name Mix Ups And Introductions

Um, and then is it Scott Tilema?

Tillema.

Tillema.

If hit it hard, mumble the rest. Tillema. But if you get it wrong, no one will know.

Well, it's well, cause the way that I kept remembering your name, obviously we interview a lot of people, so it's hard to remember last names, like I knew Scott, but you were a crisis negotiator, and I kept thinking dilemma.

Yep, no dilemma.

Tilemma. That's where I okay, so Tilema. I'm gonna get it wrong.

You got it. You got it.

And I'm gonna try not to call you Steve.

You can call me Steve. And anybody who's been in my keynote recently will know exactly what you're talking about. Like, I know that part, I remember that.

Welcome to Auto Care on Air, a candid podcast for Curious Industry. I'm Jackie Lutz, content director at the Auto Care Association, and this is Carpool Conversations, where we collaborate on today's most relevant power skills. We are all headed in the same direction, so let's get there together. Hello, everybody. Welcome to another Carpool Conversation. I'm Jackie Lutz, and I have with me today Scott Tilema.

Hey Jackie, how are you?

Good. How are you doing? Awesome. Um we are at Atlanta uh for Auto Care Connect, and you are one of our keynote speakers about a really cool topic. Um I was so glad that I got the scheduling wrong yesterday and I got to actually attend your keynote before uh doing this with you. Um, but you're an internationally recognized crisis negotiator. Tell me a little bit about that.

Right. So when I was invited to speak at AutoCare Connect, I I asked uh the point of contact. I said, I I'm not sure what you're looking for for me. I don't know anything about cars, aftermarket, like none of this stuff is in my wheelhouse. And they said, No, we're we're looking uh to have you work with a group of uh younger leaders. And I said, All right, so let's develop a talk around influence and leadership, drawing on my background as a SWAT hostage negotiator where I've had difficult conversations and life or death uh situations. And how do we get the influence to make sure that we get to a positive outcome every time? And from there learned a little bit more about the event and the audience and put together a really nice keynote that I got to share with the team yesterday.

Yeah, it was so relevant and I was really hooked on it. Um, you did a fantastic job. And do you want to give a little preview of what you talked about?

Sure.

Four Principles For Tough Talks

So um there's four big principles that I talked about yesterday, and this is going to guide the difficult conversations for people who are leading teams, people who are maybe needing to lead up and chat with somebody above them who might have a little bit more power, or dealing with a difficult customer or client or external stakeholder. So, in so many situations, we're having these tough conversations. And the first big point that I want to challenge the audience on is it's going to take courage to have these tough conversations. Because when I ask people, what emotion do you feel when I tell you you're going to be having a difficult conversation? Immediately it comes in their mind what that difficult conversation is, and immediately they have an emotion with it. And 90 plus percent of the people, when I ask this in the full day class, I'll ask them, you know, what emotion? And we're hearing emotions like anxiety, fear, dread, avoidance, all these negative emotions. And if I were to tell you, you're going to engage in an activity here very shortly. I'm not going to tell you what the activity is, but you're going to engage in it. And while you're doing this activity, you're going to feel anxiety, fear, dread, nervousness, all these bad emotions. You're going to do one of two things. Number one, we're just going to avoid it. I'm not going to do this thing. But number two, if I have to get into this, I'm going to do it just as fast as I can and rush through it and then hope for the best because I just want to get out of there. So we talk about the knowledge and skills you need to be a good negotiator. But this first piece is a decision that we make. Am I going to have the courage to step into these conversations? And the problem is we justify our lack of courage by saying, you know what, this isn't really a work issue. Um, so we're we're not going to address that. When we see somebody obviously struggling, obviously in crisis, or we just say, they just need a little space. We're just going to give them a little space. And I'm justifying my lack of courage to step in and have a tough conversation with them because people are going through things. People are struggling with professional, personal, social community in the world. There's so many challenges that we face. And it's hard to begin these conversations. We don't know where to start. We don't know how to lead the conversation. So the first big piece is it's going to take courage. Are you willing to make the decision as a leader? I'm going to have these tough conversations. You wouldn't be in leadership if you weren't ready to have these conversations. If you want to have an easy conversation, you'd go sell ice cream.

Right.

Right. So that's the first big one.

Yeah.

Second big one is around the mindset of these tough conversations that we have to lead with respect. We're emotional people. We make decisions based on how we feel. So in these situations, if the person sitting across from me doesn't feel respect from me, I have no expectation that we're ever going to reach an agreement and get to where we want to go. So we talk about how do we come to the conclusion that we were disrespected? And it's not that we analyzed, it's that we feel disrespected. So when we want to create the feeling of respect, are we extending appreciation to the people that we're dealing with? Are we uh offering them some autonomy, the freedom to make their own decisions? Are we being empathetic about their situation? Are we being fair? Do they feel we're being fair and how we're handling that? And if we can set the table with we are leading with respect, I think now we have the foundation to get toward the finish line. And disrespect creeps in there. And I mean, respect is a fragile thing, but when we experience disrespect, it can go in a really bad direction. So I I really challenge people to have the mindset that most disrespect is not intended and let's respond in a way that helps them safe face because nobody wants to feel stupid, no one wants to feel judged, no one wants to feel ashamed. Uh and then especially if we're trying to get to the finish line and get a deal done, I don't want them to remember, hey, you know, they I I remember that they were being a jerk. So sometimes, as much as I teach people you have to be a great listener, sometimes we can be a bad listener and let those things go. Third big piece is around communication. Are you powerfully communicating with the people that you are interacting with? And we all think we're good communicators because we do it all the time. But there are a couple big pieces here. Number one, are you a great listener? And the FBI teaches eight skills of active listening. And that's what I was taught in my training to become a SWAT negotiator. So uh if the folks in the audience today, if you're not familiar with the eight skills of active listening, learn what they are. Learn how to use various listening techniques, not just know what they are, but be able to then use them. Uh, let's be strategic in how we choose to communicate. We communicate in a way that's most efficient, uh, way that's easiest for us, but let's be more strategic about how we choose to communicate. And then the delivery piece, not what you say, how you say it, all these adjustments that we can make and how we deliver the message are such an afterthought. If people are preparing for their tough conversations, they're preparing what they're gonna say. Nobody ever talks about how they say it. And the last big piece is around connection. If we want influence, which is where we want to go, influence begins with connection. And are we creating connection with the people that we serve? And I feel strongly if we are not creating connection, we're creating disconnection. And for all the leaders, I and I work with leaders around the world. They tell me I'm busy, I have so much work to do. And this idea, this intangible idea of I'm just gonna create connection with the people around me isn't really on their to-do list on any given day. So I really push them that if we are going to be more influential, we create connections through these little conversations. And it's these little conversations that allow these tougher conversations to occur. Because I know every day that we have these little interactions, I know you care about me. I know you want me to succeed, I know you want me and the team and the organization to do well. So when you come to me and say, hey, we got some things we need to adjust, I know you're having this conversation because you believe that we can do better if I can make some adjustments. And that's uh a one-hour keynote just like that.

Well, there's just so many good takeaways from it. And what I really loved about it yesterday is you gave some really good examples of your crisis negotiation days. So um, just for the audience that wasn't there, um, why don't you give a little bit of background about, you know, the work that you've done and then maybe an example, one of the ones that you uh talked about yesterday, just an example of a, you know, in in your world, what a negotiation looked like. And then we'll relate that back to the business world.

SWAT Negotiation Lessons From The Field

Sure. Uh well, first of all, they don't just let people go and be hostage negotiators, which is really kind of expected. Uh they send us to training. So in uh 2007, I got the call that I was selected to be a hostage negotiator on a regional SWAT team. And I'd only been on the job for five years, but my education was uh a bachelor's in behavioral science and a master's degree in psychology. So I had the background to have these tough conversations and not only understand what people are thinking and why, but have the ability to start to move them in a direction we want to go. So that was uh a bit of an advantage to get selected, kind of young. Uh, they sent me to the FBI to go through their class and learn how to have these tough conversations. And then for the next eight years, I was assigned to this regional SWAT team serving 70 different cities in the Chicago area, 1.8 million people. Super cool, certainly a highlight of my law enforcement career. And the SWAT team is handling a variety of calls for service. And hostage taking doesn't occur very frequently in the U.S., thankfully. So a lot of times we're referred to as crisis negotiators because most often we are dealing with an individual in crisis rather than a hostage taker who's got a whole bunch of other people that are in play. And in either case, we're having a conversation, trying to make a connection with one of these people who are in these tough moments. And uh I I have so many different stories. And in my uh TEDx talk, The Secrets of Hostage Negotiators, I actually lead that talk off with a uh uh a story where it didn't turn out well. And um, without getting into it here, a bad day in the office and that job is very, very different than a bad day in the office for everybody who might be listening today. And it gives that perspective and appreciation that we have to be great and get success every single time. Like we can't say we're we're doing a pretty good job here. We have to be great at it all the time. And that's the intensity that I want to challenge people to bring into these conversations. Uh, but one of the stories that I shared yesterday from the talk was uh we were negotiating with a man who was shooting off guns inside his home. And we were called to try to talk him down. And uh our lead negotiator identified he was a narcissist, like a really big ego. The world revolves around me. I mean, this is a tough conversation. I mean, anybody who's emotional is a tough conversation, but when we have this level of ego in play, this is a really tough one. Uh, and we worked with him for five hours, using the skills of communication and connection to get the influence that we needed. And it worked over time. It took a while, but by 3 a.m., he agreed to surrender and come out. We would never use the word surrender in a negotiation. It kind of sounds like you're losing. We don't want anyone to feel like they're losing. So we say we reached an agreement that he's gonna come out. Uh, and instead of sending our negotiation team to the door where he was going to come out, uh, we just were gonna let the SWAT team put handcuffs on him. He he agreed to come out. And as he was coming to the door, um, one of the SWAT operators on the other side of the door addressed this guy using the wrong name. And it set off a really, really bad reaction. And what we thought was the finish line, and we were there, now we're back into this mess where for hours we're struggling to get this guy to where we want to go, and then we messed it up. So uh it reminded us we we have to be executing all the way through, and you're not done until you're done done. Uh so we learn all of our lessons from the the things that don't go well, the things that didn't go exactly right. Um, but it's important to debrief after all these situations because sometimes we get good outcomes just because we're lucky, not because we're super skilled. So it's it's important to see uh all the times where we can improve. Let's celebrate what we did right, but find where we can improve and uh make sure we can do better next time.

Yeah, and um obviously, fortunately, uh most people in business are not going to be doing hostage you know negotiations that high stakes, right? There's no lives on the line, usually things like that. Um, but I love what you do because if you can do it right in those kinds of situations and you can simplify it enough, like the things we're dealing with, it's very, very doable, still very emotionally charged, still, you know, consequences for one individual or the other, and you're still trying to manage yourself and manage the situation as best as you can. Um, so let's just talk about a few uh examples of where this might happen in the workplace, where people could use these skills.

So many of our tough conversations don't happen because we're afraid to have these tough conversations. But I trust that every listener right now can identify I need to have a conversation with someone. And it could be in our personal life, with our partner, with our spouse, with our kids, with our aging parents, with whoever is in our personal sphere. But in the professional space, if we're in a leadership role, we are responsible for the performance of our team. And when people aren't performing well, sometimes we'll ignore that. Sometimes we'll do a sprinkle coaching or or make a comment rather than sitting down. And my mentor, George Cole Reaser, talks about putting the fish on the table. And I love studying George, he's a professor of leadership, and this is the analogy for

Workplace Examples That Need Courage

let's put the conflict on the table and have a discussion. Because if we keep the fish under the table, it's going to stink after a while. Things don't just get better. So uh performance evaluations are a big one. And sometimes it's just every year we sign off on it and it doesn't really have value. I think if I can sit down with my leader and say, here's what's going well, here's where I want you to improve on, and here's why, that can be very powerful. It's tough to get criticism. We can all say, you know, we feel that uh I'm being criticized and it doesn't feel great. But if I know at the core you care about me and you care about my performance and that of the team, it's going to feel very, very different. So I think performance evaluations are one of the biggest difficult conversations that leaders should be having that maybe were not as effective as we could be in these conversations.

I have such a good example of this because when it came to this podcast, this was something very new. Um, we had the idea and we launched it like two or three months later. And we were very much building the plane while we were flying it, like learning things quickly, failing very quickly, so that we can try again and, you know, get it to where it is today. Um very stressful time for me. And there is somebody on our team, and he's gonna know exactly who he is. Um, but he is just a very good detail eye. And where, you know, we're running around trying to do, you know, learn how to do camera angles and learn how to what equipment we need and just like the most basic things, and you know, and in uh he points out like things that, you know, we need to change, whatever. And it's such a good person to have on the team. But I noticed in myself that when he would come to me after, you know, a long day of doing these podcasts or whatever, and he would come to me and and say something like, Um, you know, have you ever seen this podcast? Uh they do this uh for their intro, just something like that, giving me an idea. And I would immediately get very defensive because all I heard was that I'm doing a terrible job and that you hate the intro that I have for our show, which is not at all what he's saying, but that's what I'm hearing. And that's my like emotional reaction to it. And one time I just told him, I'm like, I think I just need to hear you say, You're doing a great job. Tell me a couple things that you think we're doing well, and then give me the feedback and I will be all ears. But like, I need to know that you're not gonna fire me before you give me this feedback because it's just like automatically where my brain goes. And I feel like it's a little bit of that. Like you're trying to you have to read the person, you got to use that psychology degree a little bit, um, that emotional intelligence piece, read the person and how they're going to receive the information.

For sure. Yeah. Timing is a huge piece in negotiation, it's a piece that's overlooked the most. And we'll take an example where I was negotiating with a man who he was armed and barricaded inside his house. He was having a bad day, he was drinking a little bit, and he told me, he he just flatly said, I'm going to kill you. And I mean, this was an intense moment. And it was followed up with gunshots. Bang, bang, bang. And the SWAT team gets on the radio calling out, we have shots fired from the house. I said, I'm I'm aware. Like he's upset with me. And in in this particular situation, I had my heavy SWAT body armor over my regular body armor. I was in an armored truck two or

Feedback Reactions And Better Timing

three blocks away. So I had no concern that he was actually going to hurt me because I know I need to manage myself first. But think of the timing in this. I know what I need to say to him at some point. I need you to put the gun down and surrender so we can resolve this peacefully. When he's shooting out the window, is that the time to say, hey, time to put the gun down and surrender peacefully? No, of course not, because he's not even in a position where he can hear that. Or another example, we uh were called to a man who was holding a woman hostage. He had shot a police officer, one of the most dangerous people we had ever negotiated with. And in the initial interaction with the first police officer, you can hear on the recording, he's actually vomiting in the background. And I use this as a training piece for negotiators today to say, are we hearing what's happening behind here and thinking through what that means? Are you concerned that maybe he has a stomach virus or coronavirus? You think that's what's going on? No, he is so psychologically beyond his ability to control himself that he's just he's having a physical reaction.

That's it.

So is this the time to tell him, hey, put the gun down and surrender? No, of course not. We have to manage the emotion. So think about your timing. Is the person over there very justifiably, very understandably protective and defensive? They don't know why they're in the office. I'm gonna be a little bit backed off. I'm just protecting myself to say maybe they're not ready to hear this, and and we have to give them that reassurance. Hey, you're gonna be okay. I remember one time um I I was reviewing uh an incident that we had negotiated, and they had saved all the reports and they had saved a piece of paper. And in dry erase marker, it was you sound great. And I remember that I had written this on a piece of paper and slid it over to our primary negotiator who had been working for hours to get this guy out. And I know she was getting frustrated, and we had been there for a while, and we're like, all right, so what should we do now? Just that little piece of encouragement. You sound great. And sometimes that's all we need.

Yeah.

You're doing a great job. I love your intro. I just have a thought on maybe a way we can make it better.

Yeah.

And how we frame that is so important.

Yeah. And now it's just funny because anytime he starts giving me compliments, I'm like, okay, what is it? What do you need? What is the problem? But yeah, I think there's a little bit of something to be said about the receiving end too. Because now, like, we we know each other a little bit better and how each other gives and receives information. So when he doesn't give me the compliment first, I just have to know like I need to calm down. Like, this isn't necessarily a firing conversation. He just doesn't mean that he doesn't like what we're doing today. He's giving a suggestion to maybe improve it tomorrow. So I have to change my mindset too on the receiving end.

Yeah, and I think having these relationships allows us to make adjustments and have a little bit more comfort to know it's not worst case scenario. But this is just evolutionary psychology. Our brain is hardwired to keep us alive. It's designed to see threats in the world. So when we see something that's ambiguous, we're gonna immediately expect it's the worst.

Yeah.

Because we're we're gonna protect our body, we're gonna protect our emotional, psychological uh psychological selves. That's just how the mind operates.

Yeah. And I really liked something that you said yesterday. Um, you kind of went through an exercise about the t-shirt. You want to talk about that a little bit?

Yeah. Uh it's difficult for people. And I come from the law enforcement world where we're not sitting down and talking about our feelings. How's your emotions today? How's your feelings today? So, how do we have a real discussion? And what I propose to folks is be curious around the question of what does their t-shirt say today? Because I believe that in my work as a crisis negotiator, my superpower is the ability to read the t-shirt that everybody's wearing. And the t-shirts that we've seen in these difficult conversations are so varied, but the theme is oftentimes very negative that they they've got a drinking problem, struggling with substance abuse, alcohol

The T Shirt You Cannot See

abuse, mental health issues, um, family issues, financial issues, and everybody's wearing these t shirts, and we just can't see this. So, for leaders, if I can encourage them to Have a little bit more patience in these conversations to know that maybe this person's not in a position where they can reach out and ask for help. Maybe they're struggling, maybe they're hiding something because we don't put these dark chapters on our Instagram. I celebrate the good things on my Instagram. Hey, check it out. I'm here, I connect. Highlight reels. Yeah, for sure. Meeting great people, having a good time. It's terrific. But these other moments, we think that because we don't see them, they don't exist. And that's not the case. So I I just ask them, would you be mindful that they're wearing a t-shirt? And how would your communication and connection change if you knew they were wearing one of these shirts? And it just brings to the surface this idea that we're all going through some things, things that nobody else knows about. And in people's darkest moments, I get to have conversations with them. And uh it's such it's such an honor to be there for these people because we remember that there's somebody who loves this person. This person is important to somebody out there. And maybe they can't see it, they're just in a dark place. But if we can help them turn the page and get through this very dark time, what what a cool opportunity we can give to them.

And so, like, what do people do if, you know, it's fantastic that so many people have the opportunity to come here, that their employer pays for them to come to a conference like this and learn skills like this that they will use for the rest of their careers? Um, but you know, not all of their bosses are here, right? And hearing this message. So what happens when your boss is sitting down with you and having a conversation with you? They don't have this training. Um, they're not handling it in a way that's, you know, great. Like, is there is there advice we can give to the receiver to manage themselves better? You talk about managing yourself. So in the situation where you're not leading the conversation, you're on the receiving end.

Yeah. And how many of us have had the misfortune of working for a terrible boss? And the

Handling Bad Bosses And Leading Up

bad bosses make the good bosses good, and the great bosses ruin leadership for the rest of your life because now you have a taste of what great leadership is like. You expect this from people, and then everybody else is very disappointed. Right. Absolutely. So I think that number one, we can always lead up and we can demonstrate the behavior that we want to see from them. Uh, we can be empathetic and knowing they might not have ever been given this training. You know, 30 years ago, maybe the soft skills today weren't a priority for the training. We're teaching you how to be a technical expert, and leadership has changed. It used to be the command and control leadership where I just tell you what to do, and that's the power. But everybody in an organization has power now. Every employee has the ability to sync your entire organization because everybody has a voice. Everyone has social media, everybody has access, you can post whatever information you want. So I think leadership has changed. So for the leaders, we have to have the mindset that we need to create connection and have people succeed because they want to, not do the job because we're telling them to do that. But in these conversations, we can lead up. But also, I think ego gets in the way that these leaders are sometimes threatened by high performers or high potentials coming up. And maybe subconsciously they are trying to keep you down and they don't want you to shine and succeed because they're afraid that you, the lowly employee, is going to outshine them, the very important boss. And I think that being able to align goals to show that my success as a rank and file employee or a mid-level manager is going to be the success of this entire organization. And when I succeed and we succeed, you, the boss, you succeed too. To show it's not about my ego and outdoing you that I'm helping the team find success. And hopefully that can change their mindset a little bit instead of being a little bit more abrasive and having that friction there. They say, I want to work with you. I I want to partner with you and learn what I can to help find this success. Uh so we we can have um bad interactions with with leaders and and peers for a variety of reasons, which comes back to why it's so important. We have to manage ourselves first. Yeah. And know that, hey, sometimes it's not even about you. They're going through something that you don't see, you don't realize, they don't know how to have these conversations, no one's taught them, no one's given them the feedback. Uh, and then maybe remind ourselves how lucky we are if we do have these skills, that when we get to the point of being able to lead an organization, we can do it differently.

Have you ever heard the debate about um it's either treat people how you like to be treated or treat people how they like to be treated? Which one do you think it is?

100% how they want to be treated.

Yeah.

Um, I don't want to treat people the way I want to be treated. And here's my example. I love Taco Bell. It's my favorite food in the world. Mexican pizza at Taco Bell is the best. If if it were up to me, I would have the Mexican pizza at three meals a day. I know that's not appealing to most normal, healthy people in society. That's not healthy, it's gross, it's disgusting, whatever. I think Taco Bell is great. So if I'm gonna treat you the way I want to be treated, we're gonna have Taco Bell every day for the rest of your life. And I realize most people aren't cool with that. Um, and and same with me. Sometimes I get to speak at really cool, fancy places, and

Treat People How They Want

people want to take me out for a fancy dinner with caviar and you know, the fancy stuff. Caviar is gross. I don't want that. Give me a cheeseburger. Like, treat me the way I want to be treated. Now I'm gonna feel special. But I think there's a level of empathy that's required there to say, hey, I'm seeing beyond myself and and putting away that because I think this way, everybody thinks that way. So I think it it just makes people feel very special. If you can know something about them and and give them something very personal, because number one, I'm comfortable being treated the way I want to be treated, but also I realize you cared enough to know something about me to give me something that I really like and appreciate. So I want to treat people the way they want to be treated, even if it's very different for me. And going back to communication styles, it could be you have maybe the engineering, accounting, legal, broadly types. Just give me this information. And then you have maybe the more warm, fuzzy customer service, HR leadership, more people, people who are saying, let's begin by developing rapport and having a conversation, where that could be very irritating to people who I just need some information so I can get this thing done.

Yeah. Yeah, I bet it makes a huge, like a hugely good leader when you can adapt quickly to what different people need. But that's like gotta be a tough thing to really master. Because if you think about like some leaders have, you know, they're leading organizations of hundreds, right? You can't know hundreds of people's styles, right? So is there some kind of probably some kind of skill that you you kind of pick up quickly as you talk to somebody? Or is this something that we should tell, you know, under 40 leaders that, you know, look at your organization and really try to pinpoint these things about people on your by yourself? Or is this a situation where we all need to take the responsibility to make sure we tell people how we want to be treated? Right. Like maybe like what I did with the guy I work with. Like, is that the best practice to be like, this doesn't work for me? This sends me into a spiral. This is what I need, right?

Well, from a management perspective, we can't set the span of control for leaders to be a hundred people. I mean, maybe five or six may like direct reports, then direct reports. And it's understood that you are responsible for the relationship you have with these people. Now, I mean, ultimately, you're up here and you're gonna have a hundred or a thousand people underneath you. It's not gonna be expected that you build relationships with all of those, but it is expected that we have relationships that we know intimately, the people that we are working with each day. I mean, how shameful is it if you don't know you've been working with somebody for years and you don't know and do do they have kids, what their favorite food is? I mean, it's shameful. And people will say, well, that's personal business. Yes, of of course. No, nobody's expecting you to share all your personal business. But if we've been working together for a while and and I feel like you have taken no interest in who I am outside of work or who I am as a person, I'm I'm wondering, do you do you really care about me or am I just another number?

Yeah.

Uh so I I think that just having brief conversations where we can ask, how are you doing? How is your weekend? And and learn something about somebody rather than showing up and I'm here to tell you something as the boss, just coming through and asking and listening and caring about what's going on with people is a huge step. But let's make sure that these real relationships and our span of control. I'm demonstrating that for for my direct reports, and then each one of them knows that this is the expectation for how they handle their direct reports, and then it gets to the entire organization.

Yeah, that makes complete sense. Um, this is surprising because I feel like we kind of just got started, but we're already kind of at our mark. Um, but is there like a big takeaway that like if someone just listened for 30 minutes and they could take one thing away today, what do you hope that that is?

We all have the ability to be powerful verbal influencers, every one of us. I was not born with the ability to influence, to connect, to lead life or death conversations. Like I wasn't born with this, this is all learned behavior. So if somebody out there is listening saying, man, that would be really cool to do that. Let's not devalue every conversation that we have because it impacts somebody's life. It impacts their family, it impacts the team, the organization, our communities. We all have the

One Skill To Start Today

ability to be powerful verbal influencers. And I would encourage someone to take one step. Maybe I'm gonna learn the skills of active listening. Maybe I'm gonna be more mindful of my delivery. Maybe I need to be more thoughtful about how I extend respect. Maybe I just need to be courageous and take the step. There's so many different pieces here under the umbrella of being a powerful leader and a powerful negotiator, but let's just focus on one little piece at a time and get good at it. And people are gonna notice a change. It's it doesn't take much effort to get different results and have people experience you differently. So let's not be overwhelmed and say this is some big project, some big mountain. We're gonna step by step put these things together and you're gonna realize I'm more connected, I have more influence, my ability to lead is getting stronger every day. We all have this ability.

Yeah, I love that because I, you know, this this show focuses on professional development skills, and I've never tackled a skill that I didn't think could be learned. And this, I think, is one of those ones where it's like, it's kind of like public speaking, right? Like it, it's so it just sends like a rush of emotion in you before you like just talking about it. You don't even have to do it. You're just talking about it, and it just kind of gets you all, you know, frazzled. And um, it's like a repetition thing, right? Like if you just try a couple of times, try approaching people just a little bit different, see what works. It's like those reps that just make it feel more and more comfortable and more and more confident as you do it.

That's it.

And it's something that you can master.

And people are gonna cheer you on because we want our leaders to be great. So know that people are cheering for you and wanting you to do well.

Yeah, that's perfect. Thank you so much for spending this time with me.

Thanks for having me on.

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