How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life (17 page)

A good starting point in learning the art of persuasion is to go to your preferred online bookstore and search for “persuasion.” You’ll see a number of books on the topic. Keep reading those books until they seem to be repeating the same tricks. You’ll be amazed how deep the topic of persuasion is. And you’ll use what you’ve learned in just about every business or personal interaction you have for the rest of your life. Being a good persuader is like having a magic power.

There is an ethical consideration, of course. You don’t want to persuade people to do things that are not in their best interest. And it might feel creepy and manipulative if you find yourself too skilled at persuasion. I’ve learned so much on the topic of persuasion that I intentionally dial it back when I feel like I’m in a stick fight with someone who has no stick. I’m sometimes happier not getting my way than I would be if I felt manipulative. It’s a powerful skill that should be used judiciously.

I’ll give you a taste of the topic just so you know what I’m talking about. For starters, some words and phrases are simply more persuasive than others, and that has been demonstrated in controlled studies.
I’ve included a few of my own favorite persuasion words, based on my own experiences.

Persuasive Words and Phrases

Allow me to elaborate.

Studies by psychologist Robert Cialdini show that people are more cooperative when you ask for a favor using a sentence that includes the word
because,
even if the reason you offer makes little or no sense.
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Apparently the word “because” signals reasonableness, and reasonableness allows people to let down their defenses and drop their objections.

If the science is accurate, an effective way to ask for money might look something like this: “May I borrow a hundred dollars, because I don’t get paid until next week?” That’s not much of a justification for borrowing money; no real reason is given. The person asking for money hasn’t even said why he needs it. It just feels as if a reason had been offered because of “because.”

I’ve tested this technique and it works surprisingly well.

I’ve found that any question beginning with “Would you mind …” tends to be well received. My best guess is that asking a person if he minds is signaling that you have a reasonable request that
might be inconvenient. It’s hard to be a jerk and say no to any request that starts with “Would you mind.” The question comes across as honest, while also showing concern for the other person. It’s a powerful combination.

Sometimes you need to persuade someone to stop trying to persuade you. You are in that situation every time a telemarketer calls or someone tries to sell you something you don’t want. The worst thing you can do in that sort of situation is give some logical-sounding reason why you don’t want whatever is being sold. People who sell for a living will try to talk you out of your reason with reasons of their own. In fact, they are usually equipped with arguments against every common objection. Likewise, your friends will badger you forever if you offer nothing but good reasons for rejecting their ideas.

I’ve found that the most effective way to stop people from trying to persuade me is to say, “I’m not interested.” You should try it. Don’t offer a reason why you aren’t interested. No one can say why a thing holds interest for some and not for others. There’s no argument against a lack of interest. Repeat your claim of disinterest as often as it takes to end the conversation. You might be surprised how effective this method is. I’ve been using it for years. It’s a total conversation killer.

Another good persuasion sentence is “I don’t do that.” It’s not a reason and barely tries to be. But it sounds like a hard-and-fast rule. If someone asks you to attend the annual asparagus festival, don’t say it doesn’t sound fun; that’s just begging the asparagus lovers in your group to endlessly describe just how joyous it could be if only you would try it. Instead, say something like “I don’t do food festivals.” And if anyone asks why, say, “I’m just not interested.” Some of these persuasive sentences work well in tandem.

In a similar vein, another good antipersuasion technique is to say you have a
rule
. For example, let’s say you have a lunch scheduled with a
potential client and your obnoxious coworker asks if he can join you. Honesty won’t work because you have to coexist with your coworker. Instead, say something along the lines of “I have a rule of only doing one-on-one lunches with clients.” It will sound convincing and somewhat polite, while offering no reason whatsoever.

Sometimes you hear statements that are so mind-numbingly stupid, evil, or mean that you know a direct frontal assault would only start a fight. People tend to double down when challenged, no matter how wrong they are. A more effective way to approach a dangerous social or business situation is sideways, by asking a question that starts with “I just wanted to clarify …”

That approach might look like this: “I just wanted to clarify: Are you saying you’re okay with an 80 percent chance of going to jail, or did I hear your plan wrong?”

If you phrase your clarification question correctly, it will shine an indirect light on the problem and provide a face-saving escape path. In many cases the clarification you receive will actually be an entirely new and more rational plan. No one likes to be proven wrong, but most people will be happy to “clarify,” even if the clarification is a complete reversal of an earlier position. It just feels different when you call something a clarification.

We all find ourselves in situations where an organization or person is preventing us from achieving whatever it is that we perceive as just and fair. Perhaps a retail store is refusing to take a return item, or you purchased the wrong model and the one you want is out of stock. You need to persuade someone to go above and beyond the rules to make you happy.

You know that if you get angry and demanding the person you’re dealing with might stick to the rules and try to brush you off. The most powerful way to approach a situation like this is to ask, “Is there anything you can do for me?” You will discover it to be an extraordinarily persuasive question.

The question frames you as the helpless victim and the person you
are trying to persuade as the hero and problem solver. That’s a self-image that people like to reinforce when they have the chance. All you’re doing is creating that opportunity. When you deputize someone to be your problem solver, you create a situation in which he or she has a clear payoff: Helping nice people always feels good. All you need to do is be polite and ask a direct question: “Is there anything you can do for me?” You’ll be amazed how well it works.

“Thank you” can range from a casual “thanks” to an over-the-top expression of appreciation complete with details. There’s a big difference in how effective each approach is likely to be.

When I took a class on how to train our dog, one of the first things we learned is that the quality of the dog treats made a big difference in how cooperative the dog would be. The trainer had the good stuff, and I believe she could make those dogs play the piano if she wanted. Our medium-quality treats were just barely good enough to keep the dogs from turning on us. The trainer admitted that the key to her superior results with dogs was partly snack quality.

A thank-you is like a treat for a human. When you do something generous or nice, you like to know it’s appreciated. The quality of the thank-you matters as much with humans as the quality of the treats matters to dogs. If you want people to like you, for business or for your personal life, pay special attention to the quality of your thanks.

Thank-you notes sent by snail mail are always appreciated and still a must for the bigger occasions. But a well-written e-mail is now socially acceptable for most common situations. No matter how you deliver a thank-you, make sure it includes a little detail of what makes you thankful. Was it the surprise, the thoughtfulness, or how helpful the favor or gift was? Be specific.

For example, “Thank you so much for the ride. I was worried all day about how I would get everything done while my car is in the shop. You really saved me.”

Compare that with a simple “Thank you for the ride.” Any thank-you is better than none, but you’re missing an opportunity if you do a poor job of it. It’s the sort of thing people remember when they decide whom they want to work with, pick for a team, or invite to a party. It seems like a small thing, but it isn’t.

Research
shows that people will automatically label you a friend if you share a secret.
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Sharing a confidence is a fast-track way to cause people to like and trust you. The trick is to reveal a secret that isn’t a dangerous one.

Wrong:
“I buried my boss in the backyard.”

Right:
“I probably shouldn’t admit this, but every time Jane serves her dip I only pretend to like it because everyone else says it’s to die for.”

The right approach to sharing a secret is to start small. Make sure the small secrets stay secret before you try anything riskier. One way to judge your risk is to be alert for other people’s secrets that are being relayed to you. Someone who is bad at keeping one kind of secret is probably bad at keeping all secrets. You won’t be exempt.

No one is decisive all the time. The world is a complicated place, and often we’re only guessing which path will be best. Anyone who is confident in the face of great complexity is insane.

However, some people
act
much more decisively than others. And that can be both persuasive and useful. Decisiveness looks like leadership. Keep in mind that most normal people are at least a little bit uncertain when facing unfamiliar and complicated situations. What people crave in that sort of environment is anything that looks like certainty. If you can deliver an image of decisiveness, no matter how disingenuous, others will see it as leadership.

Don’t confuse your artificial sense of decisiveness with a need to be right all of the time. Life is messy and you’re going to be right only sometimes. You’ll do everyone in your life a favor by acting decisively, though, even if you have doubts on the inside.

People respond to energy in others. If you show how much you love a particular form of entertainment, it will be easier to persuade others to try it. Energy is contagious. People like how it feels. If you show enthusiasm, others will want to experience the same rush.

In
most groups the craziest person is in control. It starts because no one wants the problems that come from pissing off a crazy person. It’s just smarter and easier sometimes to let the crazy person have his or her way.

Crazy people also take more risks and act more confidently than the facts would warrant. That’s a potent combination. Crazy + confident probably kills more people than any other combination of personality traits, but when it works just right, it’s a recipe for extraordinary persuasion. Cults are a good example of insanity being viewed as leadership.

Suppose you’re not insane. Can insanity help you? The answer is yes, but you want to use a calculated, emotional type of insanity. In any kind of negotiation, the worst thing you can do is act reasonable. Reasonable people generally cave in to irrational people because it seems like the path of least resistance.

The way fake insanity works in a negotiation is that you assign a greater value to some element of a deal than an objective observer would consider reasonable. For example, you might demand that a deal be closed before the holidays so you can announce it to your family as a holiday present. When you bring in an emotional dimension, people know they can’t talk you out of it. Emotions don’t bend to reason. So wrap your arguments in whatever emotional blankets you can think of to influence others. A little bit of irrationality is a powerful thing.

If you see persuasion as a form of manipulation, and you see manipulation as a form of evil, that worldview will keep you from being as persuasive as you might be. I think most people hold back their full powers of persuasion because it doesn’t feel good to be manipulative. It’s one thing to speak your mind and voice your preferences, but you hope that other people agree with you because of the thundering rightness of your arguments. Sadly, we do not live in a world where good arguments always win. Sometimes you need to nudge people onto the right path even if they firmly believe it to be wrong. In some cases you have a moral obligation to be manipulative if you know it
will create a good result for all involved. For example, manipulating coworkers to do better work is usually good for everyone.

Technology once was the exclusive domain of lonely geeks. Those days are over. Every adult should have a basic understanding of how the Internet works, the steps involved in building a Web site, what the “cloud” is, and of course how to use personal computers, smart phones, tablets, etc. It’s hard to imagine any profession or start-up that wouldn’t require those skills at some level, even if you’re doing nothing more than supervising vendors, outsourcing, and managing others. It’s a good idea to master technology at what I would call a hobby level. You don’t need to be your own tech support for the hard stuff, but you also don’t want to be the only person in the room who doesn’t understand the topic.

This is another case in which your personal energy can be your guide. Imagine how you feel when you find yourself in a technology discussion that you don’t understand. It’s not fun, and it’s not energizing. You can feel your soul draining out through your socks. On the other hand, being part of the conversation is always energizing if you feel you have something to add. Technology is part of the fabric of civilization, and you need to jack into it if you haven’t already. Learn the basics and you’ll be a lot happier.