Chris Voss
Say their feeling out loud
Name it before you negotiate it
Never Split the Difference, on labelling
The other side has gone quiet and will not take a call. What Voss says to say first, and why it is not a concession.
What actually happened?
Voss spent hours outside a door in a Harlem apartment building where armed fugitives were holed up. They would not pick up the phone and they were asking for nothing. He made no offer. In a deliberately slow, low voice he said through the door: It looks like you don't want to come out. It seems like you worry that if you open the door, we'll come in with guns blazing. A long silence, then a voice. He calls the move labelling: not judging the feeling, only naming it accurately.
A label is an observation, not a verdict
It seems like the price is a problem, and I think you are just balking at the cost, look similar and land nothing alike. The first can be denied, which means it can be corrected. The second files a finding, and the person on the other end can only defend.
When a client goes silent, it sounds like something here is worrying you gives them a specific opening. How do you feel about it gives them none.
Feelings first, terms second
The working assumption is that nobody takes in terms while their state is still unacknowledged. So the opening move is not a number, it is making the other person feel you know what is in their head. Skip it and every later concession buys nothing.
Talking terms to someone who is still angry is talking to a shut door. Name where they are and the door can open.
A wrong label still works
Most people avoid labelling because they might guess wrong. Voss argues the reverse: a wrong label gets corrected, and the correction is the information you came for. The value is not in guessing right, it is in ending the silence.
Say it sounds like the timeline worries you and you may hear that the timeline is fine and the acceptance criteria are not. Now you have the real problem.
How do I use it today?
Where you are: someone has gone quiet, is dodging you, or is plainly upset and not saying so.
Ask first: what is the loudest sentence in their head right now, and can you say it back starting with it seems like?
Where it goes wrong: repeating labels as a formula until it becomes performed empathy, or naming the feeling and rushing straight into terms before it has settled.
Lines to keep
Labeling is a way of validating someone's emotion by acknowledging it.
Get it wrong and they correct you. That is information too.
Same situation, other people are asking
Neither of us will be the one to back down.He meant it. Do I still let it go?Neither of us will give an inch and we both need to get past.He has gone quiet on me and I don't know what to say.It turned into a fight · all 6 questions →If this one named what you are going through,
send it to someone who needs it, or keep it somewhere you will find it again.