Chris Voss
You want that's right, not yes
Two kinds of agreement, nothing alike
Never Split the Difference, on that's right
They nodded and nothing moved afterwards. This is about telling which of the two agreements you actually walked out with.
What actually happened?
Voss calls yes the cheapest word in the language: people say it to be polite, to be left alone, to end a conversation. What he wants is two other words. That's right means the other side believes you have understood them completely, and the route there is to summarise their position back until they say it. He pairs this with a counter-intuitive move, going after no. Ask whether they have given up on the project and they start explaining why they have not, because refusing feels safe.
Cheap agreement gets reversed at execution
Nodding in the room and doing nothing afterwards means the yes was social lubricant. The test is simple: did they restate the plan in their own words? An agreement nobody can restate is not an agreement, it is the end of an uncomfortable meeting.
When someone says fine, fine, no problem, ask what the first step looks like. No answer means they were closing the conversation.
Summarise until they say it back
The method is to lay out their position, their worries and what they want, in full, until they confirm it. Those two words mark the moment they feel understood, and people only weigh your proposal after that. Everything argued before it is wasted.
Before offering someone a change of role, list their concerns one at a time. Wait for that's right, then talk about the arrangement.
No is safer than yes
Chasing a yes puts the other side on guard, because every yes moves them nearer a commitment. Letting them say no relaxes them, and relaxed people tell the truth. So build the question in a form that can be refused.
Swap can you agree to this for is this completely off the table. To deny it, they begin telling you which parts are not.
How do I use it today?
Where you are: they have agreed, and you cannot tell whether that was agreement or an exit.
Ask first: have they put it back in their own words, and did you actually hear that's right?
Where it goes wrong: summarising on and on to manufacture the phrase, which turns into a script; or using the no question as a goad rather than an opening.
Lines to keep
That's right is better than yes.
Negotiation is not an act of battle; it's a process of discovery.
No is the start of the negotiation, not the end of it.
Same situation, other people are asking
I explained it and what came back was not it.Everything is orderly now and we've somehow got slower.What I ask for and what I get are never the same thing.We added people and less gets finished than before.Nothing ships · all 12 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.