Negotiation Guru: Prof. Carolyn Goerner on the Lifelong Learning of Influence & Empathy

Prof. Carolyn Goerner is a leadership and development expert and negotiation guru at Indiana University's Kelley School of Business.

Prof. Goerner suggests approaching conversations with a sense of curiosity. By being genuinely interested in people’s needs and perspectives rather than solely focusing on our agenda, we can create a more collaborative and less adversarial environment.

Prof. Goerner emphasizes that authentic leadership requires ongoing learning and empathy, especially in understanding others' perspectives and needs. This empathy extends into negotiations, where it's crucial to balance our needs with those of others to maintain long-term, positive relationships.

In a fast-paced world often dominated by transactions, Prof. Goerner advocates for authenticity. Simple gestures like offering sincere compliments or asking thoughtful questions can transform interactions from empty exchanges into meaningful connections.

Listen to the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Amazon Music, or your favorite podcast platform to learn how to become an authentic and emotionally engaging leader.

Subscribe to Pity Party Over for more insightful episodes. Questions? Email Stephen Matini or send him a message on LinkedIn.

TRANSCRIPT

Stephen Matini: So Miss Caroline, welcome to Pity Party Over! 

Carolyn Goerner: That’s delightful to be here, Stephen. Thank you.

Stephen Matini: It’s my joy. I've been waiting for months for this moment. I'm very, very happy. So listen, the first question that I have is the following and it comes straight from your LinkedIn profile. The first thing that I read is, “Leaders are learners.” So, which is pretty fabulous. It's very short to the point, but I would like to know why you chose that. 

Carolyn Goerner: Well, honestly, there's a couple of reasons. The first is that leadership, I don't think, is something that you wake up and you say, I've mastered it. It instead is something that we try to get a little bit better at every day.

And so for me, the idea that I don't need any more leadership insight, I don't need any more leadership training, that's just silly. We all do. Nobody ever reaches the point where they're done, right?

And then second, I think there's also this point about, if I'm really going to be a good leader, I've got to figure out my context and I've got to figure out my followers.

And so I've also got a learning curve around developing empathy for people, making sure that I'm really seeing things from multiple perspectives. And that's a really big piece of it too. So I think people absolutely need to continue to learn about leadership, but then they also need to learn about the people in the context.

Stephen Matini: And how did you get into the whole world of negotiation, power, personal influence?

Carolyn Goerner: It's interesting. John Lennon said life is what happens when you're making other plans. And that sort of is how my career trajectory went. I actually did my undergraduate degrees in philosophy and religion and went through college on a debate scholarship.

So was just not really thinking about professionally what I might do. And I kind of stumbled my way into consulting. And then when I burned out on that, decided I was going to go to graduate school. And my parents are professors of communication. So I went to get my master's degree in rhetoric and communication.

So all of that persuasion, influential language really was something I was interested in. But what I very quickly realized is that I am so glad there are people who do that study, but I didn't, it wasn't me.

So I did my PhD in Management and Human Resources, and this is really the intersection of all of that coming together. It's my fascination with how we use language and how language affects people, also coupled with really interesting studies in organizational dynamics and organizational politics and how all that plays together.

Stephen Matini: Was it an advantage or disadvantage to have two parents who focused on communication growing up?

Carolyn Goerner: I think it was definitely an advantage, but I'm blessed to still have my parents living. And my goodness, they are two of my very favorite people. I think it was not the kind of thing where we always sat and scrutinized everybody, but instead there was a lot of very healthy, okay, you need to tell me about that. So I suppose it was a little bit like having parents who are psychologists being very conscious of having good, healthy conversations.

Stephen Matini: Because your parents have been such an ... they are an important figure in your life. If they were here with us and I said to them, hey, what is the secret of communication? What would they say in your opinion? 

Carolyn Goerner: Empathy. That's what they have taught me. And that's absolutely what I've seen them do with other folks. It's not about me and it's not about whether or not I'm right. It's about whether or not I'm connecting with the other person.

And so true communication really comes down to figuring out what the other party is all about and how I can then be a part of the conversation with them in ways that they can understand.

One of my favorite local leaders was a gentleman who was representative in Congress for my state for a long time. And he made a comment when he was talking to one of my classes that leaders are supposed to make everyone else in the room comfortable. And I thought, well, do you have to agree with them? That seems a little pandering and silly.

And he said, no, my job is not to agree, but I need to make a space where it's comfortable for them to express what they're thinking, and it's comfortable for us to disagree without someone getting defensive.

And that just really stayed with me. And it's very consistent with my parents' advice as well, that in order to make good communication happen, you kind of need to get out of your own way.

Stephen Matini: Have you ever worked with a client, could be, you know, one-on-one with a team that somehow you noticed they really did not have that at all. They seem not to have that ability, that social awareness. 

Carolyn Goerner: Yes. Where I see it a lot is when folks are coming from a technical background and they are making a proposal and they have worked so hard on the data. They have run their numbers 74 times. They have absolutely convinced themselves that this is the way to go.

And so they get in front of the decision maker and all they do is discuss all of the reasons why they, the presenter, are convinced. They haven't taken into account anything that the other person might need to hear or how they might need to make the decision. Instead, they're just all in on convincing people that they're right. And that's the thing I see the most often. And I grind when you ask the question because it's actually very typical.

I'm lucky enough to work with people who are really smart and really know what they're doing. And the issue is not that they can't justify or find data to justify what they're asking for. It's just the way in which they go about asking that gets them into trouble.

Stephen Matini: The thing is a lot of people, particularly around the whole notion of conflict, confrontation, negotiation, they really have a lot of issues, you know, including myself. Like I've learned it to be comfortable, but I used to feel, oh my God, awful about it. Particularly when I was younger, like I would get this block in my throat. I couldn't even speak. So a lot of people, People have all kinds of things like, you know, fear rejections. Also, there are, you know, cultural factors, social factors that come into place. What would you say that is the first thing, the first step to make peace with this so that negotiation is not so scary? What would you do? 

Carolyn Goerner: My first piece of advice is get curious. Start figuring out what it is that the other person is asking, where they might be coming from.

There's this interesting thing that psychologists call the spotlight effect. And basically what it means is that if I'm feeling uncomfortable, I feel like there's a spotlight shining on me. And it's almost paralyzing, right? I can't move. I'm just hyper-focused on myself. And I feel like everybody else is hyper-focused on me too. And it's really paralyzing. And it's funny that you say the neck thing. My neck actually gets red when that happens.

So I totally feel where you're coming from because you'll see the color just kind of start to move up into my face.

And so the way around that is to do something that two folks who study negotiations, Yuri and Fisher, who wrote the book, Getting to Yes they call it going to the balcony. And it's the idea that I am somehow going to step back emotionally from the conversation and watch it and watch it unfold and see what I can learn from everything that's going on.

And so it's trying to develop a genuine curiosity about where the other person is comi