Interview: Negotiation Skills From Former FBI Agent Chris Voss Learn It Live It Give It with Jairek Robbins

Check out this week full episode and transcription here:http://www.jairekrobbins.com/interview-negotiation-skills-from-former-fbi-agent-chris-voss/
 
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Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of JRCtv. If you’re listening to the podcast or watching this video, Hello.  We have a very special guest joining us, I just finished listening to his book which is awesome, if you’re watching it’s called NEVER SPLIT THE DIFFERENCE, you can see it right over his shoulders there which is awesome, this is Mr. Chris Voss, he’s the CEO and founder of The Black Swan LTD Group or The Black Swan Group is the better way to say it.  His 24 years experience in the FBI and was former FBI lead international kidnapping negotiator, he’s a speaker which I’ll tell you where we first run into each other as well as adjunct professor and consultant.  I believe you’re a professor at Harvard and also USC?
 
CV: “Well I did, Harvard several years ago but these days, USC University of Southern California for all you people in the Southeast and Georgetown University in Washington, DC.”
JR: “Wonderful! Well thank you for joining us and thank you for sharing some of your wisdom and experience with everyone today in advance.”
CV: “Hey man, I am flattered, I am honored to be on with you. It’s very cool, I am glad we crossed paths again.”
JR: “Yeah I am excited, speaking of which the first time we cross paths, I believe was in Philly.”
CV: “It was in Philly, yeah in an event Carolyn put on.”
JR: “Yeah and we were both speaking there and we had I think it was a 4-hour conversation that night, hanging out, talking with everybody.”
CV: “yeah it was a lot of fun.”
JR: “I don’t know and I apologize, I don’t know why it took me so long to read your book.”
CV: “It took me a while to get the book out so that’s okay.”
JR: “Fair enough, fair enough I finally got my hands on it, I went through the whole book, and I mean I wish I can just hit instant download and put this in everybody’s playbook except for the people we negotiate with because obviously, it’s a little better for us to know it than them.  About one thing you said that’s really interesting is in the negotiation itself, we’ll get to some tactics  but I wanna share about you first, but in the negotiation itself it’s not you versus them as much as it’s you both trying to solve the problem at hand and I think a lot of people including myself when stuff gets tense when stuff gets interesting a lot of times that initial you know adversary thought process comes out. So I want to talk about that maybe towards the end we’ll talk about how to make that adjustment for people but for right now, I’d love to just tell about you, like how did you get into this for those listening and watching.”
CV: “Yeah you know just one thing after another out of left field. Which I think you know everybody’s life as it takes its path. I never planned of being an FBI agent probably didn’t even think about it until about 10 or 11 months before I was looking at to become an FBI agent and then like I was a SWAT guy, you know before I went to the FBI I was a police officer at Kansas City Missouri Police Department. Very good police department, wonderful charming, wonderful city.  And then the FBI thing comes up, I head in that direction, I was on a SWAT team, to me some of the best things that have happened to me in my life as a result of something it would be perceived as negative and so I reinjured my knee.  I tore ligaments in my knee because when I was in college I fancied myself as sort of the Caucasian Bruce Lee  (laughs). I wanted to be in the martial arts and I thought that would help me with the police department, blew the knee out. Blew it out again trying out for the  FBI’s hostage rescue team, the FBI’s version of the navy seal. A b