The video delves into the impact of a positive attitude and playful demeanor on negotiation success. Sharing a personal experience, the speaker highlights a pleasant encounter at an airport's lost luggage department, attributing the unexpected assistance and successful recovery of his suitcase to his cheerful interaction and light-hearted request. This playful approach is contrasted against tense and ego-driven negotiation scenarios, emphasizing the power of positivity and calmness in achieving favorable outcomes.

The speaker further elaborates on emotional control during negotiations, discussing the role of the late night FM DJ voice in maintaining composure. This calming voice is not only useful for the speaker but also considered beneficial in soothing the negotiation environment. The video touches upon the neuroscience behind sound frequencies, where low frequency tones are linked to calming effects on listeners, thus explaining the impact of this vocal technique in negotiations.

Main takeaways from the video:

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Key Vocabularies and Common Phrases:

1. astonishing [əˈstɒnɪʃɪŋ] - (adjective) - surprisingly impressive or remarkable - Synonyms: (amazing, astounding, staggering)

And great negotiation is not exciting. It's astonishing.

2. batter [ˈbætər] - (verb) - to strike repeatedly - Synonyms: (pummel, thrash, beat)

These people are batter children.

3. schmuck [ʃmʌk] - (noun) - a foolish person - Synonyms: (jerk, idiot, fool)

And another bag pops up. This other poor schmuck is sitting there waiting.

4. elation [ɪˈleɪʃən] - (noun) - a feeling of great joy or pride - Synonyms: (joy, jubilance, delight)

I don't think you can go from sadness to elation, directly sad, depressed down.

5. oscillation [ˌɒsɪˈleɪʃən] - (noun) - movement back and forth at a regular speed - Synonyms: (fluctuation, variation, vibration)

Their mind is getting shifted toward a state of low frequency oscillation.

6. entrain [ɪnˈtreɪn] - (verb) - to synchronize with a rhythm - Synonyms: (synchronize, align, coordinate)

It entrains to your voice, not just the timing.

7. deceiving [dɪˈsiːvɪŋ] - (verb) - causing someone to believe something that is not true - Synonyms: (misleading, deluding, tricking)

I was in a negotiation with a counterpart that I knew was deceiving, lying to me.

8. extraneous [ɪkˈstreɪniəs] - (adjective) - irrelevant or unrelated to the subject being dealt with - Synonyms: (irrelevant, unnecessary, superfluous)

There are some extraneous details in the transcript.

9. dissolution [ˌdɪsəˈluːʃən] - (noun) - the closing down or dismissal of an assembly, partnership, or official body - Synonyms: (termination, disbandment, cessation)

The dissolution of a contract or something like that.

10. phenomenal [fəˈnɒmɪnəl] - (adjective) - very remarkable or extraordinary - Synonyms: (exceptional, outstanding, extraordinary)

We had a product that was phenomenal.

Master Negotiation With These Tactics & Mindsets - Chris Voss & Dr. Andrew Huberman

Like, if I'm in a great mood, like, if I'm just going to be playful, a couple of really huge personal negotiation wins. Recently was when I was just trying to be playful. I mean, I was just. I was in a great mood, and I'm joking around, and great negotiation is not exciting. It's astonishing.

I'm in a. We're in conversations right now with a yemenite, possible non scripted tv show. And so I was telling the producers, you know, this ain't gonna be real housewives to make this show properly. There ain't gonna be any screaming. It's not gonna be bar rescue, where we're yelling at people. We're not gonna be Hell's Kitchen, where we're yelling at people. It's never gonna be exciting, but it is gonna be astonishing. Like, you'll get outcomes where suddenly you find yourself in a place like, what in the world? How did that just happen?

And so I lose a suitcase in an airport the other day, and I'm walking into the lost luggage place, and I'm in a great mood because I'm home, and I'm happy to be home, and I'm going to get a good night's sleep. And even though it's late in the day, I'm just happy. And I get ready to walk into this, the lost luggage store, where these people are batter children. Like, they expect you. They know that you expect them to wave a magic wand, and poof, your luggage is going to be there.

So for whatever reason, that's what I say. When I walk in the door, this young lady says, how can I help you? Well, first of all, how you could help me is obvious. Cause I'm in a lost luggage. There's only one reason I'm in it. So that's kind of a silly question. And I go, I need you to wave a magic wand. And she just laughs, and she looks at me.

She ends up walking me out to the carousel, climbing up on the carousel, and she walks down a ramp the luggage comes out of, and I guarantee you they're not supposed to do that. And she sticks her head, and she looks around, she comes back out, and I've never seen any of these people leave the office, let alone walk back to the carousel. And she says, wait here.

And she disappears into the bowels of the airport, which, like, looks like a super highway down there, right? Like, God knows what it looks like underneath the airport. And pretty soon, the carousel starts up again, and my bag. And another bag pops up. This other poor schmuck is sitting there waiting, and I'm like, I have never seen anybody do this ever.

Like, normally they say, here's a number. We'll call you in 24 hours. It might show up at your house. And I look around at the. There's another young lady there. And I say, you know, please tell her thank you for me. I gotta go. Cause she doesn't come back out for, like, almost ten minutes.

And on my way out, she. She comes out the door and she high fies me, and she says, how's that for waving a magic wand? And that was the magic phrase. And I never would have said it to her if I wasn't playful in a moment. And I've got a couple of others, like, when I was just playful, and I'm joking with people almost at my expense. It's shocking.

astonishing what you can get people to do if you hit them the right way. So interesting. I wonder what it tapped into. But it sounds like it might have tapped into her sense that everybody's always asking me for a magic wand kind of ability, but finally somebody just said it directly, and that would be kind of fun to actually play that role, because normally they're restricted to their keyboard and their phone. I love that.

On the opposite side of that spectrum, if ever you're feeling tense, stressed, jet lagged, angry, I can think about negotiations where people are trying to keep their egos in check. They want to be right. Breakups, negotiations, not necessarily romantic breakups, that could include that, but also professional breakups, the dissolution of a contract or something like that.

Do you ever have to check yourself? Like, okay, I need to. I mean, I imagine being calm is better than not being calm for most all things. Do you have a process of doing that? You seem like a pretty steady guy. I've never seen you. Overall. I'm pretty steady.

Well, the late night FM DJ voice that I'm not sure that I coined the phrase, but kind of famous for to calm you down, also calms me down. So if I get bent out of shape, I will, and the conversation gets heated, I'll switch into that voice with the intention of calming you down, because, you know, that's the hostage negotiator's voice, but it'll calm me down too.

Like, intentionally going to that voice tamps down the negative emotions, which I'm convinced make me dumber in the moment, interfere with my capacity to process information. Got reasons for that? Layman's reasons? No. Scientific, academically rigorous studies that have been in any journals. Well, after you're done I'm going to tell you something that will perhaps be astonishing to you as to why there's real neuroscience behind that late night FM DJ voice having an impact on other people's brains. Yeah.

And I'll do that because it calms me down. Now, if I can make the shift, the hard part is a shift into a positive mindset. If I can make that shift, but I can only make it from a calm voice.

I also think it's the emotions are kind of a rock paper scissors sequence. I don't think you can go from sadness to elation, directly sad, depressed down. I think there's something to getting angry to pull you out of sadness. And I think if you're angry, you've got to go to calm next. And so.

But if I can get out of anger and go to calm, then I can say something to myself. Like, the reality is, this is a luxury problem, or I was in a negotiation with a counterpart that I knew was deceiving, lying to me.

And I remember saying to myself, you know, I'm lucky to be in this negotiation. I mean, they wouldn't be trying to hustle me if we weren't really good. If we didn't have a product that was phenomenal, I wouldn't be targeted at all. So I'm actually lucky to be in this conversation. So if I can make that next shift emotionally, then I'm good. The hard part is making those shifts.

I'm gonna just share with you what I learned recently about sound and emotion. I'm researching an episode on music and the brain. Fascinating topic, believe it or not, there's a lot known, and the auditory system has this property where, of course, there are neurons, nerve cells that respond to different frequencies of sound, low frequency, deeper tones, and high frequency squeals and that sort of thing.

Okay, that's pretty straightforward, just like we have neurons that respond to different colors or different angles of light in the room. But what I learned, and I confirmed with a good friend of mine, who's an auditory neuroscientist and neurosurgeon. His name's Eddie Chang. He was a guest on this podcast previously, is that low frequency sounds of the sort that your voice is, that late night FMDJ voice, are responded to in the brain by neurons. No surprise there.

But the frequency that those neurons fire is also low frequency. In other words, when you speak in your low voice, the other person's brain hears that and starts firing in a low frequency tone. In other words, it entrains to your voice, not just the timing, but it's actually like you're essentially playing an emotional piano down in the low keys of their mind.

Now, when you go up to the high frequencies, the neurons can't follow that high frequency. So there's something special about low frequency sound that actually changes the emotional tone of the people that hear that low frequency sound. This is wild, right?

I mean, of course, the content of the words matters, too. But anyway, there's real neuroscience to support the voice that you were endowed with and that you employed for your work. Well, then also, the point then, too, is the other side's not making a choice.

It's an involuntary reaction. That's right. This is not something one can override, except by perhaps plugging their ears.

If they're hearing that, their mind is getting shifted toward a state of low frequency oscillation, which is one of more calm. Yeah, yeah. So that's a real thing. And were you to have a high, squeaky chipmunks voice, you might not have been the negotiator. You would. Although, who knows? Maybe there'd be another tactic there.

I mean, I think back to the. What, I guess it was during one of the Gulf war campaigns where they, weren't they trying to squeeze out Saddam and some of his people by playing like, Milli Vanilli at high volume for hours and hours? Is that tactic actually used?

So that was Panama when they were trying to get Noriega out of his country. I'm only a few countries over there. I got the trivia I was telling you before, and the wacky, fascinating, useless information around terrorism and stuff like that, I tried that at Panama. And for whatever reason, the military guys, they were playing music and sounds.

And then also, among the many stupid things that the FBI did at Waco, then late at night, they tried that in the Waco compound, too. And it was just. That was one of the things that the hostage negotiators were adamantly against, but they got overruled by oncing command.

Among the many stupid things that were done at Waco, that was also done at Waco. It was stupid. Its counterproductive. Hostage negotiators were always against it.

So for those of you who don't remember Waco, Waco was Branch Davidians. David Koresh, right. Yeah. There was a Netflix series that was out about it recently. That's fair. About how it went down.

Yeah. Sad ending. He eventually set the building ablaze, killed himself and everybody else had people inside set the building on fire. Yeah. Including a lot of children perished, including some children. There are some FBI agents that have still not gotten over that.

Negotiation, Neuroscience, Communication, Inspiration, Technology, Motivation, Huberman Lab Clips