Quotes from Christopher Voss

Successful negotiation is not about getting to 'yes'; it's about mastering 'no' and understanding what the path to an agreement is.

There are three kinds of yeses. There's commitment, confirmation, and counterfeit. People are most used to giving the counterfeit yes because they've been trapped by the confirmation yes so many times. So the way you master no is understanding what really happens when somebody says 'no.' When yes is commitment, no is protection.

The No. 1 rule in any negotiation is don't take yourself hostage. People do this to themselves all the time by being desperate for 'yes' or afraid of 'no,' so they don't ask for what they really want. Instead, they ask for what they can realistically get. I've heard many people say, 'Well, that's a non-starter, so we won't even bring it up.'

'No' is a dynamic that you've got to master before you can ever master 'yes.'

As human beings, we're powerfully swayed by how much we feel we're being respected. People comply with agreements if they feel they've been treated fairly and lash out if they don't.

The moment you've convinced someone that you truly understand her dreams and feelings, mental and behavioral change becomes possible, and the foundation for a breakthrough has been laid.

The best messages in any given negotiation are really implied indirectly, come to the other person based on thinking that you're getting them to do - getting them to get some really solid thought behind their answers. And so a great thing to send someone in an email is, 'Have you given up on this project?'

The sooner you cut off negotiations with someone you shouldn't be dealing with, it gives you the chance to move on to a more profitable deal.

What drives you? What's your motivation? That's not emotion. That's passion. It's a different word.

When you expect to get into a negotiation, you expect to be faced by a guy that's going to attack you, a guy or gal that's going to attack or that they're going to try to get the best of you. Two-thirds of us, that makes us very defensive.

Mirroring is simply repeating what someone just said. It creates more reception from the other side, it focuses attention, and it gives them an opportunity to dial in more with you and you to dial in more with them. It causes an almost completely unconscious response for the person to want to go on.

In reality, every single negotiation involves another commodity that's far more important to us, which is time - minutes, hours, our investment in time. So even if you're talking about dollars, the commodity of time is always there because there has to be a discussion about how the commodity of dollars is moved.

The most dangerous negotiation is the one you don't know you're in.

In a job negotiation, the implementation of that deal is your success that also causes the company to succeed.

What I really think of myself as is a person who's great at negotiation coaching and consulting.

People typically only believe they're in a negotiation when dollars are involved. And maybe sometimes they're smart enough to see if there's a commodity that you can count being exchanged. And, of course, the commodity that we most commonly exchange is money.

The first and best way to say 'no' to anyone is, 'How am I supposed to do that?' Now the other side actually has no idea as to the number of things you've done with them at the same time. You conveyed to them you have a problem.

There's great power in deference. You ask somebody 'what' or 'how' questions. People love to be asked how to do something. They feel powerful, and from a deferential position, you've actually granted that power, and you're the one that now actually has the upper hand in the conversation.

The secret to gaining the upper hand in a negotiation is to give the other side the illusion of control. Don't try to force your opponent to admit that you are right. Ask questions, that begin with 'How?' or 'What?' so your opponent uses mental energy to figure out the answer.

Whether we notice it or not, we spend our days negotiating for something: for our spouse to do more housework, a child to eat just three more bites or go to bed on time, an extended deadline on a project, a salary increase, a better rate on a vacation package.

When it comes to salary negotiation, don't forget that salary is only one term of employment. What else is on the table - vacation time, benefits, bonuses, flex days? Before determining that these terms are 'must-haves' or 'giveaways' to get a bigger salary, find out what the counterpart has to offer.

As a negotiator, you should strive for a reputation of being fair. Your reputation precedes you. Let it precede you in a way that paves success.

'Fair' is, like, this incredibly overused term in negotiations: 'I just want what's fair.' 'What's the fair market price?'

The 'that's right' breakthrough usually doesn't come at the beginning of a negotiation. It's invisible to the counterpart when it occurs, and they embrace what you've said. To them, it's a subtle epiphany.