In short
Why logic-first persuasion fails; persuasion should start with feelings, match values, identify barriers, and use framing (including “loss” framing) to enable shared action.
Guest
Josh Bandoch (former speechwriter; author of How to Get What You Want). Background includes a decade studying why smart people struggle to persuade, fundraising experience, writing for high-level government officials, and public policy advocacy.
Key claims
Brains feel before they reason; “logic tsunami” (dumping arguments/evidence) backfires. Persuasion is about making a difference, not winning or proving you’re right (“crusader” mindset). Ask “How do you feel about X?” then use “green/yellow/red” signals to proceed or pause. When there’s hesitation, find the barrier by asking what would stop them. Use stories to deliver logic emotionally. Calm tone and timing prevent “emotional volcanoes.” Avoid manipulation; use tools with good intentions.
Notable examples
fundraising where “money isn’t the issue” until barriers are identified; occupational licensing framed differently for left vs right (freedom vs disproportionate harm).
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOJosh Bandoch's Journey to Persuasion
0:45 to 3:02
Josh shares his journey from academia to understanding persuasion.
“I'd love to start with your journey into mastering persuasion.”
The Role of Logic in Persuasion
3:02 to 6:39
Discussion on why logic alone is insufficient for effective persuasion.
“Why do you think so many of us default to logic when it comes to persuasion?”
The Logic Tsunami Effect
6:39 to 7:16
How overwhelming someone with logic can backfire in persuasion efforts.
Marrying IQ with Emotional Intelligence
7:16 to 8:38
The importance of combining logic with emotional intelligence in persuasion.
“as you know, as somebody who's experienced the persuasion to work.”
Common Misconceptions About Persuasion
8:38 to 10:34
Exploring misconceptions around persuasion being about winning and convincing.
“Yeah, I think many of us, when we think about trying to persuade someone, we think about winning and we think that winning then leads to agreement, getting the other person to fully agree with us.”
Applying Emotional Intelligence in Persuasion
13:04 to 14:01
Practical tips on using emotional intelligence to persuade others effectively.
“So to make it practical for those in our audience who might have to persuade team members or might have to persuade someone at work, How can we approach it with this EQ mindset first?”
Understanding Persuasion: Green, Yellow, Red Lights
14:01 to 15:19
Learn about the importance of emotional feedback in persuasion.
“other interns and he got to stay on and get a promotion.”
Identifying and Overcoming Barriers in Persuasion
15:20 to 18:23
Discover how to uncover and address barriers to persuasion.
“So give us some ideas of what's a green and then what might be a yellow and then what is a clear red so that we can start to steer as we go through this persuasive process.”
The Importance of Listening in Negotiation
18:24 to 21:18
Understand how listening can enhance your persuasive abilities.
“Because when people shut down and they're in the red light and they're in no mode, good luck getting them out of that.”
Types of Listening: Enhancing Connection and Understanding
22:36 to 27:21
Explore the different types of listening and their effects on communication.
“Because you tell people, listen, you need to active listening or you need to be a better listener.”
Show all 22 chapters
Avoiding Assumptions in Persuasion Conversations
27:22 to 28:00
Learn the risks of making assumptions during persuasive discussions.
“Like people do things for any number of reasons.”
Understanding the Pressure of Persuasion
28:00 to 29:59
Learn how pressure affects persuasion and the importance of emotional listening.
“They're recognizing, oh, this is a time to lean into that emotional listening and the EQ to find the value alignment and not really figure out, okay, how can we both win in this situation?”
The Importance of Identifying Barriers
30:00 to 31:39
Discover why understanding objections is crucial for successful persuasion.
“And one kind of big picture thing that I'll press on before sharing a couple of additional thoughts is the necessity of training and trusting your training and practicing in low stakes situations.”
The Psychology of Loss versus Gain
31:40 to 33:39
Explore how framing deals in terms of loss can enhance persuasion.
“And then yes, that's getting to yes means them giving you money, sign the deal, whatever, but you don't get that by forcing yes on somebody.”
Crusaders vs. Persuaders Mindset
33:40 to 36:20
Understand the difference between being right and making a difference in persuasion.
“I have a lot of potential clients or either like, well, you could gain 10%.”
Navigating Authenticity in Persuasion
36:21 to 39:26
Learn how to persuade authentically without crossing into manipulation.
“things in their terms, communicate at level of their values.”
Managing Emotional Volcanoes in Conversations
39:27 to 41:20
Discover strategies for handling high-tension situations effectively.
“But my reply is always, what is it about you that drives you straight to that quandary the minute you see basic psychology and how it works?”
Calm Responses in Heated Situations
41:21 to 42:00
Learn techniques to maintain calm during tense discussions to enhance communication.
“like get the lava not flowing, you know, okay, cool, calm things down.”
The Importance of Calmness in Communication
42:00 to 44:44
Learn how maintaining a calm demeanor can enhance persuasion and emotional management.
“Do you really need to engage them right now?”
Understanding Values for Effective Persuasion
44:44 to 47:26
Discover how recognizing and appealing to differing values can improve persuasion across divides.
“So do you have any other practical strategies that we can do if we find that in these situations, we tend to also be emotionally charged and it's difficult for us to come with that calm demeanor?”
The Taste Bud Mentality in Persuasion
47:26 to 52:30
Explore the concept of moral taste buds and their role in effective persuasion strategies.
“Would you ever force feed a vegetarian veal?”
Putting Others First: Key to Persuasion
52:30 to 55:05
Understand why prioritizing others' needs is crucial for successful persuasion.
“So now that you've mastered the art of persuasion, I'd love to wrap with what was the one piece of advice that had the biggest impact on you early in your career as you were looking to become more persuasive?”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00In each and every interaction, personal, professional, throughout every single day, we're faced with a choice. Do I want to be right or do I want to make a difference? And being right is really easy. So what's the alternative? To make a difference. And making a difference means that sometimes you got to not say that thing that you want to say because it just feels good to say it. and understand them, say things that resonate with them, build an authentic, trusting relationship with them, put things in their terms, communicate at level of their values, those sorts of things that make them feel good about moving forward with you and then grease the wheels of shared action time after time.
0:54Johnny:all right let's kick off today's show today we're talking with josh vandock former speech writer and author of how to get what you want mastering the art and science of persuasion josh spent a decade studying why smart people struggle to persuade and what neuroscience reveals about how we actually make decisions today he shares why our brains feel before they reason how six moral taste buds shape values, the real cost of making persuasion about winning, and why framing matters more than your argument. Welcome to the show, Josh. It's great to have you. AJ, John, thank you so much. It's a real pleasure to be here.
1:31Johnny:I'd love to start with your journey into mastering persuasion. If you could share with our audience a bit about your career and what drew you to persuasion. This has been really, as I reflected on this, It's been like two decades in the making. Part of it was that in my previous life, I was an academic. And academics, they're many of them really high IQ and somehow not persuasive. And I kind of intuitively knew something was a little bit off. And then I left academia. And I have come over the last decade, which is what it took to put this book together to understand what that was. So I spent some time in fundraising and I started to understand that there's this mindset you need if you want to sell things and get what you want.
2:19And it's to flip things, to not focus on yourself, but to focus on the other person. Okay. And then I just started doing a lot of research and a lot of just practicing communications. As a speechwriter, I wrote for a number of high-level government officials. and then just reading the neuroscience, the psychology, and trying to understand how this thing up here, the human brain works, because I think you have two options. You can either ignore our cognitive realities, probably not a recipe for success, or you can just understand and navigate them. So then I've also turned into a public policy advocate.
2:53So I get out and advocate for ideas on a weekly basis. And I've tried to bring all of that together and put it into this book, How to Get What You Want.
3:02Johnny:Why do you think so many of us default to logic when it comes to persuasion? Well, I think for so many reasons, and then I'll kind of explain why it's not the best approach. Look, IQ is important and logic is important. We don't want our engineers to build bridges on illogical foundations. That's a recipe for disaster. And we're also taught, right? Like, you know, be smart. And then like we're taught in school to sort of reason in a certain way. Academics reinforce this through the peer review process. So it makes sense intuitively because nobody's story is like, well, you know, I'm not smart.
3:42And like, that's great, right? Like we're all taught to be smart and we celebrate that. So it makes sense. It's just that the trouble is that our brains are wired a little bit differently. So our brains are wired to feel first, then reason. Sometimes it's feel, then reason. Sometimes it's feel and we never get to reasoning. So that's our cognitive process, but logic is still celebrated in the academy, in schools, and everything. It's just that it's not in accordance with how these things are wired, all of us.
4:14Johnny:Yeah, I think the struggle for many of us is once we've reached that place, that conclusion, that area that we want to advocate for, we feel that we've brought a lot of logic to the situation. So then we start from logic first. So we don't think about the emotions that drew us there in the first place. A hundred percent. And because we feel first, that means that persuasion actually starts with feelings, which, you know, especially for people who pride themselves on their intellect, you know, went to college, maybe had some additional degrees. That's like, that's a really tough pill to swallow.
4:46And the research actually shows that people who tragically suffer brain damage and lose the ability to emote, their logic is actually impaired. So our emotions actually support our reasoning. And, you know, maybe think about it this way. So the sort of most brutal way to, I think, take the logic first approach is what I call logic tsunami. So you just launch your logic of somebody else and you're hoping that the tsunami is gonna wash away their bad thoughts or their mistaken thoughts about something. And has that either, has that ever worked on you? It's like, we don't like being on the receiving end of that kind of approach, right?
5:32So it's like, well, we don't like people launching their logic at us. And instead, you have to start with feelings. And even when you share logic, you have to make sure that the logic that you share is in accordance with how your counterpart thinks about things, not just how you think about things. Everyone has the mechanisms in which they get to their truth. And mentioning the logic tsunami, there has certainly been a lot of positions that I had come to in the last few years that I didn't want to have to come to. and it the the logic tsunami at least for myself it didn't happen all at once it was just being bombarded with data and evidence over and over and over and over that slowly ate away at the the emotional hold that i had over some positions that had won out so you know in thinking about it absolutely the logic tsunami might not flip the switch in the moment but a steady barrage a steady leak of that the the annoying of factoids that uh if they just keep presenting themselves over and over and over again eventually if the if the other person on the other side prides themselves on accepting evidence of data, you will eventually win over.
7:15But yeah, I mean, there's many different ways, as you know, as somebody who's experienced the persuasion to work.
7:27A hundred percent. And I think the superpower that people need to develop is take your IQ and marry it with emotional intelligence. So how do you deliver that logic? And how do you deliver in a way that is going to be received better by your audience? So sure, some of it is a slow drip. You don't have to hit somebody with things all at once. And one reason that you want to start with feelings is that you just need to know how somebody's feeling about something. If you're trying to sell them on something and you can literally just ask them, how do you feel about this deal? And they say, well, look, you know, the trouble for me is I just, I don't know if I have the financing now.
8:08okay, well, there's logic there too. They don't have the money. So then you're starting to understand what are some of the barriers to moving forward. So I think it's delivering the logic in a way that's palatable. The best way to do that is to tell them stories. So you can tell a story about maybe even the data or tell a story about somebody who say, did what you wanted this person to do and how it worked out for them. You're always delivering logic. The question is, how are you doing it? And I think the answer is with as much emotional intelligence as possible.
8:38Johnny:Yeah, I think many of us, when we think about trying to persuade someone, we think about winning and we think that winning then leads to agreement, getting the other person to fully agree with us. But the actual way to get agreement first is on an emotional level. When you can actually match and mirror someone's emotions, recognize and validate those emotions, it actually opens up their ability to start to agree or see your perspective and your life. 100%. And there are two, I think, big misconceptions of what persuasion is. And you just touched on the first one, which is that it's about winning.
9:18And if I win against you, what does that make you? It makes you a loser. That's terrible. Do you want to work with somebody who makes you feel like a loser?
9:33Not really. So the other big misconception is that persuasion is all about convincing someone to think like us. And the problem is that the Latin root of the word convince actually means to vanquish or to conquer. And conquest is barbaric. So when you try to win against somebody, it's oftentimes counterproductive. And if you instead just start by understanding how they're feeling about something, then that actually is a quicker route to their logic because the emotions are almost always grounded in reason. And when you ask somebody, how do you feel about this? They give you an unguarded answer as opposed to if you say, what do you think about something?
10:12And they pause and they give you that guarded answer. And if somebody's feeling negative about the idea or they're just having a bad day, then it just might not be the right time to proceed with it. If they're feeling good, green light, go, proceed.
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13:00Johnny:See Mint Mobile for details. MintMobile.com slash charm. So to make it practical for those in our audience who might have to persuade team members or might have to persuade someone at work, How can we approach it with this EQ mindset first? Walk us through what we should be thinking and doing to prepare as we hope to persuade someone to our side. Absolutely. It starts by putting them first. And the trouble is that we're wired to think and talk mostly about ourselves. I had an intern a couple of summers ago at smart kid, nice kid, John, and he loved to just put himself at the center of things, talk first, talk, talk a lot, wave his hand around, show everyone how great he was.
13:43He even liked to interrupt people, loved to interrupt me. And I kind of said, well, you know, do you think interrupting is the best way to, you know, to get what you want? And you know, okay, maybe not. And over the course of summer, he started to transform and to instead of putting himself first, put the team first. And that worked out, it should be well for John. He started, he eventually outperformed all the other interns and he got to stay on and get a promotion. So he kind of flipped this around. And what John did aligns with our wiring, wired to think about ourselves. It's how we're taught, right?
14:15To put ourselves at the center of things. It's just not persuasive. So you have to put them first. Then what do you do? You understand how they're feeling. And the selfie tactic is just to literally ask somebody, instead of saying, what do you think about something? What are you thinking right now, whatever, just say, how do you feel about whatever it is? And then they tell you, and that's the quick intuitive. And then when you know that, if they're giving you a green light to proceed, great. If it's a red light or a yellow light, well, maybe you don't proceed or you have to pause. Then you have to generate persuasive feelings.
14:49How do you do that? Well, you have to be for something and ideally for something that resonates with them. You can be for something that makes you feel amazing. And if it doesn't generate persuasive feelings in your counterpart, then that's not gonna work. If you're trying to sell something and you have all these things you think are great about it and you're for those things, and that doesn't at all overlap with what the person wants or needs, that's not gonna work. And the best way to do all of this is to tell stories. So that's the really quick version going through everything.
15:18Johnny:Well, let's talk about that red, yellow, green scenario. So give us some ideas of what's a green and then what might be a yellow and then what is a clear red so that we can start to steer as we go through this persuasive process. So there are two big questions I would encourage people to ask. The first is, how do you feel about X? And then they're going to tell you. And if they respond something like, oh yeah, that sounds great. Well, you know, okay, cool. Or if they're like, look, I love so much about this. Okay, that's like a pretty green light. If they say, well, you know, oh, I just, I think this could work, but I'm still working on a couple of things, okay?
15:58Then there's some hesitation there. That's the yellow light. And if they're like, you know, not a good time, man, like this, please come back later, right, red light. So then if you see the yellow or the red light, people think the persuasion is about getting somebody to do something. And I've learned over the decade plus that I've been working on this, that persuasion is much more about identifying, understanding what's stopping somebody from doing something because they're not doing it now. Why not? You have to understand that. So you have to identify and remove barriers. So once you get that yellow or that red light from somebody, you literally just want to ask them something like, what would stop you from proceeding?
16:47What would stop you from working with me? What would stop you from signing on to this deal? Whatever it is that you want exactly from them. What would stop you from buying? What would stop you from increasing how much you buy from me? And when you ask somebody about barriers, they're not nearly as guarded as if you ask somebody, well, hey, will you buy more? So they'll say, well, look, I love what you're doing. I think it's a great product. But I'm committed to another vendor until the end of this year. So can you come back to me in November? Okay, cool. So it's just a matter of months. Or if they say, look, I love what you're doing.
17:24I just, I don't have the financing right now. And I got a couple of things in the pipeline. If they pan out, great. Then we could talk in a few months. Or if they say, look, you know, I just, I've been working with this other vendor for a long time. I like him. I trust him. It's a long-term relationship. Or if they say, look, I don't know if your product meets my needs. Okay, well, then you have to understand what they are. Those are all different. either yellow or red lights. And if you don't ask them what the barrier is, then you don't know what you have to overcome. And then what you need to do is remove that barrier.
17:57So if they're concerned, does your product meet their needs, understand what their needs are, and then show as authentically and carefully as possible, here's how my product is gonna give you exactly what you need. Not what I think you need, but what you need. And that's why you have to identify those barriers. Otherwise you can't remove them. And then that's stopping somebody from doing what you want them to do. And certainly if you're getting the yellow light, it's certainly proceeding with caution. Because when people shut down and they're in the red light and they're in no mode, good luck getting them out of that.
18:36They've already made up their mind. But the yellow is somewhat of a blessing because you're going to, if you ask the right questions, you're going to get all sorts of information that not only is going to help you on that cell, but it's also going to help you in the future as well. and if you if they're at a yellow but you ask them how they feel and they're they're open to it you're going to learn all sorts of things i mean people will tell you everything you need to know about them to move forward to get the green if you listen they're going to drop identity markers constantly through that conversation and those identity markers all lead to their the mechanisms that drive decisions, such as their core values, the things that are important to them.
19:31And if there are hurdles, it's going to be because a core value is either not being met or is infringed upon. 100 % to all of that. You said listening and it starts there. And a lot of people who are trying to negotiate a deal, sell something, whatever, they forget that you have to start with listening because if I listen to you and who you are, what you care about, I can appeal to that. And then if there's still a barrier there and I'm not listening for it and I don't see it because I'm not looking, because I'm just not that interested, then that's gonna always stop you from moving forward. So you have to listen.
20:10And then when you can remove those barriers, that's powerful for two reasons. It unlocks long-term working with somebody because that barrier is not there and they feel like you're really understanding them. So that forms connection, relationship, and trust, which is really powerful. Some things you also have to look out for are somebody's tone, because the words can sound good.
20:36Yeah, that would work for me. Well, there was a lot of hesitation there, as opposed to, yeah, that would work for me. If you're not listening out for tone and you just hear the words, then what sounds like a green light to somebody who's not listening, yeah, that would work for me, is actually hesitation. Yeah, that would work for me. And then when you see that hesitation, call it out because people get really afraid. So they're like, well, I think he's hesitant, but I'm just going to blow by it and I'm not going to worry about it. The best thing you can do is just to put it front and center. So you can just say, look, it sounds like you're hesitant or it sounds like you're concerned that my product doesn't meet your needs.
21:15You don't have the financing, whatever. Call it out and invite them to say more and then just listen. Don't ignore it.
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22:44Because you tell people, listen, you need to active listening or you need to be a better listener. Everybody's heard that, but yet without proper instructions or having an idea of what you're listening for, you're just turning up everything. You're just making things louder in your mind. That doesn't help. It's about identifying the indicators of those core values. And for our clients, conversation takes on new meaning once that is unlocked. In fact, you know, it's from going from, well, we're talking about hearing, but we can make the analogy of seeing from black and white to color. Absolutely.
23:30And one of the funny things about listening is that no one teaches us how to do it. I mean, I know you do with your clients, but for the most part, we're not taught how to listen. So it's like we have these things, ears, like hearing somebody is not the same as listening to them. In the book, I talk about three kinds of listening. Past listening, which is just shut the front door and just listen to what somebody's saying. And that's powerful because we love feeling heard. And then active listening, which is starting to like really press on the things that somebody cares about to deepen your understanding of them.
24:03And then proactive listening, which points you towards shared action. You might ask a question like, how do you want to proceed? And we think that if I talk, I'm going to make all my points and I'm going to drive conversation. If you ask someone how they want to proceed or what the next steps are, oftentimes, especially if you're connected with them, they're going to lay things out that you already like. Check, check, check. Cool. I didn't have to ask for that. They offered it. They're going to oftentimes offer more on some things than you were going to even ask for. And then if they are offering seven things and five of them sound great, you can say, oh, well, could we also do these one or two things?
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24:44and they feel like you're giving them five or six things and you just want one thing from them and you've gotten way more than if you said, I want this, this, and this. And they're like, well, I don't know, maybe, but then I can do that.
24:55Johnny:Yeah, I think the problem for many of us, especially when there's tension and pressure on us, is we start focusing on pattern matching with our listening. Like, oh, I hear this, so that means this barrier. Or I've heard this before on another conversation, so let me just assume that that's what's going on with them because it speeds up the process And it starts to alleviate that tension and pressure from us as we walk into uncertainty. But unfortunately, when we're making those assumptions and we're guessing based on previous conversations with completely other people, oftentimes we're going to end up being less persuasive because we're not actually identifying their real barriers.
25:31Johnny:And what I love about the questions that you just shared with our audience is these work in any situation, not just in a sales conversation. Maybe you have to give constructive feedback in a review and you want the person to actually hear what the review is and not put up a barrier and get frustrated with you and breach the relationship with them. So recognizing that by asking another layer of questions and bringing another layer of curiosity, instead of defaulting to your pattern matching analytical side, when being persuasive, creates more on the table, as you shared, really gets to the meat of what the barrier is and not just assuming that we understand the barrier and makes the other person more open to what we have to share with them because now we can find alignment instead of being adversarial.
26:16Absolutely, and listening is actually a great me first strategy. The missionary reason to listen and to put the other person first is that that's how you build authentic relationships. That's how you build trust and that's how we all wanna be treated. The mercenary reason for it is that when you're talking and I'm listening carefully, I'm identifying overlapping the things that we both want. So that's where we can work together. And I'm understanding your values and I can appeal to those values. And what you said is 100 % right, which is oftentimes we assume, okay, well, I talked to this other guy recently.
27:02This is a similar situation. So I assume this is the same situation. And it could be a totally different situation. And if you don't listen, you're making appeals, you know, A and B when it's actually appeals C and D that you need. And sometimes appeals A and B might upset the other person. So don't make those appeals, right? Like people do things for any number of reasons. Don't assume that your reasons are their reasons or that Bob's reasons is John's or AJ's reasons because they're not. Yeah.
27:33Johnny:And so often, you know, we've experienced this in sales. And if anyone in the audience is in sales, you've definitely experienced this where you might assume, oh, they don't have the money. And in actuality, by asking a few more questions, it was, well, no, actually, I make big decisions with my wife and I actually have the money. But if you just make the assumption they don't have the money and start trying to manage that roadblock, you're going to find they're going to be really frustrated with you. And they're going to feel like now you're making assumption that they don't have money at all.
28:01Johnny:So oftentimes when we're looking for these patterns to be persuasive and if we find ourselves in conversations like this, sales where we have to persuade again and again, it's easy to default to that pattern matching part of our brain and start making assumptions to speed up the process because we're feeling that tension and pressure. And that's why, as John shared, we really focus with our clients on putting them in tense and pressure-filled situations inside of the course and the training so that then when they go out in the real world and they're finding themselves in the same tense, pressure-filled situation, they're not defaulting to the pattern matching and to logic.
28:38Johnny:They're recognizing, oh, this is a time to lean into that emotional listening and the EQ to find the value alignment and not really figure out, okay, how can we both win in this situation? And one thing that comes out of this with a lot of our clients is they feel this pressure to find yes. and they may have even heard on other courses or online, like the yes ladder, just get them saying yes again and again. If you could string together a few yeses and all of a sudden they're going to be in complete agreement, right? And that falls completely flat in the moment and they don't recognize why. And I think it's really important to shift to focusing on, well, actually, what is the barrier?
29:20Johnny:What's the block here? What's the no? And can I get to that no so that we can figure out how to turn that no into a yes and not avoid the no or treat the no like the elephant in the room. To go along with that, when you bring up what yes momentum is or the yes ladder, that's where people go to, right? But what actuality is, the yes momentum or ladder is just a result of you doing the focusing on the right things. So, you know, it's not the mechanism here. It's a result of you doing the right things, which is the reason it works. It's not the mechanism itself. Absolutely. And one kind of big picture thing that I'll press on before sharing a couple of additional thoughts is the necessity of training and trusting your training and practicing in low stakes situations.
30:16so that when you get into these tense situations that you're talking about, you're negotiating a big deal, a tense conversation, that you're ready to do that. So you're training things like listening and you're even sort of untraining some of the bad habits you've talked about, like going for yes. And one of the reasons that putting them first is so powerful is that if you ask yourself, well, how would I feel if somebody did this to me? So when somebody tries to corner me into saying yes, like I get defensive. I don't want to do it. And I don't like that. So completely agree. You can actually invite no and understand what their barriers are.
30:53That's why the barrier question is so important. What would stop you? What's stopping you? I used to work in fundraising. That's just selling a nonprofit. And it's like, well, what would stop you from either investing in my organization or what would stop you from increasing? It might not be my money at all. I And it's like, money is not the issue. So is it that they just, they haven't seen the ROI on their investment? Is it that you're really a second or a third tier priority? Or they just don't know enough about you. What is it exactly that's stopping them? And if you don't know what their no is, and you just say, well, but isn't this great from my perspective, then you're not gonna make the sale or you're gonna sell way less than if you understand what their no is through listening.
31:42And then yes, that's getting to yes means them giving you money, sign the deal, whatever, but you don't get that by forcing yes on somebody. They even talk about what is it? Yes. Tie downs is one of the approaches because we all love being tied down.
31:55Johnny:Yeah. I can't imagine a more awkward conversation to be in than someone forcing yes momentum on me and tying me down to sell me the used car. Yeah. Going along with that, But I think the other default mode that we find ourselves in in these situations is we focus on the game. We feel like, hey, the best way to persuade this person is to share with them everything they're going to get out of this deal, everything that's going to come out of them actually upping their performance and doing the thing that I need and how they're going to get a raise and they're going to get a promotion if they just improve their work.
32:30Johnny:Or, hey, I'm selling you something and look at all these added benefits you're going to get. and in actuality, we are not wired to care nearly as much about the gains as we think about and fear the losses. But if we find ourselves in the situation where we're leaning into all the things you're going to gain and never addressing what the actual fear that they have is, is what are they going to lose in this deal? What are they going to pay? What's going to be the cost of them proceeding? If we don't address that at all, we actually become less persuasive. And it's really counterintuitive when we feel like, hey, this is a great deal.
33:06Johnny:I have a great service. I have a great opportunity for you. Why aren't you saying yes? Oh, I love it. Loss is so foundational. This is Danny Kahneman and Amos Tversky's work about prospect theory, which is that loss stings five or 10 times as much as a gain. So you have to not just understand what somebody's going to quote unquote win or get from something what they stand to lose. And sometimes you can even frame things in terms of losses. So do you want to lose the opportunity to work together, right? I have a lot of potential clients or either like, well, you could gain 10%. The flip side of that is that if we don't work together, you're going to lose 10%.
33:53So even just framing things in terms of loss after you understand what their concerns are, because the thing that you think they might be losing, they could see it as a gain or they may not see it as a loss. So understand what they might be worried about losing and then help them understand that they don't want to lose that and you can stop them from losing that and instead help them gain things. But yeah, frame things in terms of losses when you can.
34:19Johnny:Going along with this analytical, technical mindset that we see in our clients, much of their career and certainly much of their schooling and certification has been around proving they are right, proving that they are correct and accurate. And that creates this crusaders mindset that they then bring into these soft skill areas, these areas of persuasion where they just feel they have to prove to the other side that they are right. And if in doing so, they adopt this mindset, well, the other side is going to feel wrong and they're going to be less likely to be persuaded or convinced by our argument.
34:54Johnny:But this is a trap that many of our analytical clients fall into. Oh, I could not agree more. And there's the crusaders mindset versus the persuaders mindset. And I like to frame things this way. In each and every interaction, personal, professional, throughout every single day, we're faced with a choice. Do I want to be right or do I want to make a difference? and being right is really easy and that's what crusaders love doing, right? They love to send the text, the email, like the tweets, right? Make that point in the meeting because you know you're right. It doesn't matter how the other person experiences that.
35:38And I once worked with someone professionally, they moved on to another opportunity and I got some feedback from people that organization is for essentially like summer opportunities. and talked to the guy who supervised him and said, look, this guy performed like five years above his like grade level essentially. And doesn't matter. We don't want him back because all he did was go around and be right and offended all of his colleagues. It's like this guy's super smart and he has had so many doors closed to him because he has to be right on everything. So what's the alternative? To make a difference.
36:19And making a difference means that sometimes you got to not say that thing that you want to say because it just feels good to say it and understand them, say things that resonate with them, build an authentic, trusting relationship with them, put things in their terms, communicate at level of their values. Those sorts of things that make them feel good about moving forward with you and then grease the wheels of shared action time after time.
36:47Johnny:I think at this point, many in our audience are probably wondering about this tension that comes up anytime we talk about persuasion, which is how do we do this authentically and build a real connection versus all this tactical stuff where it feels like manipulating someone? So what do you say to that listener who's skeptical of what we shared and is fearful about coming across as manipulative? It's a great question. And I get this a lot of times. Well, aren't you just teaching manipulation? And it's like the force in Star Wars, or it's like a knife, right? How do you use it? So the force, do you want to be Yoda or Luke Skywalker?
37:29Or do you want to be Darth Vader or the Emperor? You have a knife and you can prepare a magnificent meal. You know, that's like, think about three starred, you know, chefs. They got all those fancy Michelin stars. Or you could do somebody great harm with a knife. So it's about intentions. And if you go into relationships with people and you're only trying to twist and turn, that's manipulation. So all the tools that I talk about in the book and all the strategies, they can be used to do bad things in addition to good things. the missionary reason to persuade and not to manipulate is that manipulation is wrong.
38:11No one likes being manipulated. Uh, and we don't like when people do it to us. So don't do it to other people. The mercenary reason is that when you manipulate first, so often people's sensors go off in their brain and there's already that yellow or that red light. Um, something, something's not right here. I don't know about this guy. I'm not sure if I should proceed. And that slows everything down. And then if they sign a deal with you and they found out that you did manipulate them, they're going to do a couple of things. They're going to drag their feet implementing that deal and they're never going to work with you again.
38:53And they're going to tell other people. So you lose out on all the people that if you had that authentic persuasive relationship as opposed to an inauthentic, manipulative relationship. All the people that they could say, oh my God, I've been working with AJ. He is phenomenal. They say, yeah, don't ever work with him. He's a jerk. He manipulated me. Stay away. Which one's better for long-term business? I don't know. You tell me. For myself, I usually get a lot of those comments just due to the content that I create. But my reply is always, what is it about you that drives you straight to that quandary the minute you see basic psychology and how it works?
39:46What do they say? Can I ask? Nothing.
39:49Johnny:Yeah, I think, unfortunately, for many of us, we've had it happen to us where we've been tied down or frustrated by the way someone's proceeded to potentially use our psychology against us. And then we feel quite guarded and thinking about, well, how could I use this? and unfortunately there there's situations where it's boiled over and you've been so frustrated that maybe you've experienced the emotional volcano where you have the outburst because you feel that you've been taken advantage of and maybe on the flip side you're trying some of these strategies you're breaking some eggs to make an omelet and you've misread the situation you didn't correctly understand what the barrier was or what their value was and now you've stepped in it.
40:36Johnny:So let's talk about those emotional volcanoes and how to manage that because tempers can flare when these skills are used to manipulate or when we use them inappropriately. Totally. And I would just add another layer to that, which is that there's the intentional component of manipulation and that gets tempers to flare. Sometimes it's unintentional too. You might unintentionally offend somebody's values, right? You might say something that is totally in alignment with your values and is not in alignment with their values, whether it's a financial point or a political point, we'll stay away from politics today, or anything.
41:14So whether it's intentional or unintentional, what do you do when tensions are flaring? There's what you do that you can control inside yourself and then what you can control to sort of like get the lava not flowing, you know, okay, cool, calm things down. You have to ask yourself whether now is the right time to engage somebody. If you're upset, maybe that's not the best, like when was the last time that you were furious, walked into a situation and things turned out well? I don't know. It probably doesn't happen too often. So are you even in an emotional state ready to proceed? And is the other person, right?
41:57Like they're upset, your fault or not your fault, doesn't matter they are. Do you really need to engage them right now? Because sometimes people just need time. That's like why people say, go walk around the block, because you just get a little bit of distance from a situation. And then when you're ready to proceed, bring maximum calm to a situation. Tone is really important. And if your tone is edgy, irritated, stressed out in some way, people hear that, they experience it. Whereas if you can bring calm to a situation, like what kind of leaders do we want in tense situations? We want calm leaders.
42:34And research shows that a calm tone is more effective. It also helps to ease those emotions that if someone else is just screaming at you and you can stay calm, that's going to help to cool things down. You can ask them literally like, what has them so frustrated? You don't say, why are you so angry? But just look, I'm sorry. I know you're really upset right now. Do you mind just sharing with me what has you so frustrated? And sometimes you might think it's about you and it may not be about you. Sometimes it's about you. Sometimes it's about the deal that is on the table. Maybe you didn't craft that deal.
43:10Maybe you're just selling it, but ask them, let them just share because that takes the temperature down a little bit. At least they've gotten it off their chest. Okay. And then ask, okay, well, what are your biggest concerns? What are your biggest hangups? And then when they get more emotional about certain things, look, I just feel like you're taking advantage of me. You know, we're a startup and you know, we're trying to get off the ground and I just, you know, this really frustrates me. Okay, well, they're upset about that. They feel like you're taking advantage of them. Maybe you are, maybe you aren't.
43:46You have to address it. And then call those things out, address them with emotional intelligence. Don't accuse them. Don't get upset. Because I think part of the thing that we do with emotions is that we judge them. And they're happening. And you have to observe them and navigate them way before you judge them, way before.
44:05Johnny:Yeah, and I think for many of us in these situations, those emotions we might not even recognize so the person on the other side might not even recognize that they're expressing frustration or anger at you because emotions can be very difficult for us to control especially under tension and pressure and that's why it's so important to recognize but what can we do to manage our emotions more effectively not worry so much about trying to manage the other side's emotions but if we can come with that calm tone if we can withstand whatever the emotional pressure that the other side is feeling, we become more persuasive in that moment.
44:39Johnny:And it can definitely be challenging when we feel that the stakes are really high, or maybe we can lose something here. So we feel emotionally charged too. So do you have any other practical strategies that we can do if we find that in these situations, we tend to also be emotionally charged and it's difficult for us to come with that calm demeanor? part of it is to trust your training and to know on average what works, these sorts of things, being calm, being mindful of how your counterpart is feeling. That's why the feeling question is so important. And just observing those things before that though, understanding them and trying to get a sense of where they are and what might push them to feel more negatively about something.
45:28So, you know, if you're going to meet with a potential or current client and you have information about, you know, their interest and values and their financial situation and things like that, then don't press them on things that, you know, don't work for them. Because a lot of times, you know what those triggers are and, you know, avoid those triggers. I mean, just think about, you know, like when you say something intentionally to upset somebody, you know, it's a trigger. So think about the things that could not, through any bad intentions, trigger somebody because you're trying to stop them from even going down that negative emotional route in the first place.
46:05So that's where understanding beforehand and the listening come in, giving them outlets throughout the conversation. you got to pause sometimes and say like, how are you feeling about this? Because if there's just like a little, you know, bit of like concern, maybe early in the conversation and you don't address it and that builds up, then it goes from small to big or small to enormous, or even just small to like bigger. And it's growing in their mind. So invite those things. How you feeling about this? They say, look, you know, I like a lot of what I'm hearing. Okay. What do you like? fine. It sounds like there's some hesitation.
46:42What is it? Just invite it and then address it because you're always looking to release the pressure, release the pressure so that it's manageable as opposed to unmanageable.
46:53Johnny:Now, we are far from a political show, but we've talked in the past about how politics seems to run the day right now. And many of us find ourselves across the divide from coworkers, friends, family in difficult situations. And yet we need to be persuasive. We can't just persuade our own side. We have to understand how to persuade all sides. So walk us through the taste bud mentality and how we can start to understand these core motivators and values that allow us to be persuasive, even if we have no agreement with the other side or politically, we are completely at odds. Would you ever force feed a vegetarian veal?
47:32No. Would you foresee somebody who keeps kosher? Absolutely not. Right. So the worst way to persuade somebody is to offend their values. So you have to understand somebody's values and appeal to them. So the moral taste stuff, it's chapter five of the book. And on our physical tongues, we have five, maybe six taste receptors, sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami, maybe fat. Wired, and I'll get back to that in a minute, into our hearts and minds, we have six, maybe seven moral tastes. Care, essentially, whether somebody tends to others or whether intensity to suffering. Equity, which is a concern about equal outcomes.
48:19Proportionality, which is a concern about merit and hard work. Loyalty, in-group, out-group. authority, concern for hierarchies, purity, things that are sacred versus things that are degraded or disgusting, and liberty, essentially being free to live as you see fit. Two really important things. The first is that research on twins shows that 30 to 60 percent of our sensitivity to these things is wired into us. So I don't hate people because they're not seven foot six inches tall with red hair or four foot, six inches tall with green hair. So if somebody's values are at least to a large degree wired into them, we don't have to judge those values.
49:04We can simply observe them. And that's the first thing that when it's a values conversation, we think, well, my values are right and your values are wrong. And I just observe people's values and appeal to them. The other tricky thing is that people of different political persuasions, they tend to have distinct value sets. Folks who are more on the left tend to be sensitive primarily to care and equity and like a certain kind of liberty, which is different from conservatives who are sensitive to proportionality, loyalty, authority, purity, and a certain kind of liberty, which is more about like being free to do what you want, as opposed to the kind of liberty on the left, which is about kind of enabling people to be free through, say, like a welfare program.
49:51Libertarians have an even narrower moral palette, which is just about liberty and proportionality. There's not really any overlap, one average, one average with folks on the left and the right. So one reason that it feels like, you know, we're passing in the night with political conversations is that we are, because people have different political values. So instead of judging that and saying, I'm right and you're wrong, which again, this is largely wiring, what do you do? You understand and appeal to somebody else's values. If somebody is really sensitive to say care or an unequal outcome, you don't have to say that it's wrong.
50:30You're concerned with those things. You figure out how you appeal to their values. If someone is really concerned with authority or proportionality, whatever, hard work, then you simply appeal to those things.
50:43Johnny:What I like about this tastebud model is it actually orients us around what to focus on with our questions and how to understand those values in the other person instead of placing it on judgment immediately. And I think many of us look for identity markers instead outside of those taste buds. And if we approach it from the tastebud mindset, it allows us to start to see where there is more overlap than there is disagreement. And then, of course, we can appeal to those areas of overlap. Yeah, and the overlap can be on the values, which is powerful. There can even be overlap on your goals, what you seek to achieve, or even just observing a situation similarly.
51:24One of the hats I wear is in the policy space. And for example, there is something called occupational licensing, which is a government permission slip to work in an industry. So I think that those burdens are oftentimes too big or maybe even unnecessary. If I wanted to try to persuade somebody who is conservative that these burdens are bad, I would say this infringes on somebody's freedom to work and hard work should determine if you succeed in an industry. If I wanted to talk to somebody on the left about why I think these burdens are bad, then I would say, well, these burdens disproportionately hurt blacks and Hispanics.
52:02That's based on data from the Federal Reserve of Minneapolis, again, grounded in facts. So I'm making the same recommendation. Let's reduce these burdens on people. And I'm just framing that differently, whether you're conservative or progressive. And I don't have to judge somebody because their values are different from mine, whatever they are. I can simply appeal to their values, even though I'm making the same recommendation. Framing is really important because if I frame something you like in terms you dislike, you're not going to do it.
52:36Johnny:So now that you've mastered the art of persuasion, I'd love to wrap with what was the one piece of advice that had the biggest impact on you early in your career as you were looking to become more persuasive? I started this journey in earnest, really, when I started working in fundraising. And day two, had a call with a colleague. She had been doing fundraising for about three decades. And the very first thing she said to me, we talked for an hour, hour and a half long conversation. And throughout that conversation, she kept telling me, it's about them, not you. It's about them, Not you. And if I think back even to my very first job, which was I worked at Bingo at my church and I wasn't, there was no wage.
53:28I simply worked based on tips. I was like 14 years old. And how was I going to get those tips? Well, I had to make sure that the old, mostly ladies, you know, 65, 70 year old ladies were happy with me. It was all about customer service. And they were, and I did pretty well on tips. So as this colleague kept telling me, It's about them, not you. It's like, oh. And I once went to a donor meeting in Wisconsin, sat in this guy's office for about 90 minutes in his house. And he talked like 90 % of the time. And I, at the end of the meeting, I thought, oh my God, you totally messed up. Isn't your job, when you're selling something, in this case, a nonprofit, isn't it to talk?
54:09And I'm like, oh man. And then he said, well, I have such a better idea what you all do now. And I thought, no, you don't. And then it dawned on me, it didn't matter that I didn't say that my organization was great because of this and this reason. He felt connected to me and the organization. So as I learned to put them first and make it about them, not me, I formed powerful relationships with people and they ended up giving way more money because I put them and their needs first. So really understanding that it's about them, not you, is at the heart of persuasion and it's the heart of getting what you want.
54:45And I'm so grateful to my colleague for just front and center putting it there in so many of our conversations, even after that very first one.
54:52Johnny:Well, whether it's tips, fundraising, sales, the easiest way to measure your persuasion skills is to get someone to part with their money. So it's amazing how much of these skills run the gamut through all of our experiences. I know Johnny has very similar experiences, myself included. Thank you so much for joining us, Josh. We really loved it. Where can our audience find out more about the book? You can get the book anywhere. Books are sold, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, wherever. It's called How to Get What You Want, Mastering the Art and Science of Persuasion. You can find me on LinkedIn or at my website, joshuabandock.com would be happy to connect with people or hear more from them.
55:30Johnny:Thank you so much, Josh. Thank you, Josh. Thank you both.
55:43Thank you.
From the publisher
Most people think persuasion is about having the best argument. It’s not.
AJ and Johnny sit down with former speechwriter Josh Bandoch to break down why we feel before we reason — and why logic alone fails to move people. From emotional intelligence and storytelling to identifying hidden barriers and aligning with core values, this episode reveals what actually drives decisions.
If you’ve ever struggled to get buy-in, close a deal, or change someone’s mind, this episode gives you a practical framework to persuade without forcing, manipulating, or “winning” at someone else’s expense.
Chapters00:00 – Why logic alone doesn’t persuade04:00 – The “feel first, then reason” principle08:00 – Why persuasion isn’t about winning12:00 – Green, yellow, red: reading signals16:00 – Listening for values and hidden barriers20:00 – The power of framing and storytelling
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Episode resources:
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persuasion, influence, communication skills, emotional intelligence, decision making, storytelling, negotiation, sales psychology, human behavior, framing, listening skills, values, social intelligence
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