5 steps to communicate and make you always say yes

Find out how the brain works to better organize convincing presentations of yourself and your ideas. Understanding what are the behaviors to be held in front of an audience of possible investors, learning to react when you are put in a situation of subjection by our interlocutor, knowing how to recover control of the context and keep it firmly in your own hands: all skills that can be acquired following simple rules that can be applied by anyone after doing a little “training” in everyday life.

Know the croc-brain to understand how it works and create an effective presentation

The method is based on neuroscience, so the first thing to understand is how our brain works, which developed in three separate phases. The oldest nucleus, the croc-brain (crocodile brain), filters all incoming messages and produces very intense reactions, called “escape or combat”. The middle brain determines the meaning of things and social situations. The most recent, the neocortex, has developed the ability to reflect on complex issues and give rational answers.

What you need to remember is that the thoughts created and communicated by your neocortex are received and processed by the listeners’ croc-brain. No message will reach their evolved brain if it cannot survive this first filter.

In practice, while talking about things that would be clear to the evolved part of the listener’s brain, it is actually the croc-brain that wonders if the incoming information poses a threat to immediate survival and, if not, if it can be ignored without consequences. The croc-brain does not process the details, it sends the information to the neocortex only and only if it is something unexpected and out of the ordinary.

It discards everything that has no visual references and is complicated and abstract, because it experiences it as a threat: the primordial brain knows that intellectual resources are important for managing survival needs and should not be wasted. The message passes to the amygdala, which converts the messages into physical reactions such as sweat, anxiety, acceleration of the beat. Generates a feeling that invites to escape.

To escape from what you’re saying, in this case. The croc-brain wants simple, clear and intriguing information. And it is to him that you submit your pitch. To have an effective presentation you must apply the  STRONG process :

  • S et the frame  (create the context);
  • T ell the story  (tells the story);
  • R eveal the intrigue  (reveals the intrigue);
  • O ffer the prize  (offer the reward);
  • N ail the hookpoint  (reach the hook point);
  • G et the deal  (convince the customer).

The mental patterns that apply in business and how to counter them

Each social encounter brings together different mental patterns, which cannot coexist: they face each other and one of them takes control. The winning scheme governs the interaction and gains control of the context. Think about this situation: a policeman stops you after you cross the red light.

As you turn off the engine, quickly choose which mental pattern to take: you can say “I’m sorry I didn’t see it”, or “he’s right, I’m in a hurry”. In any case, as soon as the policeman looks at you badly, asking you for a cold license and a booklet, you will have lost. It is his mental scheme, validated by the legal norm, that prevails, and he will take control.

In business situations, three types of mental patterns mainly apply: based on power, time and analysis. You can “replicate” with patterns based on containment of power, time limitation, intrigue or reward.

 

  1. Power-based scheme
    Typical of someone with a highly developed ego, whose power comes from a status. It is characterized by arrogance, ostentatious disinterest, discourtesy. People who use it are often bad judges of others’ reactions and routinely use stereotypes. They are vulnerable to the power containment scheme because they simply don’t expect it.

The strategies are two:
A. Express a small refusal
Put a binder on the meeting table with the wording “confidential – name and surname of the other party” and when the person reaches out to take it, hold it and say “no, not yet”.

B. Launch a challenge
If the other party says “I only have 15 minutes”, he replies “very well, I only have 12”. Smile, but be serious. When you show bold you must also be funny, the other side must feel intrigued, ask yourself mentally “well, what do we have here?”.

  1. Time-based scheme
    Typically occurs at a later stage in social interaction. If you feel that the attention is starting to drop, that the weather is getting cold, it is already too late. You will have already lost control. The only thing to do is to say “Time is running out, I have another meeting on the agenda, I have to say goodbye soon. We have to make a new appointment. ”
    The pattern of time must be disrupted in the bud. If, late on an appointment, the other party says to you “I’m sorry for the delay, at this point I only have 10 minutes for her”, you must answer “No, thank you. It makes no sense, if we want to collaborate I have to trust her and I can’t do it if she is unable to respect appointments “. Your time is as important as his.
  2. Analyst Scheme
    Must be countered using the intrigue scheme. If someone during a presentation discusses (often technical) details, the room temperature will drop and many of those present will begin to enter what is called “cold cognition”, while their neocortex will undertake to perform calculations, apply themselves in problem solving. It’s a problem, because people can’t handle hot and cold knowledge simultaneously.Warm cognitions are emotions, such as desire and excitement, while cold cognitions are the analysis and search for problem solving. Almost everyone has fun in front of something new and intriguing, when the interlocutor thinks to foresee, to already know the idea you are illustrating, enters a non-reactive phase and communication stops flowing.Your message must always be: “I have the solution to one of your problems, I know something you don’t know”. As the presentation progresses, some people solve the riddle and become estranged. To keep the attention alive it is important to always tell only part of the story, to remain protagonists, to bring attention to oneself. The intriguing story has these characteristics:

    – must be short and in theme with the presentation;
    – it must be personal;
    – contains risk, danger, uncertainty;
    – there is time pressure, time is running out;
    – there are tensions caused by a hostile force;
    – failure would have very negative consequences.

  3. Reward-based
    pattern Used to deal with aggressive mental patterns. The use of a reward-based mental pattern places value on you. The aim is to induce the interlocutor to follow you, to want to do business with you. To do this, three typical human behaviors must be considered:1. we chase what goes away;
    2. we want what we cannot have;
    3. We appreciate what is difficult to achieve.Hence, it is important not to be in a hurry to close, or rather, “threaten” to leave; It is a good tactic to open the presentation saying that it is important to start on time because you will have another appointment immediately after. If possible, it is good to create conditions that the customer must respect: BMW asks – for a limited edition M3 – to sign a contract with which it is committed to keep it always clean.

Using status for power during the “confrontation”

The way you are perceived by others is essential to be able to impose your dominant mental pattern and retain power during confrontation. Status has nothing to do with the charisma or with the ego, it is something that has to do – again – with the primitive brain: everyone instinctively wonders “Who is the dominant alpha subject in this room?”

The alpha subject receives all the attention he needs, when he makes a statement he is believed, within a group he receives trust and follow-up. To be an alpha, you must avoid what are called beta traps, actions that try to lower your status. The most common is access to the appointment: a receptionist invites you to sit at the entrance. Then, a secretary takes you to the office lobby, tells you that the other side is late and offers you water and coffee.

After her, a third person arrives to tell you that her boss, unfortunately, has a sudden commitment, but that she can take a few minutes, and then she will report. You can only get out of the trap by refusing the match.
Your social value is fluid, it depends on the context: it is important to recognize what is called situational status.

Think of a surgeon who takes a golf lesson from a teacher: when I am in the parking lot, the alpha subject is certainly the cry surgeon, who however becomes beta when, on the field, he has to follow his teacher like a pupil, who suddenly goes up of status.