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444. Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆

Recommended by:

Author:   Chris Voss

Genre:   Non Fiction, Psychology, Self Improvement, Business

274 pages, published May 17, 2016

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

Chris Voss, a former hostage negotiator for the FBI, explains his approach to negotiating.  He takes you inside the world of high-stakes negotiations, discussing the skills that helped him to save lives and applies them to a variety of real life situations.

Quotes 

“He who has learned to disagree without being disagreeable has discovered the most valuable secret of negotiation.”

 

“Negotiate in their world. Persuasion is not about how bright or smooth or forceful you are. It’s about the other party convincing themselves that the solution you want is their own idea. So don’t beat them with logic or brute force. Ask them questions that open paths to your goals. It’s not about you.”

 

“If you approach a negotiation thinking the other guy thinks like you, you are wrong. That’s not empathy, that’s a projection.”

 

“The fastest and most efficient means of establishing a quick working relationship is to acknowledge the negative and diffuse it.”

 

“The positive/playful voice: Should be your default voice. It’s the voice of an easygoing, good-natured person. Your attitude is light and encouraging. The key here is to relax and smile while you’re talking.”

 

“Though the intensity may differ from person to person, you can be sure that everyone you meet is driven by two primal urges: the need to feel safe and secure, and the need to feel in control. If you satisfy those drives, you’re in the door.”

 

“Another simple rule is, when you are verbally assaulted, do not counterattack. Instead, disarm your counterpart by asking a calibrated question.”

 

“Research shows that the best way to deal with negativity is to observe it, without reaction and without judgment. Then consciously label each negative feeling and replace it with positive, compassionate, and solution-based thoughts.”

 

“Psychotherapy research shows that when individuals feel listened to, they tend to listen to themselves more carefully and to openly evaluate and clarify their own thoughts and feelings.”

 

“The beauty of empathy is that it doesn’t demand that you agree with the other person’s ideas.”

 

“ Identify your counterpart’s negotiating style. Once you know whether they are Accommodator, Assertive, or Analyst, you’ll know the correct way to approach them.   Prepare, prepare, prepare. When the pressure is on, you don’t rise to the occasion; you fall to your highest level of preparation. So design an ambitious but legitimate goal and then game out the labels, calibrated questions, and responses you’ll use to get there. That way, once you’re at the bargaining table, you won’t have to wing it.  Get ready to take a punch. Kick-ass negotiators usually lead with an extreme anchor to knock you off your game. If you’re not ready, you’ll flee to your maximum without a fight. So prepare your dodging tactics to avoid getting sucked into the compromise trap.   Set boundaries, and learn to take a punch or punch back, without anger. The guy across the table is not the problem; the situation is.  Prepare an Ackerman plan. Before you head into the weeds of bargaining, you’ll need a plan of extreme anchor, calibrated questions, and well-defined offers. Remember: 65, 85, 95, 100 percent. Decreasing raises and ending on nonround numbers will get your counterpart to believe that he’s squeezing you for all you’re worth when you’re really getting to the number you want.”

 

“What does a good babysitter sell, really? It’s not child care exactly, but a relaxed evening. A furnace salesperson? Cozy rooms for family time. A locksmith? A feeling of security. Know the emotional drivers and you can frame the benefits of any deal in language that will resonate.”

 

“Negotiation is not an act of battle; it’s a process of discovery. The goal is to uncover as much information as possible.”

 

“It all starts with the universally applicable premise that people want to be understood and accepted. Listening is the cheapest, yet most effective concession we can make to get there. By listening intensely, a negotiator demonstrates empathy and shows a sincere desire to better understand what the other side is experiencing.”

 

“The last rule of labeling is silence. Once you’ve thrown out a label, be quiet and listen.”

 

“First, let’s talk a little human psychology. In basic terms, people’s emotions have two levels: the “presenting” behavior is the part above the surface you can see and hear; beneath, the “underlying” feeling is what motivates the behavior. Imagine a grandfather who’s grumbly at a family holiday dinner: the presenting behavior is that he’s cranky, but the underlying emotion is a sad sense of loneliness from his family never seeing him. What good negotiators do when labeling is address those underlying emotions. Labeling negatives diffuses them (or defuses them, in extreme cases); labeling positives reinforces them.”

 

“This really juices their self-esteem. Researchers have found that people getting concessions often feel better about the bargaining process than those who are given a single firm, “fair” offer. In fact, they feel better even when they end up paying more—or receiving less—than they otherwise might.”

 

“A good negotiator prepares, going in, to be ready for possible surprises; a great negotiator aims to use her skills to reveal the surprises she is certain to find. Don’t commit to assumptions; instead, view them as hypotheses and use the negotiation to test them rigorously. People who view negotiation as a battle of arguments become overwhelmed by the voices in their head. Negotiation is not an act of battle; it’s a process of discovery. The goal is to uncover as much information as possible. To quiet the voices in your head, make your sole and all-encompassing focus the other person and what they have to say. Slow. It. Down. Going too fast is one of the mistakes all negotiators are prone to making. If we’re too much in a hurry, people can feel as if they’re not being heard. You risk undermining the rapport and trust you’ve built. Put a smile on your face. When people are in a positive frame of mind, they think more quickly, and are more likely to collaborate and problem-solve (instead of fight and resist). Positivity creates mental agility in both you and your counterpart.”

 

“The Rule of Three is simply getting the other guy to agree to the same thing three times in the same conversation. It’s tripling the strength of whatever dynamic you’re trying to drill into at the moment. In doing so, it uncovers problems before they happen. It’s really hard to repeatedly lie or fake conviction.”

 

“Mirrors work magic. Repeat the last three words (or the critical one to three words) of what someone has just said. We fear what’s different and are drawn to what’s similar. Mirroring is the art of insinuating similarity, which facilitates bonding. Use mirrors to encourage the other side to empathize and bond with you, keep people talking, buy your side time to regroup, and encourage your counterparts to reveal their strategy.”

 

“By repeating back what people say, you trigger this mirroring instinct and your counterpart will inevitably elaborate on what was just said and sustain the process of connecting.”

 

“Creating unconditional positive regard opens the door to changing thoughts and behaviors. Humans have an innate urge toward socially constructive behavior. The more a person feels understood, and positively affirmed in that understanding, the more likely that urge for constructive behavior will take hold. “That’s right” is better than “yes.” Strive for it. Reaching “that’s right” in a negotiation creates breakthroughs. Use a summary to trigger a “that’s right.” The building blocks of a good summary are a label combined with paraphrasing. Identify, rearticulate, and emotionally affirm.”

 

My Take

I had previously read Getting to Yes: Negotiating an Agreement Without Giving In, another book on negotiating, but prefer the ideas in Never Split the Difference.  Author Chris Voss provides lots of detailed instructions and ideas on how to get the result you want in any negotiation.

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438. Pieces of Her

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:

Author:    Karin Slaughter

Genre:   Fiction, Mystery, Thriller, Crime

496 pages, published May 21, 2019

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

Pieces of Her is a twisty thriller that follows two tracks.  In the present day track, Andrea Cooper is on the run after watching her mother Laura professionally kill a would be killer.  As she makes her escape, Andrea learns that her mother is not who she thought she was.  The second track takes places more than twenty years earlier and provides the back story for Laura.

Quotes 

“Love doesn’t keep you in a constant state of turmoil. It gives you peace.”

 

“They tried to bury us. They didn’t know we were seeds. —Mexican Proverb”

 

“She had dozens, even hundreds, of friends, but not one single person knew all of the pieces of her.”

 

“Men can always reinvent themselves,” Laura said. “For women, once you’re a mother, you’re always a mother.”

 

“Age is a cruel punishment for youth.”

 

“Men never have to be uncomfortable around women. Women have to be uncomfortable around men all of the time.”

 

My Take

I found Pieces of Her to be a serviceable thriller with a few interesting plot points.  However, it would have been improved by condensing to a shorter version.

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432. I Found You

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:

Author:   Lisa Jewell

Genre:   Fiction, Mystery, Thriller

352 pages, published April 25, 2017

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

Middle aged, single mom Alice Lake finds a man on the beach outside her house.  He is suffering from amnesia and has no idea who he is or what he is doing there.  Alice invites him in and he slowly becomes part of her life.  At the same time, 21 year old Lily Monrose has only been married for three weeks. When her new husband fails to come home from work one night she is left stranded in a new country where she knows no one and the police tell her that her husband never existed.  Alice and Lily’s stories intertwine as a 20 year old secret is unveiled.

Quotes 

“She’d been acting the role of the scary woman for years because deep down inside she was scared. Scared of being alone. Scared that she’d had all her chances at happiness and blown each and every one of them.”

 

“But when it is just me. Alone. With myself—there is no sunshine.”

 

“His minute steak was tough and chewy, the chips were too greasy, and the ketchup wasn’t Heinz.”

 

“Someone, somewhere has liked something that Jasmine has posted on Instagram. This means that Alice’s phone will continue to pop for the next ten minutes or so as everyone Jasmine knows likes the thing she posted. Alice pictures a sea of disembodied thumbs senselessly pressing hearts. She sighs.”

 

My Take

I would characterize I Found You as a serviceable thriller.  It’s not a quick paced page turner, but there are enough twists to hold your attention.

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391. The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:

Author:  Jonathan Haidt

Genre:    Nonfiction, Psychology, Politics, Theology, Philosophy

419 pages, published March 13, 2012

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

In The Righteous Mind, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt explores the origins of our cultural polarization and explores way to bridge the chasms that divide us.  Haidt mixes his own research findings with those of anthropologists, historians, and other psychologists to draw a map of the moral domain. He examines the origins of morality, rejecting the view that evolution has made us selfish.  Rather, we are tribal creatures which accounts for most of our religious divisions and our political affiliations.

Quotes 

“Morality binds and blinds. It binds us into ideological teams that fight each other as though the fate of the world depended on our side winning each battle. It blinds us to the fact that each team is composed of good people who have something important to say.”

 

“Understanding the simple fact that morality differs around the world, and even within societies, is the first step toward understanding your righteous mind.”

 

“The human mind is a story processor, not a logic processor.”

 

“If you think that moral reasoning is something we do to figure out the truth, you’ll be constantly frustrated by how foolish, biased, and illogical people become when they disagree with you.”

 

“Intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.”

 

“Anyone who values truth should stop worshipping reason.”

 

“People bind themselves into political teams that share moral narratives. Once they accept a particular narrative, they become blind to alternative moral worlds.”

 

“We should not expect individuals to produce good, open-minded, truth-seeking reasoning, particularly when self-interest or reputational concerns are in play. But if you put individuals together in the right way, such that some individuals can use their reasoning powers to disconfirm the claims of others, and all individuals feel some common bond or shared fate that allows them to interact civilly, you can create a group that ends up producing good reasoning as an emergent property of the social system. This is why it’s so important to have intellectual and ideological diversity within any group or institution whose goal is to find truth (such as an intelligence agency or a community of scientists) or to produce good public policy (such as a legislature or advisory board).”

 

“Groups create supernatural beings not to explain the universe but to order their societies.”

 

“The very ritual practices that the New Atheists dismiss as costly, inefficient and irrational turn out to be a solution to one of the hardest problems humans face: cooperation without kinship.”

 

“Societies that exclude the exoskeleton of religion should reflect carefully to what will happen to them over several generations. We don’t really know, because the first atheistic societies have only emerged in Europe in the last few decades. They are the least efficient societies ever known at turning resources (of which they have a lot) into offspring (of which they have few).”

 

“Creating gods who can see everything, and who hate cheaters and oath breakers, turns out to be a good way to reduce cheating and oath breaking.”

 

“Our moral thinking is much more like a politician searching for votes than a scientist searching for truth.”

 

“Everyone cares about fairness, but there are two major kinds. On the left, fairness often implies equality, but on the right it means proportionality —people should be rewarded in proportion to what they contribute, even if that guarantees unequal outcomes.”

 

“The social intuitionist model offers an explanation of why moral and political arguments are so frustrating: because moral reasons are the tail wagged by the intuitive dog. A dog’s tail wags to communicate. You can’t make a dog happy by forcibly wagging its tail. And you can’t change people’s minds by utterly refuting their arguments.”

 

“If you really want to change someone’s mind on a moral or political matter, you’ll need to see things from that person’s angle as well as your own. And if you do truly see it the other person’s way—deeply and intuitively—you might even find your own mind opening in response. Empathy is an antidote to righteousness, although it’s very difficult to empathize across a moral divide.”

 

“The “omnivore’s dilemma” (a term coined by Paul Rozin) is that omnivores must seek out and explore new potential foods while remaining wary of them until they are proven safe. Omnivores therefore go through life with two competing motives: neophilia (an attraction to new things) and neophobia (a fear of new things). People vary in terms of which motive is stronger, and this variation will come back to help us in later chapters: Liberals score higher on measures of neophilia (also known as “openness to experience”), not just for new foods but also for new people, music, and ideas. Conservatives are higher on neophobia; they prefer to stick with what’s tried and true, and they care a lot more about guarding borders, boundaries, and traditions.”

 

My Take

The Righteous Mind fulfills one of my basic criteria for a worthwhile read; I learned something new or gained some interesting insight.  With this book, I came to a better understanding of how we make moral judgments and why it is nearly impossible to persuade someone to change their mind on a moral issue with logic and rational arguments.  I also learned why we are so tribal and how banding together has advanced the course of human civilization.  I appreciated that Jonathan Haidt backs up his conclusions with lots of research and anecdotes.  A thought provoking read.

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378. Empire of Sin: A Story of Sex, Jazz, Murder, and the Battle for Modern New Orleans

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:   Suann MacIsaac

Author:   Gary Krist

Genre:   Nonfiction, History, Crime

432 pages, published October 28, 2014

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

Empire of Sin tells the story of New Orleans in the early 20th century, immersing the reader in a time when commercialized vice, jazz culture, and endemic crime defined the Crescent City.  The book focuses on Tom Anderson who ran New Orleans’ notorious Storyville vice district and fought to keep his empire intact as it was attacked from within and without.  We also learn the stories of flashy prostitutes, moral reformers, jazzmen (including Louis Armstrong), Mafia enforcers, venal politicians, and an extremely violent axe murderer.

Quotes 

“It is no easy matter to go to heaven by way of New Orleans.”

 

“New Orleans, it was often observed, was the first American metropolis to build an opera house, but the last to build a sewage system.”

 

“New Orleans’ rebellious and free-spirited personality is nothing if not resilient. And so the disruptive energies of the place- its vibrancy and eccentricity, its defiance and nonconformity, and yes, its violence and depravity- are likely to live on.”

 

“So much, it would seem, for the music that would eventually be regarded as the first truly American art form.”

 

My Take

I liked, but did not love, Empire of Sin.  There just wasn’t enough of a compelling story or characters to really pull me in.   Which shouldn’t be too big of a problem when New Orleans is your source material.  I read this book in anticipation of my first trip to NOLA.  I loved the Crescent City and wished I would have had a better book to get me ready for the visit.

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372. The Taster

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:   Nancy Sissom

Author:   V.S. Alexander

Genre:  Fiction, Historical Fiction, World War II

323 pages, published January 30, 2018

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

In early 1943 Germany, a teenaged Magda Ritter is sent to live with her relatives in Bavaria.  Living in deprivation as a result of the second World War, Magda’s Aunt and Uncle expect her to get a job.  After an interview with the civil service, Magda is assigned to the Berghof, Hitler’s mountain retreat, to be a taster for the Fuhrer’s food to prevent poisoning.  High in the Bavarian Alps, the Berghof is its own world, far from the battles that are consuming Germany.  While Magda grows accustomed to her dangerous job, she begins to have doubts about the war, doubts that are stoked by Karl, a young SS officer with whom she falls in love.

Quotes 

 

My Take

I liked, but did not love, The Taster.  I’ve read so many books about World War II and, other than some details about the last days of Adolf Hitler, there was little new in this book.  While it is well written, I had little connection with any of the characters.

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364. The New Health Rules: Simple Changes to Achieve Whole-Body Wellness

Rating:  ☆☆1/2

Recommended by:

Author:   Frank Lipman, M.D.

Genre:  Non Fiction, Health, Nutrition, Self Improvement

224 pages, published December 13, 2016

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

The New Health Rules contains succinct tips on how to be a healthy person, covering categories from nutrition to exercise to stress reduction.

Quotes 

“Make your default mode one of generosity. It’s a nice way to live, and it’s contagious.”

 

“avocado—score it, spritz with lemon or olive oil, sprinkle with salt and cumin, and eat it like a grapefruit.”

 

“If you have a sweet tooth and you’re making a concerted effort to get yourself off sugar, take a supplement called glutamine when you have a craving (1,000 milligrams every four to six hours as needed).”

 

“Alcohol is liquid sugar. It’s more depleting than restorative. To feel your best, you shouldn’t be having alcohol every day, even red wine.”

 

“Eat grass-fed meat, wild-caught fish, greens, nuts, a bit of fruit—and no other carbs—for a month and see how you feel.”

 

“Lunch should be the largest meal—packed with protein, good fats, and vegetables.”

 

“If You Learn Only One Yoga Pose . . . . . . let it be supta baddha konasana.”

 

“Raw sugar and brown sugar have a better public image but are just as problematic as the white stuff. Cut it out.”

 

“If you’re on a statin drug like Lipitor to lower your cholesterol, you may know there’s controversy surrounding these meds. Here’s clarity: Lowering cholesterol does not, it turns out, prevent heart attacks and strokes. We’ve been sold a bill of goods. The big deal about this is that millions of people are on statins unnecessarily, and statins cause diabetes, liver damage, nervous system problems, muscle weakness, and more. Talk to your doctor about possibly getting off statins.” 

My Take

While there is lots of good advice in The New Health Rules, a pithy, informative book, I’ve heard about 90% of it before and I’m not sure about the other 10%.  Worth reading if you don’t keep up on nutrition news and are looking for guidance on how to eat.

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363. The Joy of Doing Just Enough

Rating:  ☆☆

Recommended by:

Author:   Jennifer McCartney

Genre:  Non Fiction, Humor, Self Improvement

144 pages, published April 3, 2018

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

As you can tell by the title, The Joy of Doing Just Enough isn’t a motivational, self-improvement book.   Rather, author Jennifer McCartney advocates that doing “just enough” to get by is often good enough.

Quotes  

My Take

While the message of this book isn’t completely counterproductive, my personal guru Gretchen Rubin said it much better, “One of the biggest wastes of time is doing something well that didn’t need to be done at all.”

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310. The Language of Food

Rating:  ☆☆1/2

Recommended by:   Chad Stamm

Author:   Dan Jurafsky

Genre:  Non Fiction, Food, Linguistics

272 pages, published September 15, 2014

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

Summary

In The Language of Food, linguist Dan Jurafsky (who specializes in food linguistics), offers  up a smorgasbord of food/linguistic topics including menus, dinner courses, the use of different types of food adjectives depending on whether the restaurant is upscale or downscale and the history of foods from different parts of the world.

Quotes 

“Taste, says Bourdieu, is “first and foremost . . . negation . . . of the tastes of others.” A high-status group maintains its status by legitimizing some tastes but not others, independent of inherent artistic merit, and by passing on these tastes as cultural preferences.” 

My Take

While parts of The Language of Food were interesting, other parts were a bit of a bore.  I also could have done without the recipes (especially as I was listening to the audio version of the book).  I think there must be better books out there on the intersection of language and food.

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242. Fahrenheight 451

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:  Marianne Boeke

Author:  Ray Bradbury

Genre:  Fiction, Science Fiction, Dystopia

175 pages, published October 1953

Reading Format:  Audio Book on Hoopla

 

Summary

Ray Bradbury’s science fiction classic Fahrenheight 451 is set in a dystopian future where books are verboten because the powers that be deem them to make people unhappy.  The main character is Guy Montag, a fireman whose job is to burn books.  After a few interactions with a teenage neighbor named Clarice, Guy comes to realize that something is missing in his life.  As begins to defy society’s rules by keeping books, he becomes a hunted man.

 

Quotes 

“Stuff your eyes with wonder, he said, live as if you’d drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It’s more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories.”

 

“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.

 

It doesn’t matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that’s like you after you take your hands away. The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said. The lawn-cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there a lifetime.”

 

“We cannot tell the precise moment when friendship is formed. As in filling a vessel drop by drop, there is at last a drop which makes it run over; so in a series of kindnesses there is at last one which makes the heart run over.”

 

“There must be something in books, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing.”

 

“If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you’ll never learn.”

 

“The books are to remind us what asses and fool we are. They’re Caeser’s praetorian guard, whispering as the parade roars down the avenue, “Remember, Caeser, thou art mortal.” Most of us can’t rush around, talking to everyone, know all the cities of the world, we haven’t time, money or that many friends. The things you’re looking for, Montag, are in the world, but the only way the average chap will ever see ninety-nine per cent of them is in a book. Don’t ask for guarantees. And don’t look to be saved in any one thing, person, machine, or library. Do your own bit of saving, and if you drown, at least die knowing you were headed for shore.”

 

“It doesn’t matter what you do…so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that’s like you after you take your hands away.”

 

“And when he died, I suddenly realized I wasn’t crying for him at all, but for the things he did. I cried because he would never do them again, he would never carve another piece of wood or help us raise doves and pigeons in the backyard or play the violin the way he did, or tell us jokes the way he did. He was part of us and when he died, all the actions stopped dead and there was no one to do them the way he did. He was individual. He was an important man. I’ve never gotten over his death. Often I think what wonderful carvings never came to birth because he died. How many jokes are missing from the world, and how many homing pigeons untouched by his hands? He shaped the world. He did things to the world. The world was bankrupted of ten million fine actions the night he passed on.”

 

My Take

I first read Fahrenheight 451 in high school.  I enjoyed it then, but think I liked it even better on the second reading more than 35 years later.  As an avid reader, it is hard for me to imagine a world without books.  They enrich my life deeply and make me think about ideas in whole new ways.  That is the point Bradbury is trying to make.  Without exposure to ideas both old and new (with books as the premier transmission form), we are destined for a life of mediocrity and banality.

 

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