Try to recall when you are in a sales conversation, a negotiation, or work related.
Let us say you are about to ask for something from the person in front of you.
What thought came to your awareness when we relive this scene?
What was your disposition then? How did you carry yourself forward?
When we approach a conversation with our thoughts already winding up of what it means when we hear a NO (that dreadful feeling of rejection associated with it), we have already departed from the opportunity to enable a genuine human connection to happen during the conversation.
But when we approach it knowing that a NO is not necessarily about us, we let go of pressure from self-judgment and allow a human-centered conversation to unfold.
A productive conversation takes place when we approach it from a place of Value-giving.
The kind of conversation in which we take an interest to know more of what matters to them.
The same place where we know that difference-making would make more impact to the person on the other side of the room or a favorable outcome in your business dealings.
I invite you to explore this approach today:
Try to get into a space of discovery.
Of building relationships.
Of value-giving and difference-making rather than what you can take out of it.
And also with the awareness that hearing the word NO is not necessarily about you (no matter how the other person thinks it is).
How will you approach it differently?