Supercommunicators

When starting a dialogue, it helps to think of the discussion as a negotiation where the prize is figuring out what everyone wants. And, above all, the most important goal of any conversation is to connect.

He explained that one reason she felt so at ease was likely because of the environment they had created together, how Felix had listened closely, had asked questions that drew out people’s vulnerabilities, how they had all revealed meaningful details about themselves.

“The single biggest problem with communication,”2 said the playwright George Bernard Shaw, “is the illusion it has taken place.” But scientists have now unraveled many of the secrets of how successful conversations happen. They’ve learned that paying attention to someone’s body, alongside their voice, helps us hear them better. They have determined

“I learned that if you listen for someone’s truth, and you put your truth next to it, you might reach them.” His goal, during sales calls, became simply to connect.

Happily married couples, successful negotiators, persuasive politicians, influential executives, and other kinds of supercommunicators tend to have a few behaviors in common. They are as interested in figuring out what kind of conversation everyone wants as the topics they hope to discuss. They ask more questions about others’ feelings and backgrou

Or are they talking about plans and decisions, or evaluating options? Have they brought up politics or finances or choosing a place for next year’s vacation? (“Is Maine or Florida better in June?”) If so, they might be in a more practical logic of costs and benefits mindset, and you’re better off getting analytical yourself.

Listen for attempts to change the topic. People tell us what they want to discuss through their non sequiturs, asides, and sudden shifts—or, put differently, through the experiments they conduct. If someone asks the same question in different ways, or if they abruptly introduce a new subject, it’s a sign they want to add something to the table and

“An important step in any negotiation is getting clarity on what all the participants want,” Malhotra told me. Often, what people desire from a negotiation isn’t obvious at first. Sometimes a union leader might say her goal is higher wages. But then, over time, other goals are revealed: She also wants to look good to her members, or one union facti

Effective communication requires recognizing what kind of conversation is occurring, and then matching each other. On a very basic level, if someone seems emotional, allow yourself to become emotional as well. If someone is intent on decision making, match that focus. If they are preoccupied by social implications, reflect their fixation back to th