Ask Your Client This 6-Word Question If the Conversation Is Getting Heated

when to use it: If a conversation or negotiation is getting out control, use this phrase to refocus on agreement. When people feel threatened, they tend to focus exclusively on areas of disagreement.

why? It’s remarkable to see parties who agree on 90 percent of an issue obsess over and even magnify the 10 percent they disagree about. You can profoundly change the tone of a conversation by stopping this pathological divisiveness with a request to pause. Then deliberately, slowly, and sincerely, you can enumerate common interests, beliefs, or histories.

SOURCE: Joseph Grenny, Harvard Business Review