Oren Klaff Quotes

Defiance and light humor are the keys to seizing power and frame control.

They want to see someone forced into action and positively overcoming obstacles.

Influence, and particularly Inception, is most effective when the person you are speaking to feels like he or she is on the same level of the hierarchy as you. This is where Inception is strongest and works the best.

Make people feel like the idea is coming from them and they will place more value on it, believe it more deeply, adopt it more quickly, and remember it more easily.

This was classic Sam Greenberg, who, like the legendary Carthaginian commander Hannibal, would either find a way or make one.

A frame is the instrument you use to package your power, authority, strength, information, and status. 1. Everyone uses frames whether they realize it or not. 2. Every social encounter brings different frames together. 3. Frames do not coexist in the same time and place for long. They crash into each other, and one or the other gains control. 4. Only one frame survives. The others break and are absorbed. Stronger frames always absorb weaker frames. 5. The winning frame governs the social interaction. It is said to have frame control.

The two parts of the attention cocktail are novelty and tension, which in a pitch work together in a feedback loop for about 20 minutes until — no matter what you do or how hard you try — they get out of balance and then stop working altogether.

Money is never a prize; it’s a commodity, a means for getting things done. Money simply transfers economic value from place to place so that people are able to work together.

So you guys are asking me to delay the start? Okay. I can give you 15 minutes to get organized. But if we can’t start by then, then let’s just call it a day.

The human brain is thus wired by evolution to distrust any information from the outside world and to greatly favor that which originates inside us.

As I’ve said before, the brain is a cognitive miser. Unless it can get value for itself, it stops paying attention.

Here are some subtler examples of taking the power frame away. As soon as you come in contact with your target, look for the first opportunity to 1. Perpetrate a small denial, or 2. Act out some type of defiance. Examples You place a folder on the conference table that is labeled “Confidential — John Smith.” When the target reaches for the file, you grab it and say, “Uh-uh, not yet. You have to wait for this.” If you deal in creative work and you brought visuals, let the target sneak a peek and then, when you see him curiously looking, turn it over, take it away, and deliver a soft reprimand that says, not until I say you’re ready.

As you are pitching your idea, the croc brain of the person sitting across from you isn't 'listening' and thinking, 'Hmm, is this a good deal or not?' Its reaction to your pitch basically goes like this: 'Since this is not an emergency, how can I ignore this or spend the least amount of time possible on it?'

This filtering system of the crocodile brain has a very short-sighted view of the world. Anything that is not a crisis it tries to mark as 'spam.'

If you got a chance to look at the croc brain's filtering instructions, it would look something like this:
1. If it's not dangerous, ignore it
2. If it's not new and exciting, ignore it.
3. If it is new, summarize it as quickly as possible - and forget about the details.
And finally there is this specific instruction:
4. Do not send anything up to the neocortex for problem solving unless you have a situation that is really unexpected and out of the ordinary.

These are the basic operating policies and procedures of our brains. No wonder pitching is so difficult.

Seizing Situational Status Here are the steps involved in elevating your status in any situation. You will recognize some of these actions from framing, and for good reason. Frame control and status are closely related, as are the pitch techniques you will learn in Chapter 4. 1. Politely ignore power rituals and avoid beta traps. 2. Be unaffected by your customer’s global status (meaning the customer’s status inside and outside the business environment). 3. Look for opportunities to perpetrate small denials and defiances that strengthen your frame and elevate your status. 4. As soon as you take power, quickly move the discussion into an area where you are the domain expert, where your knowledge and information are unassailable by your audience. 5. Apply a prize frame by positioning yourself as the reward for making the decision to do business with you. 6. Confirm your alpha status by making your customer, who now temporarily occupies a beta position, make a statement that qualifies your higher status.

First, you don’t want your message to trigger fear alarms. And second, you want to make sure it gets recognized as something positive, unexpected, and out of the ordinary — a pleasant novelty.