It's not what I say, it's the tone with which I say it that matters most

"It's not what I say, it's the tone with which I say it that matters most."
A client headed into a comp negotiation with his CIO reflected

Your tone can be respectful, solution-oriented, collaborative,
or full of your own emotion: you vs me.

The hypnotic power of "we" "our" "us" "together" is much more likely to get the person in charge of the pen to give you what you want.

The emotional self projects past and current injustices onto today's boss, and creates a narrative of pity, underappreciation and anger (or indignance and riteousness.

The higher evolved consciousness thinks "I will work with my boss to get more of what I would like to receive in exchange for my value; or I'll decide my value will be better monetized elsewhere."

The emotional brain is always first to the gas pedal,
with the rational brain attempting to logically justify a feeling.

While these strong feelings can provide evidence that you're on the short end of the stick, or that you need to advocate for yourself more clearly, your counterpart won't see it like your emotion presents it.

So an emotional call to action is valuable information;
but acting on it immedatetly, rarely works out well.

Instead answer it with a breath,
Locate what's driving the feeling (of feeling unappreciated, underpaid etc)
Devise a narrative to "invite" your boss to see the value you are creating,
And if they disagree: this is a wonderful opportunity to realign your efforts with what they feel would be of value.

How can your emotional impulses, actually help you serve your client better. And if the client is unreasonable, it's a great moment to consider serving someone else, or going out on your own -- and appealing directly to LPs.

#privateequity #growthequity