Sourcils broussailleux
Les sourcils. Je n'oublierai jamais les gros sourcils gris et broussailleux.
Juan et moi nous étions retrouvés au milieu d'un concours involontaire de regards. La conversation s'est arrêtée de manière peu naturelle juste après qu'il ait dit :
"Rob, je pense que tu vas faire faillite."
Et puis, il m'a regardé fixement.
Plutôt que de me lancer dans une réponse, j'ai tenu ma langue. Il m'a fallu tout ce que j'avais, mais j'ai commencé à compter dans ma tête :
… one one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand…
Et je l'ai regardé fixement.
See, I had a good read on Juan’s personality and had him pegged as a pretty strong Introvert after observing some of his personality type clues. I knew this meant there was a decent chance that he had more to say, but seulement if I created space for him to continue.
...quatre mille, cinq mille, six mille...
Out of the corner of my eye, I remember seeing my right hand reach out for one of those tasty rolls they serve at Legal Sea Foods in Boston. I noticed the more-than-slight tremble in my fingers. I remember that I felt my body physically start sweating at the four one-thousand mark.
Mais j'ai continué à regarder ces sourcils et j'ai retenu ma voix.
I’d worked too hard to set up this meeting to be thrown off the bucking bronco now. My wife and I had just started our business a few months earlier, and every prospective client could be the difference between success and having to head back to the law firm world with my tail tucked between my legs. Certainly, that’s what a LOT of people thought was likely to happen. How could I have let that whole successful career go, and instead try to sell big companies on the topic of personality type? C’mon Rob, did you REALLY think it was going to work?
Part of the sweat wasn’t just the discomfort of an Extravert (me) working hard to create space for Juan. Part of it was the pressure I felt to make this whole new, unconventional career path work. We needed Juan and a dozen other client conversations to say yes to prove that we had something valuable that people wanted. We’d leveraged our network to get access to Juan, who had gone to the same college my wife and I had attended. There weren’t a lot of those kinds of connections for us to convert.
...sept mille, huit mille, neuf mille...
I don’t know what was going through Juan’s mind. I don’t know if he was seeing the sweat form on my brow, if he saw the tremble in my hand, if he noticed that I’d stopped breathing. But, I do know that when my count reached ten one-thousand, he opened his mouth and continued his thought as if nothing had ever happened:
"...à moins, bien sûr, que vous ne concentriez vos efforts sur les entreprises pharmaceutiques, et..."
His words barely registered.
J'ai aspiré une longue bouffée d'air aussi silencieusement que possible à travers des lèvres pincées et j'ai senti le coin de ma bouche se retrousser pour former le plus léger soupçon de sourire. IJ'ai tenu bon. Je l'avais attendu. Je ne pourrai jamais oublier ces sourcils, gravés dans mes yeux comme ils l'étaient au fil des heures que j'ai passées à les fixer.
Welcome to the game. The game of Influence – of spotting the observable personality type clues of others … and then using that information to craft an approach most likely to build rapport, connection, and ultimately convey information in ways the other person is most likely to hear, understand and relate to.
But, even knowing what I knew, it took everything I had to implement the technique. And yet, it clearly worked: Juan had opened up to me and was speaking in a free-flowing and natural way. I’d not filled the awkward silence with nervous chatter. I’d respected his style and the reward was him feeling at ease and sharing insights and ideas with me far beyond what I originally expected.
Personality Type Clues: The Introvert Pause
Depuis, je m'assois en silence avec mes Introvertis des milliers de fois et ont toujours été récompensés. Les introvertis ont TOUJOURS plus à dire, si vous leur laissez de la place dans la conversation pour qu'ils puissent le faire à leur manière.
The TypeCoach Approach: Reading Personality Type Clues
Si vous souhaitez apprendre les autres techniques que nous enseignons, j'ai rassemblé dans cette série d'articles les connaissances acquises au cours des 20 dernières années de formation de vendeurs et d'autres personnes qui ont besoin d'influencer leur entourage. Ces articles s'appuient les uns sur les autres et je recommande donc de les lire dans l'ordre.
- La règle des 2-48 heures
- Comment et pourquoi
- Relations et logique
- Le spectre de fermeture
- Traditionalistes
- Expérimentateurs
- Les concepteurs
- Les idéalistes
- Scénarios - Testez vos compétences
You also might be interested in the Programme d'influence TypeCoach, where you can learn about personality type clues from a TypeCoach certified master coach.
Pour ceux qui se demandent ce qui s'est passé avec Juan, nous avons effectivement établi un partenariat fructueux avec son équipe de direction. Une semaine ou deux après notre signature, ils ont vendu l'entreprise et nous n'avons plus jamais travaillé ensemble. Ah, les joies de l'aventure entrepreneuriale.
4 commentaires
Great article! For an extrovert, that ‘Introvert Pause’ can be brutal but as you pointed out – well worth it in the end. I can’t even imagine how difficult it was for you to have this conversation. I can see all those ‘thought bubbles’ around your head!
So true and so hard to implement as an extrovert but so worth the effort. One of reasons that the TypeCoach experience has such a transformational impact on 1:1 and team effectiveness.
I work with a large auto manufacturing company. As you might guess, there are many introverts attracted to this work and this is born out by the number that know their type. I have learned to count AND to practice box breathing. I was in a meeting with the head of engineering, ISTJ, one level down from the president, presenting information on a program they asked me to design. I asked questions and paused. I let him collect his thoughts. We went from my doing 2 days of training to 11 days! I never saw that coming!
What an awesome story Rob. I was holding my breath right along with you as I was reading. And this is a hard learned lesson for all of us extroverts – I had to learn it early in my career and instinctively saw it even before I got personality type training. And it’s a lesson I keep relearning all the time!