Chris Voss
CEO and Founder, The Black Swan Group. On 4 shows, 5 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
authorfounderexecutiveacademicother@VossNegotiation ↗LinkedIn ↗blackswanltd.com/our-team/chris-voss ↗Wikipedia ↗
Chris Voss served for 24 years in the FBI, spending several years as its chief international kidnapping negotiator. He later founded The Black Swan Group to train corporate professionals and co-authored the bestselling book Never Split the Difference.
4shows
5appearances
138statements
7resolved
2supported
2contradicted
29%fully supported
57said about them ↓ Everything Chris Voss said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Chris Voss: Relying on penalty clauses reveals poor negotiation skills
“If you're putting penalty clauses in your contracts, that means you're not a good negotiator.”
Chris Voss: 'Getting to Yes' fails because humans make decisions emotionally
“Getting to yes is intellectually sound. There's nothing intellectually to be challenged on getting to yes. And unfortunately, that does you no good as soon as you involve human beings because none of us are intellectually sound.”
Chris Voss: BATNA is a horrible negotiation strategy that leaves money on the table
“An intellectually brilliant idea in practice, a horrible idea... Here's, here's the problem with Batman. That becomes your goal, and so therefore, if you say to yourself, and the vast majority of people who calculate their BATNA, you know, as long as I do bett…”
Voss: Intentionally saying falsehoods elicits hidden information through irresistible correction
“The urge to correct is so irresistible that we actually use it as one of our negotiation skills. I'll say something wrong on purpose. Because you will not be able to resist the urge to correct me with the truth. And it's a great way for me to trigger getting h…”
Voss: Handing off to a new negotiator always signals a harder line
“No negotiation team, whether it's business or hostage, hands a negotiator off to another negotiator to be nicer.
Ever.
Business or hostage.
If there's a change in negotiation, negotiators on the other side, it is always to take a harder line.
Always.”
Chris Voss: Pre-planned 'must-haves' and 'giveaways' can be completely wrong
“Well, if they've got proprietary information that would change everything, then your must haves and your giveaways could be completely wrong.”
Voss: Driving for 'no' creates safety while seeking 'yes' creates friction
“Instead of, do you want to talk about what we're here for, which you're driving for yes, because that going for yes creates friction, but going for no creates protection and safety.”
Voss: Relying on leverage caps a negotiator at B-level performance
“I mean, you get yourself to B level negotiator there. You'll never get yourself to A plus on leverage. Cause leverage is the ability to inflict harm. And if you're making deals based on the ability to inflict harm, these are not, those don't go for stable long…”
Voss: Decoupling understanding from agreement unlocks unmatched influence
“So when you can decouple those, Then actually you give yourself the ability to influence people in a way nobody else can.”
Voss: Lying is never necessary in negotiation, even in life-or-death scenarios
“No, I don't think it's ever necessary. I'm very much against it.”
Voss: Psychopathy Prevalence Estimates Have Risen to Roughly 1 in 35
“When I first started looking at the number, you know, they used to say like one in every 112, 116, and now they're saying roughly one in 35”
Voss: Vocal Tone Triggers Involuntary Neurochemical Responses That Dissolve Barriers
“Your response to my tone of voice is a neurochemical response, which means it's not a choice. And if it's, if I can trigger neurochemicals in your brain, then you can't stop me from triggering them. Now you can fight them. But I can initiate the process, which…”
Voss: The 9/11 investigation was solved by FBI New York, not Headquarters
“Nine 11 was solved by FBI New York. And Mueller had just taken over, and they wanted headquarters to be in charge, but FBI New York knew what was going on, so what they did, so the headquarters were being charged, they transferred everybody into New York to he…”
Voss: Donald Trump gained admiration simply by refusing to ever apologize
“Whatever you think of Donald Trump, love him or hate him, nobody's in the middle. I think he gained so much admiration by refusing to back off of what he said. And every politician prior to him, they'd say something and they get criticized and a politician say…”
Voss: Six instigators can turn a 2,000-person peaceful crowd into a mob
“And then they show us how a crowd of peaceful demonstrators, numbering anywhere from 50 to 2000, Can be turned into a raging violent mob by six instigators. Only six instigators to turn a peaceful crowd of a thousand into a raging violent mob.”
Voss: Fox News and CNN intentionally act as professional instigators
“And the people with the megaphones are professional instigators. They want us at each other's throats. And I think if we're just aware that their intent is to instigate, whether they be with Fox news or whether they be with CNN, Their intent is to instigate.”
Voss: Letting the other side speak first speeds up negotiations
“You know, seek first to understand, then be understood is a mercenary's tool. I mean, if you want to get to an out, if you want to get to your outcome faster, Let the other side go first. It'll take a lot less time. You don't waste time spinning your wheels, o…”
Voss: Fear impedes deals 3x to 9x more than benefits create them
“Fear gets in the way of deals anyway from three to nine times more than benefits make deals.”
Chris Voss: Tactical empathy is a tool to save time in negotiation
“You don't use empathy because you're a missionary, because you're soft touch. Use empathy because you want to get stuff done faster, and you've got other stuff to do to get after.”
Chris Voss: Every negotiator, including business sociopaths, is driven by loss aversion
“Everybody's driven by loss. You know, our sociopaths, which there's no shortage of them functioning in the business world. They're self-interested. They have desires. They're driven by loss, loss aversion. There's no getting around that.”
Voss: Rephrasing Questions to Provoke 'No' Has an Insane Success Rate
“Intentionally getting people to say no that, that rewarding all your yes oriented questions into no oriented questions and said, would you like to do this? Say, are you against this? That's an insane success rate.”
Voss: Compromise introduces half measures that destroy both sides' ideas
“And that's what happens with compromise. You get, you know, you put half measures in, and it destroys everybody's idea instead of finding out what's, what's the best course of action.”
Voss: Replacing 'Trust' with 'Predictability' Leads to Better Decisions
“If you can substitute the word predict for trust or predictable for trust, then put you in a much more rational frame of mind and you can see things easier and then you can make better decisions.”
The other half of the tape: Chris Voss's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 54 times in 14 episodes across the shows. 3 statements on the record name them. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Codie Sanchez 35Ted Seides 16Alex Ramon 2Anne Mahlum 1
Statements about Chris Voss, by other people (3)
Sanchez: Reframing Emotional Accusations Reduces Hostility Faster Than Direct Rebuttals
“Reframing emotional accusations reduces hostility faster than a direct rebuttal.”
Sanchez: Saying 'if I were you' centers yourself rather than showing empathy
“When you start your sentence with, if I were you, That's not empathy. You're not them. You're making it about you.”
Van der Hoef: Letting counterparts speak first is crucial in negotiations
“While many of us think about a negotiation as an exchange of statements, Chris Voss explains that it's much more powerful to ask open-ended questions and let the other side go first. This allows you to gain access to the other person's mind, which is crucial i…”
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
BigDeal 37
Capital Allocators 16
My First Million 1
2026 3 mentions in 1 episode
2025 17 mentions in 3 episodes 6 per episode
2024 29 mentions in 8 episodes 4 per episode
- Follow These 10 Steps to Completely Change Your Life in 2025 | BigDeal Wrapped
- Dan Tennebaum - The Case for India at India Capital (EP.387)
- Brett Barakett - Digging for the Puck at Tremblant Capital (EP.386)
- How to Persuade Anyone, Build Confidence & Become Influential | Expert Magician
- What Makes a Leader Great?
- Watch this if you hate your job and want to quit…
- From Nonprofit Founder To Building A $300M Pilates Business
- Communication Expert: Master the Secret Art of Charisma & Influence | Vanessa Van Edwards
- every mention in 2024, scene by scene →
2023 1 mention in 1 episode
2019 4 mentions in 1 episode
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Chris's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| BIGDEALLEDGER | CEO and Founder, The Black Swan Group | 2 | 57 | 33% 2/6 | full record on BigDeal → |
 KNOWLEDGE PROJECTLEDGER | CEO and Founder, The Black Swan Group | 1 | 42 | — | full record on the Knowledge Project → |
| MY FIRST MILLIONLEDGER | CEO and Founder, The Black Swan Group | 1 | 22 | 0% 0/1 | full record on My First Million → |
| CAPITAL ALLOCATORSLEDGER | CEO and Founder, The Black Swan Group | 1 | 17 | — | full record on Capital Allocators → |