Speaker 1: Pushkin. Welcome back to Risky Business, a show about making
Speaker 1: better decisions. I'm Maria Kanikova.
Speaker 2: And I'm made Silver.
Speaker 1: Today on the show, Nate, we are going to be
Speaker 1: talking about the Conclave, not the movie, but the actual
Speaker 1: process for choosing the next hope and more broadly, how
Speaker 1: does group decision making work and what is the best
Speaker 1: way of doing it.
Speaker 3: We'll also be talking about negotiation, using the prompt of
Speaker 3: the movie Sinners. We're going to be talking about how
Speaker 3: to negotiate a good deal for yourself.
Speaker 1: And at the end, we will leave you with a
Speaker 1: little game that Nate and I are going to play
Speaker 1: called would you rather? By the way, listeners, I apologize
Speaker 1: my voice is a little bit shot. I am in
Speaker 1: the middle of allergy season and just off of a
Speaker 1: red eye, so I will be extra raspy today. I
Speaker 1: still love you, and yes, that's what I'm going to
Speaker 1: sound like for the pod, and.
Speaker 2: We talked about our red eyes. Drata, what flight did
Speaker 2: you take? What time was your flight?
Speaker 1: My flight was at six pm. It was the only
Speaker 1: direct flight to NIS from New York.
Speaker 3: I didn't know I had a fucking direct flight to Congratulations.
Speaker 1: Yeah, direct flights be Yeah. So I took a direct
Speaker 1: flight to Nis and then took a car from Nice
Speaker 1: to Monte Carlo. The other way to do it is
Speaker 1: to take a helicopter, but we've talked on the show
Speaker 1: about the dangers of helicopters and I did not do that.
Speaker 1: And now I'm here for EPT Monte Carlo, which happened
Speaker 1: to be my first ever international poker tournament. Back when
Speaker 1: I started playing poker, my first ever international hendon mob
Speaker 1: flagnate was from Monte Carlo. So I'm back to the
Speaker 1: scene of the crime and I have never cashed the
Speaker 1: main event here? Is this going to be the year will?
Speaker 2: Are you superscitious about that?
Speaker 3: Are you like, oh, there are certain venues where I
Speaker 3: run well or certain events.
Speaker 1: Absolutely not. I think that that's a very self handicapping
Speaker 1: way of thinking.
Speaker 2: The six pm flight, I think is the worst option.
Speaker 1: By the way, it's an awful it's hard to sleep, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's really hard. But for me, taking a direct flight
Speaker 1: is the least bad option. I would rather take a
Speaker 1: direct flight to Nise than a later flight at a
Speaker 1: more optimal time to Paris and then have to fly
Speaker 1: to Nise. So sometimes you make the least bad decision possible,
Speaker 1: which brings us to electing the pope, which directly ties
Speaker 1: to the least bad decision possible. So Nate, the Pope
Speaker 1: died as we know. Oh wait, yeah, oh my god,
Speaker 1: I'm so sorry, breaking news story. JD. Vans killed the Pope.
Speaker 1: Now I'm sorry. I shouldn't say that, but the Pope
Speaker 1: did die day after meeting with JD. Vance. I take
Speaker 1: it all back. We're not conspiracy theorists on risky Business,
Speaker 1: or are we. Okay, So the Pope is dead and
Speaker 1: now they must choose a new pope, and they do
Speaker 1: this by a process called a conclave, and it's been
Speaker 1: announced that is going to take place on May seventh.
Speaker 1: We are taping this on April thirtieth, so a week
Speaker 1: from now is when the conclave starts. And this is
Speaker 1: how the process works. So there are around two hundred cardinals,
Speaker 1: but only one hundred and thirty five of those are
Speaker 1: actually eligible to vote in the conclave because by the rules,
Speaker 1: they have to be under the age of eighty. A
Speaker 1: lot of old cardinals out there, is what I'm hearing here.
Speaker 2: So you're saying is that they're too young to be
Speaker 2: the US president.
Speaker 1: That is exactly what I'm saying, And technically speaking, any
Speaker 1: Catholic male can be elected pope. Practically speaking, it's going
Speaker 1: to be one of those one hundred and thirty five cardinals.
Speaker 1: The way that it works is they vote up to
Speaker 1: four times a day, but in the morning and in
Speaker 1: the afternoon, and they can vote once or twice in
Speaker 1: those sessions. And they basically have multiple days of meetings
Speaker 1: that have already started leading up to conclave. Then they
Speaker 1: seal the doors and the only people there are the
Speaker 1: cardinals who can vote. And then they're also you know,
Speaker 1: there's guards, there's a doctor. Everyone's sworn to secrecy. They're
Speaker 1: completely cut off from the outside world. No phones, no news.
Speaker 1: The place is swept for listening devices. You know, it's
Speaker 1: like very like hush hush. And then the vote is
Speaker 1: done by secret ballot, So everyone on a piece of
Speaker 1: paper writes their choice for the pope, folds it up,
Speaker 1: it's collected, the ballots are shaken, and then three people
Speaker 1: will read the ballots. So one person will take a
Speaker 1: ballot out at a time and will silently write down
Speaker 1: what the name is. The the second person will also
Speaker 1: write down what the name is, and the third person
Speaker 1: will read it out loud. So this is to make
Speaker 1: sure that the votes are tallied accurately. If there's a miscount,
Speaker 1: so say one hundred and thirty five people vote and
Speaker 1: there's only one hundred and thirty four ballots or one
Speaker 1: hundred and thirty six somehow, then they destroy it and
Speaker 1: do it all over. You need a two thirds majority
Speaker 1: to become pope. After each vote, the ballots are burned
Speaker 1: and smoke comes out of the chimney. The smoke is
Speaker 1: either black if they have not chosen a pope, or
Speaker 1: white if they have chosen a pope. This can take
Speaker 1: quite a bit of time. The last two times it
Speaker 1: took two days. One time it took two years. There
Speaker 1: was a lot of infighting. They weren't actually in secret
Speaker 1: conclave for that entire period, but that it took a
Speaker 1: while to elect that pope. So, first of all, you
Speaker 1: had told me before we started recording that you weren't
Speaker 1: really familiar with this process.
Speaker 3: So now what happens pre recording says pre recording Maria, I.
Speaker 1: Thought, no, no, but this is but this is actually
Speaker 1: I think it's actually a really it's good to just
Speaker 1: have a fresh reaction, because you know, a lot about
Speaker 1: decision making, So just fresh your your first reaction to
Speaker 1: how this is structured. What do you think is this
Speaker 1: a good way to make, you know, such a monumental decision.
Speaker 1: What are we thinking here?
Speaker 3: Well, my first thought is that this is an easy
Speaker 3: decision because there is a candidate named Pierre Batista Pizza Bala.
Speaker 3: He's a fucking red hat looks kind of like a
Speaker 3: pizza Pope slash hat, Like, how can you not name
Speaker 3: that guy pope? He has a divine right, I think
Speaker 3: I'm using that term incorrectly.
Speaker 1: No, Look, he's not the favorite, he's not the betting
Speaker 1: market favorite. Night we can talk about it.
Speaker 2: I got all the money and Pizza Bala I tell
Speaker 2: you that much.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's a pretty amazing name. I will
Speaker 1: hand it to him.
Speaker 3: No, the process I am indirectly familiar with because it's
Speaker 3: the same process essentially that like political parties used choose
Speaker 3: a candidate in the event of a broker or contested convention.
Speaker 3: Right there, you need a majority and not two thirty
Speaker 3: said it was Maria. But still they go one ballot
Speaker 3: at a time, and it can take a lot of ballots.
Speaker 3: You know, in some of the conventions in the early
Speaker 3: twentieth century, you could take more than one hundred, I think, right,
Speaker 3: and like, there's a couple of dynamics that are important, right.
Speaker 3: You know, One is that people are trying to through
Speaker 3: the kind of veil of anonymity. Of course, I can
Speaker 3: also have conversations on the side, right side channel conversations.
Speaker 3: You know, they're trying to order their preferences.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: Maybe I do think that Pete Sabala is my first choice,
Speaker 3: but I'd rather have I'm just looking at some of
Speaker 3: these other candidates. I'd rather have Peter Trix and them
Speaker 3: Matteo Zupie, Right, and so you know, I am looking
Speaker 3: for signals about how other people vote. You can also
Speaker 3: have I don't know if this takes place in the conclave,
Speaker 3: but it does in like political American context. You can
Speaker 3: kind of play your votes to a different candidate, right,
Speaker 3: I mean there are kind of you know, and a
Speaker 3: minimum two dimensions that are important here.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: One is you can have a more reformist pope like
Speaker 3: Francis versus ones that are more traditional.
Speaker 2: That's one dimension.
Speaker 3: Then you have Italian versus Europe versus the rest of
Speaker 3: the world. Right, you could have the first Filipino pope.
Speaker 3: You could have the first black pope, for example, And
Speaker 3: so yeah, I don't quite know how you begin to
Speaker 3: kind of model the game theory of this. My guess
Speaker 3: is that, like, there are some essentially random dynamics right
Speaker 3: where someone's like, fuck it, I'm bored of keep voting
Speaker 3: over and over again. I'm gonna shift my vote That
Speaker 3: catalyzes a chain reaction of sorts. And my guess is
Speaker 3: that if you kind of like somehow simulated this, it
Speaker 3: wouldn't be deterministic.
Speaker 2: It would be somewhat stochastic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, first name, I have a question, and then
Speaker 1: and then I'll reach when we're in the US political system,
Speaker 1: when you need a majority. They're not sequestered though, right
Speaker 1: like they're still they They are allowed to listen to
Speaker 1: the news and everything. It's a little bit more open, right.
Speaker 3: No, Look, today they'd all be on their phones and
Speaker 3: and there'd be a lot of implicit pressure. In the
Speaker 3: old days, it was a proverbial smoke filled rooms. It's
Speaker 3: one of the context in which that phrase kind of
Speaker 3: comes from, Right, So you might have some degree of.
Speaker 2: Isolation.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Now it's it's tricky because everything you say is
Speaker 3: on Twitter, and and you know the back channels can
Speaker 3: be compromised and leaked to the press.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3: I know, if there's like a pope, if there's a
Speaker 3: Maggie Haberman of the Vatican or something, right who's leaking stuff,
Speaker 3: there has to be some way to leak stuff.
Speaker 1: No, there's there's really no way to leak stuff these days.
Speaker 1: So the you know, the idea behind the total sequestering
Speaker 1: is to keep it secretive on their side, but also
Speaker 1: to minimize the politicking that's going on. That said, I mean,
Speaker 1: the meetings have already started, so you were saying that,
Speaker 1: you know, you can pledge votes to a pope. That
Speaker 1: absolutely does happen, and popees start, potential popes start building coalitions.
Speaker 1: And even now we're still a week out and already
Speaker 1: a number of that one hundred and thirty five eligible
Speaker 1: cardinals have dropped out. Some have done it for health reasons,
Speaker 1: but people are like already who can and can't vote
Speaker 1: is a thing, because since it's two thirds, the actual
Speaker 1: number really matters, right Like, it matters if all one
Speaker 1: thirty five vote or if only one hundred and ten vote,
Speaker 1: right Like, that's a big difference. In terms of what
Speaker 1: you need for support, because even though the percentage is
Speaker 1: the same, because we're talking about very personal relationships, absolute
Speaker 1: numbers here matter, right, Do I need to get one
Speaker 1: more vote? Do I need to get three more votes?
Speaker 1: Like here? That actually does make a difference. So Paula
Speaker 1: taking starts very very early, and I think that yes, sure,
Speaker 1: sequestering them the day of the conclave accomplishes something. But
Speaker 1: I wonder, like the moment that someone you know dies,
Speaker 1: like the moment Francis died, can we just like see
Speaker 1: what immediately gather them all there like it, start sequestering
Speaker 1: because they.
Speaker 3: If they can't vote, I mean they get a break
Speaker 3: at night, right, No they they stay there.
Speaker 1: No, they can't leave, so they they h it's completely
Speaker 1: They have a dormitory on premises, so they sleep there
Speaker 1: as well. So everyone everyone is there twenty four to
Speaker 1: seven until the pope is elected. That's why they have doctors.
Speaker 1: So so the only one of some of the only
Speaker 1: people who are allowed in who are not the voting
Speaker 1: cardinals are medical professionals in case something happens, because Nate,
Speaker 1: we've already established that these are not young men who
Speaker 1: are doing this, and so.
Speaker 3: There's always ways for information to leak.
Speaker 1: There is always ways for information to leak. And I
Speaker 1: would go one step further. There are secret ballots, and
Speaker 1: there are secret ballots. Right, so we are here, you know, saying, Okay,
Speaker 1: this is your secret ballot. But first of all, they're
Speaker 1: writing it by hand. And these are men who probably,
Speaker 1: like I'm sorry, handwriting is recognizable, Like I hate saying
Speaker 1: it's true.
Speaker 3: Friends just supposedly had very discentive like small handwriting, yeah everywhere.
Speaker 1: I mean, these are men who've been handwriting their whole life.
Speaker 1: This isn't like a twenty year old who like grew
Speaker 1: up on social media and never handwrites anything. Handwriting is distinctive.
Speaker 1: You are, you know, they're sitting in an open room.
Speaker 1: They're not going to voting booths. The thing is like
Speaker 1: it's secret, but it's not secret, and you can still
Speaker 1: exert pressure on people and people can still think they
Speaker 1: still know how I'm voting, and like that sort of
Speaker 1: psychological play is definitely a factor here. And I think
Speaker 1: is you know, even though we're talking holy men, like
Speaker 1: they are not above this, Like I'm guessing that that
Speaker 1: voting and that pressure can get pretty damn vicious and
Speaker 1: there are better and worse ways to make group decisions,
Speaker 1: and yes, this is one of the better ways to
Speaker 1: try to do it. But I think that we can
Speaker 1: go a step further and try to really anonymize it
Speaker 1: and take that pressure off so that you can't point
Speaker 1: fingers and be like, see, I recognize your handwriting, Nate.
Speaker 1: I know that you voted for mister Pizza because you
Speaker 1: still like it and you don't be the bull. Good
Speaker 1: vote for me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, look, there are there's a lot of theory about
Speaker 3: how this supplies to the US Congress as well, and
Speaker 3: the public nature of the voting process. Yeah, if you
Speaker 3: had a private ballot, you might have had I mean,
Speaker 3: Trump was impeached but not convicted. It might have been
Speaker 3: convicted if you privately asked GOP centers what they thought.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: So you know, as poker player, on the one hand,
Speaker 3: there's like a party, It's like, hey, information, I'm a journalist,
Speaker 3: so therefore therefore information is always good. We always want
Speaker 3: to give people more information and they make rational decisions.
Speaker 3: Whereas poker players, we understand that information has value and information,
Speaker 3: the existence of information and the flow of information can
Speaker 3: like can reshape the world.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, And controlling the flow of information also
Speaker 1: has a lot of value. Who controls the information and
Speaker 1: what information gets shared and the order in which it
Speaker 1: gets shared is also incredibly important. So let's just back
Speaker 1: up a little bit, because you know, this group dec
Speaker 1: is being made in secret, but the run up to
Speaker 1: it is not in secret, and so we know, you know,
Speaker 1: we can see the betting odds, we can see kind
Speaker 1: of the stories, we see the headlines, we see of
Speaker 1: the arguments for you know, all of your front runners.
Speaker 1: Why you would want Pietro Perolin, who's currently the front
Speaker 1: runner on most betting sites, versus Luis Antonio Tagle, who
Speaker 1: is known as the Asian Francis. You know, they're that's
Speaker 1: his nickname. You know, why you'd want one or the other?
Speaker 1: The odds actually have changed. So when I looked on
Speaker 1: the twenty second Tagle was actually the odds on favorite,
Speaker 1: and now he's in second place to perilin so already, right,
Speaker 1: people have been shifting. And what we know about decision
Speaker 1: making is those early things matter, right, Like that is framing,
Speaker 1: and that is kind of dynamics that actually can affect results,
Speaker 1: Like if you can make yourself appear to be a
Speaker 1: front runner early in a decision process that can actually
Speaker 1: influence how the group makes a decision later on. You know,
Speaker 1: that first mover advantage is absolutely crucial and can really
Speaker 1: affect how people think and how they think other people
Speaker 1: are thinking. Which is also a major thing here, right,
Speaker 1: because also no one wants a two year long conclive.
Speaker 1: So you're also trying to think strategically about this as
Speaker 1: you would in any group decision. You know, how do
Speaker 1: we get to this outcome faster?
Speaker 3: Yes, this is a big media pr thing too, right, Well, sometimes,
Speaker 3: I mean increasingly you'll have people who are the subject
Speaker 3: of a critical media story, right, and they will go
Speaker 3: on their social media accounts and be like, yeah, I
Speaker 3: just want to I mean, they'll be more delicate than
Speaker 3: this way. I just want to preempt this. It's a
Speaker 3: hit job. Or let's say, I just want to preempt
Speaker 3: this by admitting I fucked this thing up, and you
Speaker 3: know the subtext and softening a little bit. Why it's
Speaker 3: not quite as bad as you think. I mean, yeah,
Speaker 3: this and you know, perpecause people are kind of lazy
Speaker 3: and it's costly to contradict people. I mean, we've probably
Speaker 3: all been in a decision making process. Right, a meeting
Speaker 3: where like maybe five people want I mean, take whatever
Speaker 3: simple example you want. Five people want to get pizza,
Speaker 3: one person wants to get Thai food, right, and then
Speaker 3: like and for whatever reason, the Thai food fucking person
Speaker 3: speaks up first and they're like, super fucking annoying. Right,
Speaker 3: you can tell I want pizza. I'm in Chicago, something,
Speaker 3: I got pizza, pizza on the brain.
Speaker 1: Here, you've got pizza on the brand.
Speaker 3: Yeah, even though it's none am Yeah, But anyway, absolutely,
Speaker 3: I mean again that goes to the notion of this
Speaker 3: it can be a bit random and stochastic, and like
Speaker 3: having having a secret ballot with minimal I am skeptical
Speaker 3: of zero information leakage is a way to diminish that.
Speaker 3: But you know, maybe a conversation you have in the
Speaker 3: hallway or things like that can have cascading effects.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, and let's actually also do the converse of that. So,
Speaker 1: as I said, Cardinal Pietro Perolyn is currently the favorite
Speaker 1: to be the next pope. He is, you know, Italian,
Speaker 1: kind of a little bit more centrist, but still someone
Speaker 1: who was close to Francis. You know, people think that
Speaker 1: he's a nice choice now imagine I'm going to do it. Total.
Speaker 1: We don't know what's going to happen in the conclave,
Speaker 1: and we will never know because, as as we've already said,
Speaker 1: totally secret. Imagine the first vote he is like number
Speaker 1: four or something, right, Imagine he's actually very performs below expectation.
Speaker 1: That also can have an outsized effect. Right when you
Speaker 1: are a perceived front runner and that first ballot doesn't
Speaker 1: go your way, that can also throw throw things into
Speaker 1: disarray and really change the dynamic of the group decision. Right, Yeah, that.
Speaker 3: First I would imagine that that he would withdraw or
Speaker 3: support would collapse after that. Right, it's like, okay, this
Speaker 3: is a guy that probably ought to start out with
Speaker 3: the head start, right, and if he doesn't, then there's
Speaker 3: a big scramble where it's like a unexpected dark horse candidate.
Speaker 3: If they got five votes out of nowhere, that probably
Speaker 3: means that might be quite bullish, right.
Speaker 2: People.
Speaker 3: Now, people can also do say hey, I just want
Speaker 3: to wait and see and prolong the process. Like in
Speaker 3: the contextilitical conventions, they might nominate like a favorite son. Right,
Speaker 3: you're a delegate from West Virginia, The governor of West Virginia,
Speaker 3: is not a viable nominee, but you want to wait
Speaker 3: and see what everyone else does and maybe like preserve
Speaker 3: time for a viable candidate who is not the front
Speaker 3: runner to gather support. Right, So you want to make
Speaker 3: sure there's no first ballot pick, so you just vote
Speaker 3: for your governor or something. Right, So people are pretty
Speaker 3: smart about this for the most part.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's actually an interesting broader question. In any sort
Speaker 1: of group decision situation like this, does it make sense
Speaker 1: to vote for the person who you think is kind
Speaker 1: of likely to win and you'll eventually end up supporting
Speaker 1: at first or does it make sense to just vote
Speaker 1: for your preferred candidate and split the ballot, you know,
Speaker 1: one hundred ways or or or whatever it is. What
Speaker 1: is the strategically smarter decision? And yeah, Nate, if you
Speaker 1: were to I mean, if you were to pick, would
Speaker 1: you go with Perilin just because he is the betting
Speaker 1: market's favorite.
Speaker 3: No, I like, I like the you know, obviously Pizzabella
Speaker 3: pizza bala, excuse me, and then the how do you say,
Speaker 3: I guess I go with him?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's he was actually, Yeah, Asian Francis was my pick.
Speaker 2: Is there a vice pope?
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: Him will be right back after this break.
Speaker 1: Well, Nate, now we've talked to group decision making, let's
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about negotiation. I have not seen
Speaker 1: Sinners as the movie that's taken Hollywood by storm. You
Speaker 1: have not seen it either, No, so for listeners who
Speaker 1: haven't seen it, don't worry. There will be zero spoilers
Speaker 1: because we have no idea what happens. The reason we're
Speaker 1: talking about it is because Ryan Coogler created a clause
Speaker 1: in his deal with Warner Brothers that said that in
Speaker 1: twenty five years, the rights to the film will revert
Speaker 1: to him, and so he will retain his rights. He
Speaker 1: is not the first person to have done this. There
Speaker 1: are some filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino who have been able
Speaker 1: to negotiate deals like this, but it is incredibly rare.
Speaker 1: It is something that is not seen often in Hollywood,
Speaker 1: and people are up in arms saying, oh, these kinds
Speaker 1: of deals are going to be the death of studios.
Speaker 3: You know about Totals Studio, but the fucking Disney Company,
Speaker 3: and I feel about sympathetically for them as I do
Speaker 3: for Harvard. If you've seen previous segments, and I don't
Speaker 3: think the Trump administration is targeting the White or the
Speaker 3: Walt Disney company, yet in the way he did for Harvard.
Speaker 3: So so yeah, go go fuck yourself studios. Now I'll
Speaker 3: never get a contract for anything.
Speaker 1: He didn't mean it, guys, he didn't mean it. Actually
Speaker 1: know he probably he did mean it. He did mean it,
Speaker 1: and I kind of agree. So so no, this is
Speaker 1: a completely I think this is a completely ludicrous take
Speaker 1: because what it's saying is that, oh, you know, after
Speaker 1: twenty five years, the creator cannot have the copyright over
Speaker 1: his creation. And people are you know, people are saying, oh,
Speaker 1: this is this is totally crazy. You know, the studio
Speaker 1: is the one that financed it, They're the one who
Speaker 1: made the movie. And yet right there would be no
Speaker 1: movie without the person who created it, without the person
Speaker 1: who actually made the movie who wrote about it. Now,
Speaker 1: I was thinking about this in terms of what you
Speaker 1: and I do, Nate, which is write books. One of
Speaker 1: the things you and I do. So who owns the
Speaker 1: copyright to what you write?
Speaker 2: I guess the publish.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, you retained the copyright.
Speaker 2: Eventually eventually public That's what I have an agent for.
Speaker 1: So so you we have you know, you have publishers,
Speaker 1: they publish your book. Everyone has different deals. You get royalties,
Speaker 1: you know, or you don't get royalties. However however it is.
Speaker 1: But eventually, you know, we die and the rights go
Speaker 1: to our state, right and then they they can kind
Speaker 1: of negotiate.
Speaker 2: So just going in to chat see good luck with that.
Speaker 1: The rights revert to CHAT GPT or whichever m ends
Speaker 1: up winning that race. So no, So it's to think
Speaker 1: that creators can't have rights to their work, that you
Speaker 1: just kind of sell it and then that's it. It's
Speaker 1: just a completely just insane way of looking at it.
Speaker 1: And twenty five years. It's not like he's saying, I
Speaker 1: get you know, in five years, you guys stop right,
Speaker 1: stop owning these rights. Twenty five years, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of time to make your money back. By the way,
Speaker 1: he also invested in the movie. His production company invested
Speaker 1: in the movie, so he is also one of the
Speaker 1: people who paid for it. So it's not like he
Speaker 1: puts zero dollars and zero sounds in there.
Speaker 3: Okay, so neither of us have seen this movie yet.
Speaker 3: I give sixty percent outs. I will eventually, but we
Speaker 3: have done negotiations in the past, probably more than the
Speaker 3: average person has done being kind of independent freelancers, etcetera
Speaker 3: for a long time. So let's use some negotiating tips. Maria,
Speaker 3: I'm gonna put you on the spot. What's your number
Speaker 3: one tip?
Speaker 1: All right? So my number one tip is do not
Speaker 1: be the first to act. Don't be the first mover,
Speaker 1: because information is power, and you do not want to
Speaker 1: be the one who is revealing information first.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean doesn't that like.
Speaker 3: Contradict the idea of framing the conversation now that we
Speaker 3: talked about in the Pope segment. I'm not just seeing
Speaker 3: with you, I'm being a little provocative.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I think that this is a really interesting dynamic, right,
Speaker 1: there are different considerations at play. The reason I said
Speaker 1: what I said is you don't want to end up
Speaker 1: anchoring people too low, and you also don't want to
Speaker 1: tip your hand as to what your expectation might be, right,
Speaker 1: So you want them to make the first move so
Speaker 1: that you can be the one to have more information
Speaker 1: rather than less information. So this is like from an
Speaker 1: anchoring standpoint and from a negotiating informational standpoint.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, there's always negotiation before the negotiation, right.
Speaker 2: I mean, like.
Speaker 3: Things from if you go out to dinner or lunch, right,
Speaker 3: who is picking up the lunch and how nice is
Speaker 3: the place? I mean that's a signal. It might not
Speaker 3: tell you very much. And people can be charmed by
Speaker 3: things that are charming and not actually, you know, that
Speaker 3: may not be a positive signal actually, right, And.
Speaker 2: You know I have suffered in.
Speaker 3: Negotiations sometime from actually being too polite right where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 3: this isn't really going to work out. I want to,
Speaker 3: like I have some social relationship with the person to maintain,
Speaker 3: or maybe they're like a backup option later on. Right,
Speaker 3: so you're like too solicitous stuff that you kind of
Speaker 3: know it's going to be an offer that's insufficient or uninteresting.
Speaker 3: And then and then yeah, I mean, look, I was
Speaker 3: going to say, you know my approach. I guess this
Speaker 3: is my number one tip. Be aware that giving out
Speaker 3: information is costly.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: The flip side of that, or the companion of that
Speaker 3: being that, like, I don't think misdirection. It's just not
Speaker 3: worth my time. Usually I think there are too many
Speaker 3: ways it ends badly.
Speaker 1: You know, No, I actually I totally agree with that,
Speaker 1: and I think, yeah, ours kind of go hand in
Speaker 1: hand information valuable, giving off information costly. And yet there's
Speaker 1: a cost to both of our tips because the framing
Speaker 1: can be valuable. Right, So if you are the one
Speaker 1: who kind of frames things, that can also be helpful.
Speaker 1: But I think you and I both are airing on
Speaker 1: the side of information power, and so that's why we're
Speaker 1: giving our number one tips the way that we are.
Speaker 1: But do keep in mind, as a caveat to both
Speaker 1: of these that framing the conversation is alwoso important.
Speaker 3: With the important exception that, like, you know, look, a
Speaker 3: negotiation is supposed to in most contexts result in the
Speaker 3: positive sum agreement. Right now, if you're trying to like
Speaker 3: rent an apartment or something, then that's more straightforward. I'm
Speaker 3: trying to get five hundred bucks per month off the lease,
Speaker 3: and the counter party is trying to figure out, Okay,
Speaker 3: if this guy doesn't sign the lease, what's the expected
Speaker 3: value of maybe taking another month to rent the apartment?
Speaker 3: That kind of thing, right, Yeah, But like if I'm
Speaker 3: trying to, like, let's say I'm trying to get investment
Speaker 3: for a business venture silver bulletin or receive business or
Speaker 3: whatever else, right, you know, I mean there is mutual
Speaker 3: gain from information. It's like, hey, this is acually a
Speaker 3: good idea, like because Pardoner got figuring, like how do
Speaker 3: we how do we create value in all these different
Speaker 3: ways that we might create value in the world. Right, Okay, Marie,
Speaker 3: what's your what's your second hint?
Speaker 1: My second tip is be willing to walk away.
Speaker 2: Okay, it was my Yeah, we're.
Speaker 1: Going to we're going to merge. Yeah, so great, so
Speaker 1: we both we both agree that's crucial, Nate. If you
Speaker 1: enter a negotiation and you're not willing to walk away,
Speaker 1: you've already lost, right, because there will be a point
Speaker 1: at which they realize that you're not going to walk away,
Speaker 1: and then they can get what they want to get.
Speaker 1: You need to be willing to walk away from the table,
Speaker 1: truly willing, not just say oh yeah, I'm willing to
Speaker 1: walk away, Otherwise you're going to you're going to be
Speaker 1: the weaker party.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: No, I think I benefited it in my life from
Speaker 3: from walking away and being very patient to find a
Speaker 3: deal that I thought was really good. Not good in
Speaker 3: the sense of being unfair, right, but in the sense
Speaker 3: of like, look, I hold my work product in high esteem, right,
Speaker 3: and like, and you.
Speaker 2: Know, look, if you're.
Speaker 3: If you're resourceful, then you have a lot of optionalities
Speaker 3: you get older and better connected and things like that.
Speaker 3: I think in general, people are too quick to settle.
Speaker 3: I think I think it's a general tip. It's probably
Speaker 3: right in most contexts in life, right, and I think
Speaker 3: I think in the context of negotiations too. I mean,
Speaker 3: it's very powerful as a negotiating tactic. But also like
Speaker 3: you know, look, I've had deals that fell through that
Speaker 3: I would have been worse off if I had signed them.
Speaker 1: Right, absolutely, Yeah, And that actually goes to my tip
Speaker 1: number three, which is before you enter the negotiation, right
Speaker 1: down and know what your non negotiables are, right, Like,
Speaker 1: what are the few things that like you absolutely must
Speaker 1: have and you don't have to like state them all,
Speaker 1: but just know these are the things that like without
Speaker 1: this or it can be either way. Either without this,
Speaker 1: I walk away or if this happens, then I walk away.
Speaker 1: And then do not negotiate on those, no matter how
Speaker 1: compelling other things might look. Know what your core principles are, right,
Speaker 1: and don't compromise them in the heat of the moment,
Speaker 1: under emotion, whatever it is. Because it's really easy to
Speaker 1: try to convince yourself in the moment. If someone's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: well i'll give you this much more money. If you
Speaker 1: can just accept this one thing you really don't want
Speaker 1: to accept, it can be easy to convince yourself that
Speaker 1: it will be okay, and in the long run it
Speaker 1: probably won't if this was one of your core principles.
Speaker 1: That's why it's important to know those ahead of time.
Speaker 1: I'm not talking a long list. I just mean like,
Speaker 1: sometimes there are just a few crucial things that you
Speaker 1: know that you must have or that you absolutely can't have.
Speaker 3: My third tip is kind of like focus on someone's negotiables,
Speaker 3: and I would say, in hooker terms like exploit that right,
Speaker 3: arranging from small to large. When I negotiate my deal
Speaker 3: with Disney back in twenty thirteen, I guess it was,
Speaker 3: you know, one thing I asked for was like business
Speaker 3: class travel and accommodations because it's relatively small cost. Right,
Speaker 3: it might be worth one percent of the salary or something,
Speaker 3: but they're not going to blow up the whole deal
Speaker 3: over that kind of thing, and so it's free basically, right.
Speaker 3: A more serious thing is like they, I think did
Speaker 3: not appreciate the value of the intellectual property of the models, right,
Speaker 3: and so like you have to go to totally to
Speaker 3: town there. I mean, that's almost a more important provision
Speaker 3: than it turned out than like my license fee and
Speaker 3: salary and things like that, but like paying attention to
Speaker 3: the non central terms that are important to you, especially
Speaker 3: the other side seems blind to them and and is desperate, right, Like,
Speaker 3: it's sometimes easier to negotiate on things that aren't salary
Speaker 3: when they're when they're material.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely absolutely, And so I think that this, like
Speaker 1: to me, that would all of our tips kind of
Speaker 1: make a tip number four, which is like a meta thing,
Speaker 1: which is, don't negotiate when you're emotional, like under under pressure,
Speaker 1: under emotion. Think through all of these things ahead of time,
Speaker 1: try to do a lot of work ahead of time,
Speaker 1: and try to give yourself time to you know, execute one, two,
Speaker 1: and three, and we'll be back right after this. All right, Nate,
Speaker 1: Let's play a game called would you rather? Okay, all right, Nate,
Speaker 1: would you rather be President of the United States or
Speaker 1: the next pope?
Speaker 3: I'd rather be president. I mean, first of all, I'm
Speaker 3: not pappable, right, I'm not Catholic. Various other problems doubly.
Speaker 1: I'm doubly not pappable. I'm not.
Speaker 3: If there are only two people left, I'm gonna become
Speaker 3: the Pope.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, Maria, right you are.
Speaker 3: I don't think I want to be president, but I mean,
Speaker 3: I yeah, I mean way better than being fucking not
Speaker 3: fucking I respect the Catholic. What am I even talking about.
Speaker 3: I'd rather be president of the United States?
Speaker 2: Okay, Maria.
Speaker 3: Would you rather be underestimated in every negotiation or feared
Speaker 3: in every negotiation?
Speaker 1: Well, I know how the first one feels, because that's
Speaker 1: that's the way I've gone through life, and I think
Speaker 1: it's actually a pretty good thing. So I'm just gonna
Speaker 1: choose choose the devil. I know, I'd rather be underestimated
Speaker 1: in every negotiation because if people underestimate you, then it
Speaker 1: can be easier to to surprise them, right, and to
Speaker 1: pull off stuff that they wouldn't expect coming from you.
Speaker 1: That said, like, sometimes I think it would be pretty
Speaker 1: cool to be feared, and no one ever fears me.
Speaker 1: They look at the.
Speaker 3: Weird things too, where like you can like win a
Speaker 3: negotiation for an outcome that winds up not being great
Speaker 3: for you, right, because someone is cowed and it's omission
Speaker 3: and they are unhappy, right, and you kind of and
Speaker 3: you receive worse information from them. We talked before about
Speaker 3: sometimes it's not a purely zero sum game.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I think that's I would agree with that.
Speaker 1: All right, Nay? Would you rather be an average American
Speaker 1: or Chinese citizen a year from now American USA? Fuck?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: I actually what reason? It's been a busy week.
Speaker 3: I went and gave a talk at West Point on Monday,
Speaker 3: actually spent the whole day there. So not too many
Speaker 3: civilians get that opportunity. And like you know, these cadets
Speaker 3: who forsake traditional college experience to commit to five years
Speaker 3: serving the country, we're very smart, and like you know,
Speaker 3: it's a very selective program, right, You can't just do
Speaker 3: it unless you're very very good. But that made me
Speaker 3: a little bit more optimistic for the future of the country. Nice, okay, MARIREGT.
Speaker 3: Would you rather let current AI decide? So chat GPT,
Speaker 3: you get to use version four point five year I'm
Speaker 3: going to tell you when to launch nuclear weapons or
Speaker 3: the June twenty twenty four version of Biden the day
Speaker 3: that Biden did that debate, for example, So.
Speaker 1: I am not trying to be tech alarmist, but I
Speaker 1: would actually still say June twenty twenty four, Biden, because
Speaker 1: he wouldn't be the one making the decision, okay, right,
Speaker 1: He has his smart advisors making the decision. And all
Speaker 1: he does is, you know, he lacks capacity for his
Speaker 1: own independent meddling, and he just says he just like
Speaker 1: he says fine on whatever it is, because he's exhausted.
Speaker 1: You know, he's done. Here was my so exactly exactly,
Speaker 1: and he like the one thing other than stepping down
Speaker 1: at which he did eventually do, he did listen to
Speaker 1: his advisors, and so I think that that would be
Speaker 1: my choice. And with that, Nate, I am off to well, actually, no,
Speaker 1: I'm going to make a good decision. I was going
Speaker 1: to say, I am off to play my first tournament
Speaker 1: at EPT Monte Carlo. But I'm not going to play
Speaker 1: because I am off of a red eye, I did
Speaker 1: not sleep, I'm exhausted, and it's going to be a
Speaker 1: minus CVO. Love.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 1: I love that turn.
Speaker 3: I love the barreling into town right late regis late
Speaker 3: regime from mccaren Airport. I love the I love blowing
Speaker 3: my first bullet on, like, you know, a fifteen hundred
Speaker 3: dollars Omaha eight tournament. I'm going to fucking like Yeah,
Speaker 3: I like getting the babbling out of the way really soon.
Speaker 1: Well, but but the three hour jet lag is not
Speaker 1: a nine hour or six hour jet lag. So after
Speaker 1: a red eye, be tough. That said, I have played
Speaker 1: this first day at Monte Carlo in the past, but
Speaker 1: right now I think I'm just a little bit too tired,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to be responsible, Nate. I'm going to
Speaker 1: be financially responsible and not not blow eleven hundred responsibilities.
Speaker 3: You can do something irresponsible later. That's how I That's
Speaker 3: how I love.
Speaker 1: Yes, Yes, so I will. I will be able to
Speaker 1: reward myself with a little treat later on because I'm
Speaker 1: being so good right now. What are you going to do, Nate?
Speaker 1: You are in Chicago. Are you going to go eat
Speaker 1: some pizza?
Speaker 2: I probably won't.
Speaker 3: It's hard to find non heavy food, and it's probably
Speaker 3: some Mexican Actually, I love the Mexican go.
Speaker 1: To peaquads, peaquads. I like, I'm here by my pizza.
Speaker 3: I mean seeing some friends there tomorrow at their place. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm not going to have a whole fucking pizza by myself.
Speaker 1: I don't think you can eat some pea quads and
Speaker 1: bring the rest for your friends.
Speaker 2: Okay, let me let me, let me, let me. Let
Speaker 2: me evaluate some options. Maria, peakwads is quite good.
Speaker 1: Peaquads is quite good. Now I've put it in your brain,
Speaker 1: and with that, we'll see you all next week. Risky
Speaker 1: Business is hosted by me Maria Kanikova.
Speaker 3: And by me Nate Silver. The show is a co
Speaker 3: production of Pushkin Industries and iHeartMedia. This episode was produced
Speaker 3: by Isabelle Carter. Our associate producer is Sonya Gerwit. Sally
Speaker 3: Helm is our editor, and our executive producer is Jacob Goldstein.
Speaker 2: Mixing by Sarah Bruger.
Speaker 1: If you like this show, please rate and review us
Speaker 1: so other people can find us too. Thanks so much
Speaker 1: for tuning in.