In other words, the salespeople with an optimistic explanatory style—who saw rejections as temporary rather than permanent, specific rather than universal, and external rather than personal—sold more insurance and survived in their jobs much longer.

As social scientists have discovered, interrogative self-talk is often more valuable than the declarative kind.

People often find potential more interesting than accomplishment because it’s more uncertain, the researchers argue. That uncertainty can lead people to think more deeply about the person they’re evaluating—and the more intensive processing that requires can lead to generating more and better reasons why the person is a good choice. So next time you’re selling yourself, don’t fixate only on what you achieved yesterday. Also emphasize the promise of what you could accomplish tomorrow.

When sellers and buyers are evenly matched, pushing for win-lose rarely leads to a win for anyone—and often ends in lose-lose.

But emotionally intelligent signage goes deeper. It achieves those same ends by enlisting the principles of “make it personal” and “make it purposeful.” It tries to move others by expressing empathy with the person viewing the sign (that’s the personal part)...