When you value something deeply, don’t shy away from talking about it. Instead, embrace telling people why it’s important to you. Assume that for the message to stick, it should be heard ten different times and said in ten different ways. The more you can enlist others to help spread your message, the more likely it is to have an impact.

The other way to know if you have a strategy? Do you say “no” 20 times more than you say “yes” — no to the increasing number of opportunities coming your way; no to the wrong customers for your business model; no to nineteen of the twenty people wanting to work with you (because marketing is getting you a steady stream of applicants!); etc?

The worst thing you can do when entering into a negotiation is to suggest or promise something because you know the other person wants to hear it, only to have to reverse course later. You have to be clear about where you stand from the beginning. I knew if I misled George, simply to begin the bargaining process, or to keep the conversation going, it would ultimately backfire on me.

By making people work just a little harder, question pitches prompt people to come up with their own reasons for agreeing (or not). And when people summon their own reasons for believing something, they endorse the belief more strongly and become more likely to act on it.

Instead of swirling downward into frustration, “Yes and” spirals upward toward possibility. When you stop you’ve got a set of options, not a sense of futility.

There are certainly plenty of times in life to say “No.” When it comes to moving others, however, the best default position is this second principle of improv. And its benefits stretch further than sales and non-sales selling.