What Great Communicators Do Differently with Vance Crowe

In this episode, Mike Donaldson talks with Vance Crowe about the role communication plays in leadership, relationships, and agriculture.

Vance explains how interest-based communication helps people better understand motivations, reduce unnecessary conflict, and improve conversations in both professional and personal settings. The discussion covers listening skills, negotiation strategies, and the importance of curiosity when navigating disagreements.

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Transcript

Chris Radke [01:39]

Hello and welcome to AK Podcasts, where we explore science and nutrition behind livestock care and management with the best in the brides of the buisinesss. I'm your host, Chris Radke, part of the sales department here at Agri-King. And with me today is the Director of Field Services and a member of the Sales Management Team, Mr. Mike Donaldson. Mike, how you doing, buddy?

Mike Donaldson [01:57]

having a wonderful day. Chris, how's yours going?

Chris Radke [02:00]

Great, great, great. Hey, Mike, so we have a slightly different topic today. Who's with us and what are we talking about?

Mike Donaldson [02:06]

We do Chris, we have a little differently themed episode for you people this week. Instead of our usual focus being forages, aspects of animal husbandry, nutrition, ⁓ we are going to change things up today. ⁓ Good communication has never been more important in agriculture than it is currently. Farms are bigger, there's more people working on them. ⁓ People have dealings with employees like never before, but also the business relationships that they have.

outside of their own farm are becoming a more and more important part of their business. When you add in how the quality of actual spoken communication seems to be on the decline in many cases, we think this is an opportunity for someone who will work on their communication skills to pick up some nice advantages. And today's guest has made it a very important part of his life.

to help people improve those communication skills. Today we're joined by Vance Crowe, founder of Legacy Interviews. I was first introduced to Vance at the 2026 Michigan Pork Symposium. And Vance speaks regularly to agricultural audiences across the country, in addition to his businesses one-on-one work. I was drawn first to the depth of his experiences both in and out of agriculture.

but also to a philosophy of his interest-based communication. I'm going to ask Vance to finish his own introduction. He can give you his background. ⁓ And I'm going to prompt him to tell you the story about applying for the job he didn't want and how getting that job wound up changing a lot of things in his life. And then he can move into that philosophy of interest-based communications. Thanks Vance.

Thank you for joining us today. Please tell us about yourself.

Vance Crowe [04:04]

Well, I'm glad to be here. Yeah, that Michigan pork symposium, it's so funny because it seems like a long time ago, but it really was just this winter. And that talk, like many of the talks I'm invited to give, where I'm brought in to say, hey, how can an operation get better outside of the balance sheet, outside of the physical work that needs to get done to make your farm more productive or just better to work in?

And a lot of my work is around teaching people how does the human mind connect with another mind? How do you communicate ideas that you have inside of yourself to another person so that they not only understand you, but that they want to share more about their perspective with you? And just like at the Michigan Pork Symposium, I travel all over the United States, Canada, every once in a while to Europe to give talks on this subject.

But I did not set out to do this. is never ever my dream or what I was gonna do. ⁓ I always wanted to be in communication.

I'm like that little kid that just can't stop talking, that's using words way beyond his understanding of those words. But really all I want to do is just talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. And as I got older, I would tell people when they would ask me, what do want to be when you grow up? I'd be like, well, I want to be a communicator. And they'd be like, there's no such thing as a communicator. You need to go into marketing. You need to go into PR. You need to go into some field. And to make a very long story short, the big transition in my life happened when I was

invited to interview for the director of millennial engagement at Monsanto. And this is kind of a funny story. I'm glad you're letting me tell it. It's a fun story to tell. When I first heard about Monsanto, I thought what everybody else thought, which I don't know. Young people today don't really probably won't know this, but 10, 15, 20 years ago, Monsanto was viewed as pure evil. Just that was like in every documentary. If you just mentioned the word Monsanto, people would be like, yeah, the,

The Dark Place.

Well, they're headquartered in St. Louis, and I was living here with my wife. I had moved here from Washington, DC, where I'd been working at the World Bank. And I got an invitation to interview at Monsanto, and I had no interest in this job. But I thought, well, who doesn't want to see inside of North Korea? So ⁓ I took the interview, and as soon as I get on campus, I'm instantly disappointed. Because what I had thought was going to happen was that I was going to get there, and it would be an 80-story building with dark storm clouds all around it and everybody.

will be wearing black suits and matrix style sunglasses. And so when I pull up and it's a two story campus with a fountain and the person that greets me at the front door has a ponytail is wearing a sweater and her name's Holly. This does not match my expectations.

Mike Donaldson [06:46]

Thank you.

Vance Crowe [06:53]

So I go in to do the interview and ⁓ I don't know if either of you two guys have ever interviewed for a job that you don't want, but it is about as much fun as you can have because you can say anything you want. And so in my first panel of interviews with the people, they would ask me questions like, ⁓ what's your preferred management style? And I would respond like, I like to be given a task and then be given a lot of autonomy to be able to do my work. Why is it that you're poisoning the Gulf of Mexico?

Mike Donaldson [07:01]

done ⁓

you

Vance Crowe [07:23]

And then

they were a little bit shocked and they'd try and answer my question. And then they'd ask me, tell us a little bit about your leadership style. And I'd say, well, I prefer to give people goals and to give them resources and then wait until they need something for me to ⁓ intervene. ⁓ Why is it that you are suing farmers and taking their farms? And I just kept doing this. was like every time. So why are you causing Indian farmers to commit suicide?

Mike Donaldson [07:30]

you ⁓

Vance Crowe [07:52]

These are the things that were going on in the world and I wanted to know. And they were very genuine in the way that they answered the questions. know, oftentimes they were a little caught off guard. But what was crazy was that we did this for seven panels, each panel being an hour long. So I did this to them for seven straight hours. And eventually Holly comes back in after all the panels are done and she sits across the table from me and she says, Vance.

We're now done with all the panel interviews. Do you have any remaining questions for me? And I said, yeah, you're going to hire a person to do this job and represent a company that everybody knows is is evil and dark. How are you going to train the person to do this job, to go out and represent you to the world? And Holly paused and kind of looked away for a little bit. And then she said, well, you know, at Monsanto, we train people based on their real skill set. And since you've been so

Curious? I think if we hired you, what I'd do is I'd write a list of 50 people from throughout the company, chemists, breeders, farmers, attorneys, communicators, know, everybody throughout the organization. have you sit down and talk with each one of those 50 people. And then when you get done with that list, you and I'll sit down and we'll figure out what you do and don't know. And then I'll write you another list of 50 people.

And in that moment, a light bulb went off in my mind. was like, I love talking to people. love prompting them to tell me things. And I was given it being given a chance to run around this company and ask anyone anything that I wanted. So there were absolutely only two outcomes that would be possible. Either I was going to discover that everyone that what everybody already knew that they were evil. And I was going to discover the inner workings of that. In which case, I'd go write the greatest tell all book of all time.

Mike Donaldson [09:30]

Okay.

Vance Crowe [09:40]

Or you would discover that what I thought I knew maybe wasn't as clear or wasn't as obvious or as true as what is really true, and that perhaps I would discover that ⁓ agriculture was growing food more bountifully, more effectively than it ever had before in the history of human civilization, and yet people are afraid and even angry about how their food is being grown. And so within those two things, there is clearly a communications problem.

And so I now had a new problem in my life because I had gone out that morning telling my wife, haha, I'm interviewing for a job I don't want. And now I was going to have to come home and explain to her why I really wanted that job. I ended up taking the job and spent the next five years traveling all over the English speaking world and talking with people about their concerns about modern agriculture, talking internally to Ag about why they do what they do. And I became kind of a diplomat between these two worlds.

Chris Radke [10:15]

Thank you.

Mike Donaldson [10:19]

Thank

Vance Crowe [10:37]

where I really got a chance to talk with people that had a lot of high emotions, but maybe not lot of information and learned firsthand how to have better conversations with people.

Mike Donaldson [10:47]

⁓ I love that story. think I've heard you tell all or part of it three times now. And I just, I just think it, ⁓ yeah, I just think that's a really cool story. So talk a little bit, I mean, segue into the aspect of the interest based communication. The, mean, you kind of touched on a lifelong passion for better communication. What.

what sort of coalesced your thoughts into where you are now with that philosophy.

Vance Crowe [11:24]

Well, my life really changed. Just like all young people, when you're in your twenties, oftentimes the most valuable thing that you're getting is experience. You're interacting with people that know how to do things way better than you did. And I had a really pivotal experience where I basically went to ⁓ try and force my boss to give a raise. I won't go into all the details.

And instead of her fighting with me, she got me to think about what it was that I really wanted. What was the money I was going to be using? What was it for? And if I didn't get it, what would I do instead? And how would this process work? And how could we work together? And so what I learned from that was that she knew that if I myself understood my interests better, I maybe wouldn't be asking for a 30 % raise.

Maybe I'd be asking for other things that would be easier for her to give that she'd be happy to give that would make me just as happy, maybe even happier. And so I went off to graduate school. went to the Seton Hall School of Diplomacy and I studied negotiations. And there I studied under this Chinese professor who had a really ⁓ amazing way to look at the world. And it was a lot more. ⁓

⁓ You know in the American context we always want to win We're always trying to find the way to get the most that we can out of things and the Chinese perspective Which is much more about we can find ways to work together and oftentimes if we work together We will both get more than what we would have gotten as individuals on our own and as I started to do this I started to realize there's two camps people that are good at negotiations and people that are really good at communications

Chris Radke [12:37]

Thank

Vance Crowe [13:04]

And if you really want to be a great negotiator, you have to know what is it that people want? What is it that they need? And oftentimes, like I talked about in my boss example, I didn't even know what I wanted. So communication comes out in how do you get people to think about what they care about, what they want, what they need? And so merging those two things together, negotiations and communications, has really given me a chance to work with people like you, Mike, which are...

They have a deep skill in something. They want to figure out how do I make myself more effective in the world? And that's what this philosophy teaches. It teaches everyone has interests. Your attention is the most valuable thing that you own. And ⁓ if you really pay attention to a person and you really care about what they're saying, you will learn things.

that are going to be critically and deeply important sometime in the future in your life. And from those three premises, the whole philosophy kind of unfolds.

Mike Donaldson [14:03]

Well, start and ⁓ I'm working really hard not to steal your thunder on one of the most impactful three word questions I think I've come across lately. So I'm purposely leaving that for you to unveil at the point you want to take us down the understanding, take us down the path to understanding how this would start to manifest itself in someone's practices.

Vance Crowe [14:33]

Well, I think the very first thing is to recognize that your attention is the most valuable thing that you own.

whatever you're paying attention to, that is what you are advancing. If you are paying attention to some really small detail that has to get done right, that's what you're moving forward at the expense of other things. And one of the things that I think often happens is when we're talking to most of the people in our lives, nobody's really paying attention to one another. It's most of the time, it's a transaction. It's a, need this thing from you. So I'm going to ask, and I'm going to just try and find out what the information is that I need so that I can go on to what I'm doing next.

But if you first understand that if I'm going to be spending my time talking to a person I'm just going to give them a hundred percent of my attention I'm not going to allow myself to be distracted you begin to see that the conversations you thought you were having are actually much deeper have an opportunity to be far more beautiful and

will express things to you that are really helpful that you didn't know you could learn from this other person. And then from there, if you come from that concept of my attention is the most valuable thing that I own and you come to fully realize everyone has interests and most of the time what somebody says, I want this, they are not really aware of all the factors that lead up to why do you want that? What do you want that price? What does that price represent? Does it represent?

how much work you're trying to get off your plate and you're willing to pay for it. Does it represent ⁓ your ability to do something else because you have money that you need? So in combining those two things, once people begin to start to understand that this is the way that great negotiations happens, they can begin to, you don't need a mad lib. The classes that I teach are all about if you understand these things, then you begin to see the world open up in ways that you

you couldn't predict before you start doing it.

Mike Donaldson [16:32]

It always either bothers or annoys me when people think

this type of practice takes too long. Well, just ask. You don't need to go into all that question, all that detail. You know what you've got. You've got to guess what they want. Just ask. Sometimes it just seems rude. Sometimes it just seems stupid. between those, how do you, I mean, you sort of laid it out.

But if I was to say to you, well, you're just taking way too long, convince me I'm wrong.

Vance Crowe [17:15]

Well, I think that almost never happens I mean you can get to a very deep conversation if you really listen to a person the other person feels it and knows it even if they couldn't articulate they just think I Really feel heard by this person and if they feel heard their willingness to tell you things that matter to them goes way up and really in all conflicts

Right. What you're trying to find out is what is it that you actually need solved to feel better about this? And that could be in a sales process that could be in a dispute with your your neighbor, your next door neighbor, a co-worker. Oftentimes we think.

Hey, I'm going to ask you directly because I assume that you know what you care about. But I believe and really having done hundreds of legacy interviews where I record people telling their life stories, I've come to realize that most of what we think of as thinking, we think, hey, when I'm talking to another person, they're aware of what matters to them, what they care about, what they want. But the truth is,

Life is going so fast that in order to be able to contain all of our challenges, we decide that's my problem and this is what I want in return, in response. I want this price. I want my neighbor to do this thing. And we don't really unpack why do we want that. But when you understand all the things that come into why do you want that, now all of a sudden the position you asserted, I want this thing, doesn't seem quite as important. And so the interest-based negotiator

may take a few more minutes to talk, but the depth at which they can solve a conflict between two people is infinitely ⁓ more valuable than the person that's going really fast.

Mike Donaldson [19:02]

⁓ last month I took, I took a class that Chris, or I put this, I took a class that Vance offers and of the 12, 13 people in the class, ⁓ the majority were fairly large crop farmers, often with a tie in to being a seed dealer. But the majority of their purpose for being in the class was

the people that work on their farm with them. It was almost a common thread. Most of these people were between two or three and up to almost 10,000 acres. Do you see even now a lot of hands-on farmers that struggle with doing something besides ordering things done? I mean, I don't want to cast farmers in a negative light.

But they often got where they are by going out and doing things. They weren't necessarily well-schooled in different aspects of management, especially people. is it something that you see and deal with quite a bit, where farmers benefit by backing up and realizing, it's not enough for me to just tell someone, go do this. There needs to be a deeper understanding.

Vance Crowe [20:27]

Yeah, I mean, I guess I would zoom the camera lens back and say, really, it's anybody that is good at accomplishing things. ⁓ They often struggle the most ⁓ with saying, hey, let's take a pause and zoom out.

And let's see what is the bigger picture here because you're good at getting things done. You're good at having self-discipline and saying, Hey, these are the things that I know I can control and I can do. And I think that what I'm really proposing is for the achiever, these people that seem

completely unreasonable to you. They seem like they're either lazy or they seem like they're not paying attention to you or they don't care as much as you. When you start to observe that that is your ⁓ opinion of them, then it's time for you to say, let me go check those assumptions. Let me go find out how is it that they came to decide to do the project that way? How is it that they are ⁓ approaching this problem, that they're getting an outcome that is not satisfactory

to me. And you think like it should be very, very obvious, but as Mike, as you know, I often will show a painting ⁓ that I use in my studio and I'll ask people, what do you think, what do you see when you look at that?

And what's crazy is everybody that looks at it's like, well, I know exactly what it is that I see. And everybody else sees this thing too. But as soon as people start telling you what it is that they see, you realize some people think that's an old lady. Some people think it's an old man. Some people think it's a clown. Some people think that person's in a field. It's not a trick painting. It's that everybody comes with a different point of view. And the faster you come to realize that you cannot intuitively know what's going on in another person's mind without asking,

The faster you get to solving deeper problems, which makes your whole operation better

Mike Donaldson [22:21]

And I will attest to that in the, showed us a slide in the class setting. There were 12 or 13 people and 12 or 13 different things that were being seen. And, and, but as soon as somebody said, well, no, I think it's this. I can see that too. That's still not what I see, but I can see what, mean, it was a, it really kind of brought the room together in some ways as we started to see what other people.

We're seeing besides what only we saw in the same thing. No. So how, and I'm not trying to condense your talk, your class into a single podcast. Obviously can't be done. What would be some things that someone listening to this and want to dip their toe in? What are some suggestions to start focusing someone's thoughts?

and their conversation to be this interest-based philosophy.

Vance Crowe [23:24]

Well, I think the very first thing that I'm going to tell people to do, it will seem like no way. That's going to be really uncomfortable. People are going to notice what I'm doing right away. this is, and I'll get your experience. I'm about to teach you what is akin to magic because it's so unbelievable how it works.

But the next time you're in a conversation with somebody, particularly if they're saying something you disagree with, instead of responding to what they're saying, just repeat back for them what you heard them say. So I'm hearing you say, the reason we went into Iran was for these reasons, and this is what you think the outcome is going to be. I'm giving a political example, but it could be a work example. It could be anything, right? That person,

is going to have just said their argument and now they're going to hear you saying it back to them. They now are going to process their own argument from a different part of their brain. And if you have just said it back in a genuine way, hey, this is what I understand is your point of view. Now they are going to hear their own argument. And what you'll watch is they'll go like, well, actually, no, that's not what I meant. What I meant was, and they'll update it.

Or if they don't, they'll say, yeah, that's exactly right. And normally in a conversation, if somebody says, yeah, that's exactly right, then you jump in with your own point of view. But if instead you say, well, tell me more about that.

Chris Radke [24:45]

Okay.

Vance Crowe [24:50]

Now the person is going to that you've just been like you've demonstrated you understand their point of view. Now tell me more about that makes them feel euphoric because we almost never get a chance to have two separate times where we get to talk with nobody interrupting us. So they're going to expand what they're saying. And if this is in a conflict, all of a sudden they're going to start expressing things that you were like, wait, wait, wait, you were upset about that. I didn't know that. But if you just keep mirroring back what you've heard them say with

out saying anything at all about your perspective, you will watch the entire argument open up and you'll see the person becoming more reasonable. They'll be much more relaxed and they're going to be much, much more open to what you have to say after they've been able to get all of their ideas out. Because what you're really offering them a chance to do is they're getting a chance to think.

Because most of what we think of as thinking is just a cloud of emotions. It's just a cloud of thoughts that you've kind of strung together as you're wandering through your day. And allowing somebody to speak is the same as allowing them to think. And once they've thought with you, now whatever you were discussing gets a lot easier.

Mike Donaldson [26:03]

Well, and that brought out, it was the tell me more. That's what I, that's what I wanted to let you be the one to say, because when I heard you talk about it at the Pork Symposium and I'd never, you know, I've spent a lot of my life trying to learn how to ask better questions and how to engage in conversation and something that simple, it somehow escaped my awareness up until that point. And I will be the first to, I'll be the first to admit I've

I've been working that into conversation. doesn't, I mean, it doesn't have to be business. I'm anything you're doing. If once you teach yourself to say those words and then shut up and listen, it's amazing what you could discover.

Vance Crowe [26:47]

Yeah, tell me about some of those experiences.

Mike Donaldson [26:50]

⁓ I think the, you he's really good at this people. The first time we talked, the first time we talked, it was, it was almost like trying to dance with somebody who's a hell of a lot better dancer than I am. But, but I think, I think it actually, ⁓ what I've observed is that it forces people to, I mean, Vance has said a couple of times, it forces them to drop their guard and open up.

Vance Crowe [27:01]

Hahaha!

Mike Donaldson [27:18]

because they were only prepared to tell you what they just said. They hadn't thought they were gonna have to express any more on that to you. They, I've said my piece, that should be enough for you. And when you genuinely and sincerely, and know, body language and tone, you know, you can't say, well, tell me more. But if you genuinely look them in the eye and you say, that's, that's interesting. Could you tell me more about that? And it almost trips them for a second.

And then is when you start to have a conversation instead of playing the roles in this either cold conversation or a structured argument that they thought you were going to have with them. That it just, it really is a game changer. Absolutely.

Vance Crowe [28:06]

And what happens with the other person is they don't even realize something is going on. They just know this is one of the very, one of the only times anybody ever asks me or invites me to say more, they're interested in what I have to say. Most of the time we're fighting for airspace. I mean, this is one of the things I communicate oftentimes that men is the reason that we have likes and ums and you knows, and we have like long extensions when we're talking.

This is a trick you pick up on the schoolyard right. Everybody's around in a circle. You're talking about whatever and any kid that had a little pause in there what they were saying.

somebody else jumps in and takes over the conversation. And so most of the time we've been trained, you're going to get one shot to get out your information and then it's going to be somebody else. They're going to argue with you. They're going to agree. They're going to whatever, but the conversation moves forward by somebody else telling you, what are we going to talk about next? So the person that says, me more hands, a gift to the other person. And the biggest gift is you're saying, I'm going to pay attention to you. I'm going to give you the most valuable thing that I have. And I want to see,

You know, what can you do with it and what people will tell you is way more than you ever imagined they had to say

Mike Donaldson [29:22]

No, it, it, it, and it does work people. And it's not, it's not something you do to people. It's something you do with them. It's, it's a, it's a shared experiences. I mean, I think sometimes things like this can get a bad reputation if they're misused or if it's manipulated and no one likes to feel manipulated. But when it's genuine, when it's very genuine and open and honest, it, makes a very big difference.

Vance Crowe [29:52]

Yeah. And in that vein, the mirroring, the thing where you're repeating back for somebody what you heard them say, when you first start doing it, the reason you're doing it is because you heard about this trick, right? You heard about like, hey, this is supposed to help me do work. But what happens is, and I've had to learn this, you know, from doing this for years is what you discover very quickly is what you thought you heard the other person saying was not what they were saying.

And that actually your interpretation of whatever they were saying, right or wrong, it doesn't matter. It has, it has really important flaws in it. And so mirroring starts off as a trick, a thing you're trying to do to, I'm going to try and create these conversations. And then suddenly you realize like, ⁓ actually I almost never get it right. I'm so glad I asked this because then I really know what we are talking about.

Mike Donaldson [30:43]

What, and I don't, and I encourage you to go to Vance's website. I don't know if there's a complete list of where he'll be appearing in the coming months or, ⁓ and the class I went to is actually the first one that he'd done. And I highly recommend that whenever a schedule of those comes out, you should look into it. Take, take us a little further with that aspect of listening with asking, tell me more the mirroring.

Keep going with some of those tools, even if we don't maybe peel all the layers off today. What are some of the other tenets of the philosophy behind interest-based communication?

Vance Crowe [31:22]

So I built this course ⁓ as a result of having one of my former business partners, he broke off and ⁓ he went out and raised a bunch of money. And he came back and said, the reason I was able to raise a bunch of money was not because I became some great speaker, it's because I was a great listener. But now I'm hiring all these scientists and I need them to have the listening and speaking skills that you helped me develop. So the class is really built.

for highly logical, very direct people. It was built for scientists initially. Now it's been done with, like you had said, like high performance doers, guys that are running big operations, and they're often really logical people that are ⁓ quite direct. And one of the things that I've observed is that really logical people, when they are trying to focus, when they're trying to listen,

Their face is deadpan, right? They are super locked in on you. And so a person that maybe is of a lower rank or is a little bit nervous, they see a person that is staring blankly at them and they think, I'm pissing this person off. I'm making this person not have a good experience. I feel uncomfortable. So they get more and more nervous, right? They speed up, they do all these things to try and not have this discomfort that I'm this other person doesn't like me or they don't like what I'm saying.

So one of the things that very direct people can work on is very subtle. But cues that you have, you know, the power of raising your eyebrows while somebody's saying something leaning forward, like you said about the people at the IHOP, right? You know, somebody's listening if they're leaning forward.

⁓ It's reacting. It's nodding. Now, these are things that you think like body language. How big of a deal could that be? But what it is is it is a silent language that human beings can interpret a huge volume of body language messages that you're putting out there. And if you're one of those people that's really stoic, very straight, don't give out any emotion, you often are kind of blinding the person and that nervousness that they feel will prevent them from speaking.

So if you are one of these people, one of the best things you can do is start to really observe what signals am I sending that aren't words. And I think this is far more powerful than most people would give credit to at first blush.

Mike Donaldson [33:47]

Do you think?

This has become a more common challenge in the last 20 or 30 years. And if so, why?

Vance Crowe [34:00]

Well, I think so when I studied under this Chinese professor, Zheng Wang was his name. I remember he told me he said, Vance in China, we have this terrible problem. And that is that because of the one child policy, kids didn't like fight with one another. They didn't have siblings. They didn't have other kids to like look at and play with. And it came on about at the same time that the internet came on. so people, Chinese culture is not one that has confrontation to begin with, but now kids are really confrontationally averse.

And I kind of laughed and I remember thinking like, that would never happen here. Well, fast forward 20 years and we are in a different ⁓ landscape. We do have kids growing up with fewer siblings. We do have kids ⁓ where when they want to have some kind of a confrontation, they do it over text. And I think that we all would love to just be like, I'm just going to send this message and try and resolve this problem and then send it back to me. Right.

But what I have noticed is actually young people are the most hungry for this material. They are like, hey, I want to be able to address conflict. I want to be able to speak up for myself. I want to be able to negotiate in a way that doesn't make me feel like I'm being some hard knuckled manipulator that's fighting through things. But I think that it's a reality that much of the things that were in place in our culture that guided us and taught us a lot of these skills

those have been removed and that we're as as we've been in this age of acceleration where technology keeps moving faster and faster and faster. A lot of these skills people know that they don't have but where can they go to develop them and this is really where why this class has become I think so popular is because people really know this is this is something that is keeping me back from leading the full life.

that I know I could do because I have great ideas in my mind, I just don't know how to get them expressed or get them understood.

Mike Donaldson [35:59]

And as we talked before we set this up, we obviously are gearing towards an agricultural community at the same time. I'm a firm believer if we can help someone's, if we can help someone's life be better, that's part and parcel of being a good company or a good, good organization to work with. And I know you've got some children of your own.

What would you recommend to a parent? How do you take some of these steps right within your own home with the kids of any age around you?

Vance Crowe [36:36]

Well, as a parent that has been humbled, right? You know, you have kids and they cry and they do. I'm reluctant to give very much parenting advice. However, I will say this. Being present is your attention, right? And I think that parents have so many pressures on getting work done, on getting all the things they've done that they need to, that we often look at childhood or whatever situation our child is and we think...

Hey, I'm you know, you're going to understand this when you're older or I can't wait till we get past this phase. But that truly your children are just as much living their life right now as a three year old as I am as a 44 year old man. We are equally alive. We are equally ⁓ having moments in our in in our experience. And so I try and ⁓ recognize that their time and their attention

is no less valuable than mine. And that really ⁓ humbles me. It doesn't mean I put up with wild tantrums or, you know, give in to any of these things, but I do take seriously the words that they use, the emotions that they're feeling in the same way that I would take a 44 year old's emotions and feelings, recognizing that they don't have them as developed as we do. And that has caused me to be a lot more patient and children.

or chaos and it's hard to be patient. So I give this advice with all humility because if somebody was driving by my house on Saturday, daughter was throwing a tantrum and ran down the street, you know, with her arms up in the air yelling mommy come back. like, you know, can say this with humility.

Mike Donaldson [38:22]

Well, there's people that'll tell you they have issues and problems and people that will lie to you about other stuff too. it's, that's great. So I want to be sure we get, I want to be sure we get this philosophy covered in a way that not only gives you a feeling like it was worth your time to join us, but also hopefully elicit some interest that

people hearing this will dig a little deeper. And I don't want to say closing thoughts. We can be on here for 20 more minutes and I'll be fine. But what it, I guess I'm giving you the opportunity now to be sure you get anything you want. If someone never hears you speak again, that you've gotten the chance to make the impact you'd like to make on them, or hopefully someone is intrigued enough to come looking for more information.

Vance Crowe [39:23]

Well, I think ⁓ the thing that I would hope people would take away from any part of the interest-based communication philosophy is that you do not have to fear conflict anymore once you have taken on this philosophy. And because what you realize when you really understand what I'm talking about here is that conflict is just a signal.

that there is an opportunity for things to be better. And this goes all the way down into the deep recesses of how you feel about things, right? Sometimes we look at somebody and we're resentful of them, right? Resentment is a map. Resentment tells you, I feel like I should be here, I'm over here, and there's some kind of delta there, there's some kind of gap. And instead of walking away or shying away from that, you can start to say, hey,

I want to know what are my interests? Why do I want to be in that other spot that I'm not in? What is it that I think would change about my life if I were there? Okay, now what other ways could I accomplish those goals? Who could I engage with? Who could I ally with? Or if you say, hey, I'm in conflict with this other person, you know, what are the things that you could do that would be empowered if you understood their perspective better?

how would it be, how much more open would they be to you if they knew that you understood them and that you were able to articulate what you thought. And so the thing that I love about the class that I teach is people come back to me about a month or two afterwards and they'll tell me, hey, I started solving problems that I had been avoiding and I started to realize that things became, they accelerated, things got better, things got more interesting.

And I believe that by giving away this philosophy, I mean, I told you, Mike, because you were like, I'm going to steal some of these things. And I'm like, there is no stealing. It is a philosophy. And I want this to be out in the world. I teach it as a function of getting people real, tangible skills. But my belief is the more that we have better communication, better negotiation among people, the more good things get put into the world. And the whole world gets better as a result of it. So I'm.

I'm happy for people to learn from anyone from come take my class or I'll give you a list of all the books I've ever read about this subject and you can go do your own curriculum. I just want people to approach life more like this because it made my life so much better and it's made the lives of people around me so much better.

Mike Donaldson [42:01]

And I can't help but feel that this is a time of incredible opportunity because it's so easy to live a solitary life with a four inch screen in front of you and retreat to a world where you only hear the opinion of people who already agree with you or you...

start to self-select down to where you're not forced to think about how other people approach things. I just think that we've never had it as easy to draw within ourselves and not be part of the bigger world. so yeah, perfect.

Any other thoughts, fans, before we turn you loose?

Vance Crowe [43:03]

Well, if anybody is interested in taking this class, I built a website, ⁓ articulate.ventures slash IBC, interest-based communication. So articulate.ventures. And you can go there. You see, we have a few classes coming up. Actually, Mike, after our experience, I'm taking it from two days to three. We're going to start doing more ⁓ another nighttime activity and just give people the thing that people get from this class. Well, I take it to you is the practice.

Right. We don't do fake drills. We do everything where we say bring your real challenges and everybody commits to ⁓ confidentiality. And I want to give people more space to try out their things, to work out their challenges. And we have another class coming up right at the beginning of May. So if people want to sign up for that, it's right there.

Mike Donaldson [43:52]

Well, that is perfect. I really, mean, from someone that barely six weeks ago, I didn't even know existed on this earth. I appreciate you now taking time. It's good to have a friend in St. Louis and I appreciate you taking time to help us all with a little better understanding of being a better communicator. Chris, what'd you pick up today?

Chris Radke [44:14]

I'm gonna say my big takeaway is your attention is the most important thing we own. I think that's just valuable and ⁓ I'll tell you what, I'll probably use some of these tricks with my kids or little hacks. I do do the mirroring thing with my children, especially the younger ones and it's amazing how you get to ⁓ hear what they're, because he's only nine and processed like where he is. So it's a good way of just reading their, what's their, they're processing things.

Vance Crowe [44:24]

Yeah.

Chris Radke [44:40]

Hey Vance, I appreciate your passion. Thank you so much for sharing your story and your knowledge and just I like the idea that you don't want to keep it in but you're willing just help to better the world. I love that passion and that excitement. So thank you so much for sharing that with us. Thank you so much for your time. If you like what you heard, ⁓ you heard us or you can find us on just about any of our socials ⁓ and you can hit us up with a question or if you'd like us to discuss anything like what Vance is talking about or anything agricultural, you can find us.

at podcast at agriking.com. I will put Vance's website and his email at the bottom of this podcast. Vance, thank you so much for your time and Mike, thank you so much for your time.

Mike Donaldson [45:21]

Hey, thank you both very much.

Vance Crowe [45:23]

Thanks guys.

Chris Radke [45:25]

Thanks.