Page 73 - Getting to the Heart of High Performance
P. 73
THE SECRET TO MANAGING FIRST IMPRESSIONS
Your first crack at influencing others, then, occurs in the
initial 1/20th of a second of your encounter! That’s a
mighty small window of opportunity. You can’t think that
fast. So if you want to influence others to behave a cer-
tain way, you need to already be that way when their
mirror neurons fire off in your direction. Whatever emo-
tion or behavior you want mirrored back toward you
must already be in place, waiting within you, ready for
other people to read it.
The good news is that other people can’t avoid the
impulse to behave like you. The bad news? Well, if you
make a first impression that’s negative, you literally pro-
gram them to be negative too. They may fight the urge to
match your mood and manner, but the natural inclination
will be to reciprocate. Their mirror neurons’ job is to syn-
chronize with you emotionally.
Your Hot-Wired Emotional Brain 57
