While “new” is in the air right now, there are always messages that bear repeating, like the tip I share this time every year about what it takes to make personal change really stick. I’m going to boldly say (again) that this tip is your #1 predictor of success in 2017, whether your aims relate to building relationships or developing business or something more personal.

Do you know Dan Harris? He’s co-anchor of Nightline on ABC News, and the author of 10% Happier, a book about how he discovered meditation “after having a live, nationally-televised panic attack on Good Morning America.”

It’s that time of year again. There’s a good chance you have holiday or year-end celebrations ahead, and a high probability you’re negatively anticipating—maybe even dreading—being with a family member or two. A politically-charged climate only makes this 10 times harder.

Last week’s tip focused on 10 negotiations pitfalls. This week offers a very specific checklist to use at your next negotiation. Live by each tenet and you’ll distinguish yourself not as a “good negotiator,” but as someone who negotiates from and with trust:

You may know the parable about two monkeys and one banana that vividly illustrates the way negotiations usually play out. Being monkeys, they both want the banana. They struggle briefly and the banana gets ripped in two. One proceeds to peel his half of the banana and eat the skin, while the other throws away the peel and just eats the meat inside.

Last week’s post on faking it less reminded me of a phenomenon I once read about called “Athlete Talk.” Not sports talk; this is different. I find myself guilty of it sometimes, and wonder if you do too.

I caught myself faking it last week. She who prides herself on “getting real.”

It was—what shall I call it—an unexpected kind of morning on the heels of very little sleep for a lot of people (myself included) as a result of watching U.S. election returns until the wee hours.

Last week’s tip about untrustworthy sales language got me thinking about another problem with conventional sales/influence training: a plethora of bad advice about how to “overcome objections.”

I’ve borrowed the headline for this week’s tip (“How (NOT) to turn ‘suspects’ into ‘prospects’”) from the title of a recent article shared by a well-respected sales training organization. I added the “NOT” and some choicely-placed quotation marks as an act of rebellion against the words they chose. Why the fervor?