Sharon Drew Morgen – What? Did You Really Say What I Think I Heard?

When I started up my tech company in the UK in 1983, I wanted a company that served both clients and staff with kindness, honesty and authenticity, a bit of fun, and lots of learning. I set about hiring employees that would support those values. They became the glue that held us all together.

My first job was to serve my employees so they could then serve our clients. After all, these folks would be the touch point between the people who would buy my product and the company. My employees were my first customers.

EMPLOYEE CARE

To ensure employees remained creative, loyal, and engaged, especially those in the field and who I didn’t regularly see, I called each of the 48 techies monthly to check in and held monthly meetups at a pub (Darts was my Waterloo. I think one needs to be British to win.); weekly, I sat down with the 8 managers, the receptionist (who knew EVERYTHING) and my secretary (ditto) to catch up. And my door was always open.

To keep managers inspired, I gave them an all-expense paid week off a year (besides their annual holiday) to take any course of their choosing (not work-specific). And when I noticed them lagging from working too many intense hours (it was hard to get them to take vacations!) I sent them home for a few days for some ‘mental health’ time after calling their wives (in those days in the UK, men worked, women did childcare) to keep them ‘in bed’ for a while. I even sent meals from a local restaurant. I took care of them with the same thoughtfulness and care I did my clients.

We did well. In just under 4 years, we had a $5,000,000 gross income – with no computers, no web, no email, no urls, no online anything. Just me, a phone, in-person meetings, and my wonderful team who kept clients happy and called me when they heard of a lead within the client’s workplace.

I’m certain our success came from my team: much of our growth came from happy clients giving us repeat business and referrals. We doubled our business every year. That was 40 years ago, and the company is still in business.

In the 5 years I ran the company only one person left, due to a cross-country move. I learned afterwards that most of my folks had been approached by competitors and offered double the salary, but they wouldn’t leave due to the respect and hands-on care I gave them. Plus, they found it great fun to watch me attempt to play darts every month.

HAS IT CHANGED TOO MUCH?

It seems to be different now. Money seems to be an overriding criterion and people don’t seem to matter.

A client recently told me of a colleague – a long-standing sales team member and good producer – who quit due to the disrespect she felt from her manager and COO.

I asked if she’d explained her reasons at her exit interview so the company could fix their internal issues and stop others from quitting also. Seems she was just asked to complete a survey and was not given an exit interview. And, according to my client, he and several team members are looking for jobs due to the disrespect rampant in the company.

Seems the company has no criteria around improvement, obviously committed to maintaining the status quo.

Have times changed and people have become a commodity? Currently only 50% of companies offer an exit interview, while 75% offer a survey. That leads me to wonder how many companies don’t achieve their potential due to unhappy employees or disrespectful management. I can’t understand why they’d prefer to go through the time and expense to rehire and train new employees than fix the problems that caused them.

EXIT INTERVIEWS

Obviously, exit interviews that ask hard questions (“Is there something we’re doing as a company that should be improved? That, if fixed, would have enabled you to stay?”) would offer meaningful insights that could illuminate underlying problems in the culture, employee satisfaction, and the employee lifecycle. But that’s not happening as often as it should.

I’d like to offer a few Facilitative Questions™ to help companies currently not offering exit interviews reconsider their employee practices in hopes they’ll be more aware of their responsibility around serving employees well. After all, they’ve spent time and money hiring and training folks to represent them. Might as well keep them and simultaneously run a respectful company.

What would you need to know or believe differently to be willing to add respect, communication and servant leadership to the skills necessary for management – and include these values in hiring practices?
How will you know if your managers have the skills to enable employees to thrive, be creative, and feel good about working for you? And how do you ensure they’re supervised around these skills?
What practices must you put in place to

o Have continual checks on management skills to ensure employee happiness?

o Offer management training programs to ensure respect, collaboration, communication, and kindness are part of their daily practice?

o Put required exit interviews in place led by HR professionals?

o Develop hiring practices that sort for managers who put employee respect and growth as necessary skills?

What supervision practices must you maintain to ensure management provides respect, acceptance, and communication with all employees?

I would like to think that employees aren’t considered a commodity, or that companies aren’t above self-examination or willingness to improve. Do your company a favor: make employee retention, satisfaction, respect, and creativity part of your company identity. And commit to doing exit interviews to discover your weaknesses so you can improve your bottom line.

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Sharon-Drew Morgen is a breakthrough innovator and original thinker, having developed new paradigms in sales (inventor Buying Facilitation®, listening/communication (What? Did you really say what I think I heard?), change management (The How of Change™), coaching, and leadership. She is the author of several books, including her new book HOW? Generating new neural circuits for learning, behavior change and decision making, the NYTimes Business Bestseller Selling with Integrity and Dirty Little Secrets: why buyers can’t buy and sellers can’t sell). Sharon-Drew coaches and consults with companies seeking out of the box remedies for congruent, servant-leader-based change in leadership, healthcare, and sales. Her award-winning blog carries original articles with new thinking, weekly. www.sharon-drew.com She can be reached at sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com.

Sharon Drew Morgen February 16th, 2026

Posted In: News

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Imagine being in a strange country where you don’t understand the mores – and aren’t aware you don’t understand them. Say, waiting for scrambled eggs to show up for breakfast in Tel Aviv (They eat salad for breakfast), or saying a friendly “Hi” to young indigenous men in the jungles of Ecuador, wondering why they then followed you in a pack (Looking into a man’s eyes means a woman is ready for sex.).

Because events get interpreted uniquely by different cultures, people like me on the Spectrum are sort of stuck: NeuroTypicals (NTs) make the rules. And from my vantage point they are crazy.

DIFFERENT STROKES FOR DIFFERENT FOLKS

As an Aspie, my internal rules, my assumptions, my responses, and my perceptions are different from a NTs. I hear metamessages (unspoken assumptions) primarily and content secondarily; I respond according to what the Speaker intended (often unspoken) rather than what my (biased) ears interpret. I think in systems, in wholes and experience the world in patterns, not sequences and details as NTs prmarily do.

NTs seem to operate using rules that fit a norm I cannot fathom. Yet somehow, with the majority of humans on the NT scale, there’s agreement that those rules make sense. In my mind, they don’t.

Why should I reply “Fine, thanks. How are you?” when someone asks how I am? It’s a real question that should be answered with how I’m faring, right? If they don’t want to know how I am, why did they ask? And how did it get agreed that a meaningless exchange is an authentic greeting? I’ll never understand.

Why am I labeled inappropriate when I respond to something differently than ‘expected’, and sometimes an interesting add-on to what’s been said? Who says NTs are the ones who understand accurately? Maybe my references and responses are the correct way of seeing. Maybe my references and responses are a great ‘add’ to a conversation that expands the scope of the subject. Maybe my comments are worthy of curiosity.

Why am I the one being too direct? Why aren’t NTs more honest?

Why am I the one who’s deemed too intense? Why are NTs so superficial?

I recently watched my 7 year old friend throw a small toy across the room where his four younger sibs played on the floor. Stop throwing that, said Dad, afraid the little ones might get hurt. My friend again threw the toy. Stop, or I’ll take it away, said Dad. Again, the toy went across the room. Give me that. No more toy.

I said to my young friend, “Your dad was afraid the toy might hurt your brothers and sister. What were you hoping to accomplish by throwing that toy?”

“I wanted to understand how it was spinning.”

“So next time, tell Dad what you want to do and he’ll let you go outside to throw it.” Why didn’t Dad get curious? Why was removing the toy without understanding the reasoning the only option? This was a clear case of NT’s and Aspies considering different aspects of the same problem – something that happens far too frequently in my world.

THINKING IN SYSTEMS LEADS TO MORE CREATIVITY

My Aspie brain perceives a wholly different culture from the world of NTs, with different expectations, referents, assumptions, thinking systems, rules, and interpretations. My systems thinking and different understanding of what’s happening has enabled me to develop new models for conscious choice, different from the long-held biases and assumptions built into behavior change-based conventional business, personal, and healthcare models.

Indeed, with my ability to see, hear, and notice largely unconscious systems, I have devoted my life to unraveling, (de)coding, and inventing models for change in a way that gets to the unconscious systems that generate values-based decisions so change becomes easy and everyone can make congruent choices.

- I recognized that selling doesn’t cause buying and the sales model merely places solutions, overlooking the Pre-Sales change /risk management issues involved when anyone seeks to resolve a problem. I invented Buying Facilitation® 40 years ago to enable sellers to find and lead prospects through their decision making (13 stages) before selling.
- Because of the way I listen I clearly recognize the gap between what’s said and what’s heard. I developed a road map so people can hear each other without bias and wrote a book on it.

Sample

People make decisions via their unconscious mental models and habitual neural pathways. Yet influencers merely lead Others to where the influencers think they should look, rather than where in their brains Others hold their own answers. I developed a new form of question (Facilitative Questions) that facilitates others through to where their own values-based answers are stored.
I noticed that people seeking to change behaviors had trouble maintaining their changes because real change involves generating wholly new synapses/pathways. I’ve successfully trained many thousands of people to change habits and behaviors permanently via discovering, and consciously managing their unconscious brain circuitry.
The training model offers content, assuming, incorrectly, that learners will accurately hear, understand, and store the incoming knowledge. I designed Learning Facilitation, an addition to standard training that enables brains to house, retain, and understand the new knowledge.
I noticed how change agents, healthcare providers, coaches and leaders posed biased questions to promote change and modify behaviors. I developed a model that enables Others to change habits and behaviors permanently by getting into their own neural systems to make change.

Thinking in systems has it possible for me to develop models I’ve trained to 100,000 people globally. Yet I continue to be judged negatively against the norms of the NT world.

How, I wonder, does the world change unless the outliers like me instigate radical change? You can’t do that from the middle. And if more NTs were willing to be curious, look through a different lens, it wouldn’t take people like me decades to instill productive ideas.

RIGHT VS WRONG

So that brings me to my question: How do Aspies end up being the ones who are wrong or on the wrong side of normal? Why? Because my ideas, my speaking patterns, are different? Because they challenge the norm? Why isn’t that exciting? Or fun? Or interesting?

The good news about Aspies is that we’re often pretty smart. Because we think in systems and can see all aspects of something we often are the innovators, the visionaries, who notice, invent, code stuff decades before academics or scientists.

In these days of more openness and a real desire to accept minorities, to communicate and live without bias, maybe it’s time that Aspies are acknowledged as well.

Maybe when NTs hear someone say something that’s a bit off the mark, or rattle on about a topic that’s interesting albeit a bit long winded (We get SO excited by our topics!), maybe they can just say, ‘Hm. Sounds like an Aspie. I wonder what I can learn here. I wonder if I can be curious about something new.’ Then we, too, can have a voice. And just maybe we can become a welcome addition, add our two cents, and maybe make the world a better place because of our differences. Just sayin’.

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Sharon Drew Morgen February 9th, 2026

Posted In: Communication, News

33 Comments

It’s often said that change is hard. But it only seems hard because of the way we’re going about it. I’ve been developing systemic brain change models for decades: With different thinking it’s possible to meet goals, enable buy-in, inspire ownership, and avoid resistance altogether.

We’re a culture dominated by the mind. Information. Data. Content. Stories. Facts. Our minds certainly need data to think with, to learn from and weight decisions with.

But it becomes a problem when we want to make a change. When we assume we can effect new behaviors and prompt change because we desire it and provide ‘rational’ reasons for it, because we’re in a leadership position and plan it, we often fail. You see, neither facts, stories, information or new goals cause permanent change.

PERMANENT CHANGE IS A BRAIN THING

Change is a brain thing (electrochemical; systemic); information and behaviors are mind things (intentional; tactical). Outputs – behaviors, actions, choices – emerge from instructions triggered by the brain.

Problems – failures, resistance, risk – arise when we assume we only need to change behaviors to solve a problem. There’s no way to change a behavior by merely trying to change a behavior: our brain will always produce the same output when we seek to replace something we’ve been doing (an action or habit or even an unconscious pattern) with a different behavior.

When we merely try to change our behaviors, there are no circuits to trigger the new for retention and ongoing use – the foundational problem with behavior-based change models. This is why

Learning isn’t maintained;
Patients don’t change their behaviors;
Dieters can’t maintain weight loss;
Coaching clients don’t permanently change;
Buyers take so long to decide;
important change management projects are resisted.

As important as any change might be, if there are no neural circuits to house the new instructions, or retain the proposed activities or learning, there’s no way for change to be maintained.

Take a look at my presentation at Columbia University Learning Ideas Conference in which I explain how to generate new neural circuits for a training program. And my book HOW? details the mind-brain connection and how to construct the specific circuitry to generate the choice we desire.

Sample

OUR BRAIN TRIGGERS BEHAVIORS

For permanent change, we must begin all change initiatives by setting up the systems (generally values-based and inclusive) that will automatically generate and maintain new choices. Trying to change without generating the new brain circuitry is like expecting your bike to ride itself without you peddling, then blaming the bike.

For example: when starting a new project, explaining to users the importance of the change (regardless of the need or efficacy of the solution) will generally produce resistance as the information may clash with the existing practices and habituated norms. But by assembling all involved, including their voices – needs, fears, ideas – and values-based criteria for change, it’s possible to set goals that everyone agrees to and works hard to achieve.

It’s the same with changing a habit. Instead of merely trying to change behaviors that have been habituated and normalized for some time, figure out the core beliefs and values that need to be met (“I’m a healthy person seeking my best food choices to maintain my weight over time”, rather than “I need to lose weight, and this time I’ll keep it off!”) and incorporate the values-based criteria into the change.

Unfortunately, discipline or ‘rational’ thinking or new goals can’t prompt new circuit configurations or new activity. Things like maintaining new habits, trying to maintain departmental change, pitching a product or story to prompt decision making, cannot be triggered into normalized action because of the risk they pose to the status quo. And our current change practices don’t have the tools to get to the specific areas in the unconscious to generate new neural circuits to trigger our new choices.

Current change models try to fix the symptom and ignore modifying the initiation point (generally values-based) they emanate from. Models like Behavior Modification, or Cognitive Behavior Change or ADKAR or Kotter try to push change with mind-based mastery like discipline, repetition, regulation, rational thinking, habit creation, practice, and training. But the mind has no way of carrying out our wishes. The mind is merely the translator of the brain’s instructions.

CHANGE FACILITATION

I have spent decades unwrapping the route between the conscious and the unconscious and have developed unique, unbiased, systemic skill sets to generate new neural circuits: a form of question that is brain directional; a meta way to listen; the sequence of change, etc. to enable permanent change and learning.

I train these facilitation models in sales, coaching, OD, System Dynamics, training and healthcare to help learners learn permanently, help buyers make decisions, help clients make permanent change, help teams change and clients implement large scale projects.

Got it? So next time your team is having a hard time making a change and giving you resistance, call me and I’ll teach you all how to facilitate change permanently…from the brain.

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Sharon Drew Morgen February 2nd, 2026

Posted In: Change Management

Where does ‘common knowledge’ come from? I began wondering when writing my book on the gap between what’s said and what’s heard. I had thought I was an attentive listener and heard everything perfectly because, well, obviously, we all hear precisely what a speaker shares! Nope. Turns out we only accurately ‘hear’ 10-35% of what’s been said! My goodness! If that bit of common knowledge was wrong, what else was wrong?

With my new awareness I began keeping a list and found many common assumptions that we’ve all perpetuated. I’d like to share some – by no means a complete list – that we take for granted that have been proven untrue or at least face reasonable doubt as fail rates prevail in habit change, weight loss, implementations, selling, coaching, etc.

Sample

WHY NOT USE FAILURE AS A REASON TO CHANGE?

These erroneous norms (below) have been handed down for decades and built into many of our (business) practices. Sadly, due to their ubiquitous nature, they continue without even casting doubt (i.e. false assumptions like ‘people will buy once sellers find prospects with need’ – 95% failure; ‘habits can change permanently with behavior modification’ – 97% failure.).

Why is failure merely built-into the bottom line (hire 9x more sellers, i.e.) rather than changing assumptions? If we realize that change models achieve resistance in almost all projects, and over 70% of project fail, why not do something different and alleviate it by ensuring and managing buy-in before a project commences?

As you read these and find yourself resisting, remember: your assumptions are the norms through which you translate what’s been said and restrict your curiosity, your behaviors, your choices. We are all hampered by their universal repetition and imbedded use, following us into daily life: scientific research, college programs; healthcare, behavior change….

This article will hopefully broaden your world view, inspire further thought, or at least cause you to do some research. Or maybe just make you angry.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Behaviors are standalone events and pop up as needed.

Resistance is a natural element during change.

Selling causes buying.

People don’t consider the risk when making choices.

You can change a behavior with habit change and behavior modification.

People who are homeless got that way through mistakes they’ve made.

A reduced calorie intake maintains weight loss.

Good information will produce a new decision, cause learners to learn, people to buy, and patients to change their behaviors.

Statins are the only way to reduce cholesterol and there are no natural remedies that are more effective (Hint: Red Yeast Rice).

The toilet seat should be down.

I am speaking with the decision maker.

Choice comes from conscious decision making.

Sellers can understand what buyers need; meetings are important to the sales process.

Implementation occurs when clients are given a good solution.

Learning occurs when new information is presented.

Neuroplasticity occurs when the brain experiences new inputs.

Doctors have the answers. We will heal if we follow their suggestions.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.

The only remedy for a bad, painful hip is a hip replacement.

Agave is healthy. Butter, ice cream, and fats are bad for you. Eggs have too much cholesterol.

Mick Jagger is the leader of the Rolling Stones.

Castor oil makes you healthy.

If we listen intentionally/carefully/attentively, we will accurately understand what’s been said.

Eye blinks are so short they don’t affect our vision.

Everyone interprets specific words the same way.

There’s such a thing as objectively rational.

The role of a coach is to impart knowledge/wisdom.

Leaders understand enough about a problem to set the goal for a project.

We can figure out what’s really going on by noticing behavioral problems.

Mind and Brain are interchangeable.

Our curiosity is infinite.

We can learn and retain new knowledge when we hear it.

Good questions elicit good, accurate answers.

Permanent, resistance-free change is possible when good information is known and practiced.

When we believe/recognize an idea/answer to be a good one, it probably is.

Intuition is not restricted.

People over 70 aren’t horny anymore.

We interpret words according to their meaning.

People will buy when they’ve understood how a specific solution will fix their problem; an appropriate solution will generate a buying decision.

If you hunch over and raise your shoulders you’ll get warm.

Voice bots and virtual receptionists can take care of customers as well as live receptionists.

Memories are accurate renditions of what occurred.

It’s possible to accurately hear what Others say.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

I hope these cliches prompted some thoughts! And for being so supportive and reading this far, here two gems: a present: the amount of time football players actually physically play is 11 minutes; If you add up the time you’re functionally blind when you blink, you’ve been unsighted for 23 minutes a day. SD

__________________________

Sharon Drew Morgen January 23rd, 2026

Posted In: News

After having several conversations with a new prospect and his team in 2015 we all decided to move forward and get them trained in Buying Facilitation® so they could not only close more/faster but use the telephone for the initial prospecting, risk management, and team assembly.

I sent a contract to Joe including the agreed-upon dates and the team’s requirements. I then received an email from him saying he needed to put the program on hold for six months so his new hires could prove their value and start earning money – very different from our agreement. I called him.

“I’m confused. How can your new hires start earning money if they won’t get their training for several months? And how can they prove their value selling the mainstream way when you want them to learn to first facilitate the Buy Side (Buying Facilitation®)?”

WHO IS THE BUYER?

My prospect said that the COO (Frank) called him in when my contract came over his desk saying that if they were going to spend ‘that kind of money’ on sales training they had better have a team in place that had earned it.

Joe was both angry and embarrassed: he had thought he was the decision maker given it was his own budget, the team had agreed to the training, and his boss hadn’t exhibited any interest in sales training before this. He felt his boss didn’t trust him.

What appeared to be a ‘closed’ sale had just become a money objection from a “C” level executive who had no idea who I was, what I was offering, or how to put a value on it, and he was overriding his own Sales Director and the entire sales team. And money seemed to be his only criteria.

But I knew that money is rarely the real objection. I had to find out what was going on and see if I could facilitate the COO to a different decision.

Joe and I put our heads together and decided to have Frank call me to discuss it. We believed that if I could lead Frank through the Buying Facilitation® Method and he could experience it personally, he’d be able to decide for himself.

Sample and Purchase

I knew I’d have to handle both money and phone objections as Frank believed no business could be handled on the phone. I also had to walk an interesting line: not only was Frank superseding Joe’s authority and disrespecting him, his discomfort came from faulty assumptions: I wasn’t delivering ‘sales training’.

CASE STUDY: THERE ARE NO REAL MONEY OBJECTIONS

Below is a transcript of the actual call that employs Buying Facilitation®. It includes commentary on the specific tools I use to help Frank examine, and possibly expand, his own criteria; notice his own incongruences; trust me and trust Joe; and give the green light to the training.

As you read this, note: Buying Facilitation® uses a different set of tools than standard for sales: Meta Listening, Facilitative Questions™, Presumptive Summaries, and the sequence of unconscious decision making and change. It offers no information or pitch; and has a different goal – to facilitate people through their unconscious to their own answers.

Sellers often forget they have nothing to sell if someone has nothing to buy. And since the risk of change is one of the main factors in a buying decision, Buying Facilitation® facilitates people through their hidden risk factors as well as helps them discover their unconscious values and criteria and self-identify as buyers.

As per arrangement, Frank called. His voice was tough, crisp, and in charge.

Frank: I understand you’ve been speaking with Joe and the team about doing some training. I’m OK with that [So why are we having this conversation?]. He’s got his own budget, but with so many new folks, it’ll have to wait until they prove themselves. And if you want to have a discussion with me about it, you’ll have to come here to visit us (A three-hour drive each way.). It would probably be a good idea for us to meet anyway. I’m curious to meet someone who charges that much for a training program. [He obviously has no idea that Buying Facilitation® is original IP and I’m the inventor.]

SDM: Gosh, I hate to drive. Hmmm. How ‘bout if we meet halfway – we’ll each drive one and one half hours?

F: You want ME to drive?? [It’s ok for ME to drive??]

SDM; Oh. You hate to drive also [This puts us on equal footing,]. Hmmm. I have an idea. Since neither of us want to drive, how ‘bout if we spend a few moments on the phone and see where we stand. We might end up hating each other and there won’t be any need for either of us to drive.

F: Sounds reasonable. [I just helped him overcome his objections to using the phone AND his insistence I drive to him. He’s also ceding some control.]

SDM: I hear you are having thoughts about my prices. [I’m now taking over the conversation and starting the Buying Facilitation® process.]

F: Well, they are higher than I’ve ever heard of for sales training. But of course, if we end up getting fair value for it, it would be worth it. [But he objected before he knew that. Obviously money isn’t the issue! And he’s begun trying to sell the idea to himself. Not to mention I’m not running a sales training program.]

SDM: Given you don’t know who I am, what your folks would learn, what about my original model might be worth more than conventional training, or how to know upfront if you’d get value from it, you must be uncomfortable. [Presumptive Summary that names his objections and throws in a bit of information he wasn’t aware of.]

F: Not uncomfortable, exactly, because I trust Joe’s decision making [Really?]. But you’re correct. I’m not happy spending that kind of money for something I believe I can get cheaper. [Good for him. He’s put his cards on the table. But he assumes he understands what I’m offering without considering the possibility that maybe he doesn’t.]

SDM: So how would you know that Buying Facilitation® – the model I’ve developed that facilitates the Buy Side decision-making and will be teaching [Words chosen carefully to build in my presumed contract] Joe’s folks – offers a new set of skills that would actually give you the type of ROI that you’re seeking? [Facilitative Question™]

F: I wouldn’t. I’d just have to take Joe’s word for it. [But he already didn’t, so that’s not the real answer. He’s showing no curiosity or interest in understanding what I’m offering and doesn’t offer any opening to change his opinion. Holding his cards very close to his chest. But I’m still in control of the call.]

SDM: I wonder if there is a way that you could learn enough about Buying Facilitation® to give you comfort, get you to recognize its value, and see if it’s the sort of Model that would get your numbers up to where you want them to be. [That’s all the pitch I need.]

F: I suppose I should know something about the Model. Is there something you can send me so I can learn about it? [He’s now doing business on the phone AND being curious! Not to mention he didn’t ask me – the inventor, who is on the phone with him! – to explain anything!] Obviously if Joe is willing to use his entire training budget to bring you in, it must have value and it would probably be good for me to learn about it. [Note it took only minutes to get here.] What else would you suggest I do? [He’s trusting me! But I must take care to continue helping his decision-making process and avoid saying anything that would bias him. If I pitch now his brain will compare his initial – faulty – assumptions against what I say, and the work I’ve done so far in this conversation to enable his personal discovery would be wasted and I’d have lost the job.]

SDM: I can send you some essays, and Joe has a copy of my book you can read. I understand that before we move forward, you’ll need to figure out what my value is. [I’ve moved the conversation from ‘trusting Joe’ to the real issue: why would he be willing to pay a lot for something he perceived he could get cheaper?] How would you know that my program is worth what I’m charging?

F: I probably wouldn’t know until after the program.

SDM: Then it becomes like a Bungee jump – you won’t know if it’s going to work until after you’ve jumped. And then it’s too late.

We all laughed.

SDM: So, what would you need to know about Buying Facilitation® that would help you understand that it would give your people a new set of tools to double their numbers as you’ve required? [A small pitch that offers reasons working with me would avoid risk. Notice I’m still not trying to sell him as he still doesn’t know what he wants to buy and he’s not aware that I’m the inventor and trainer. Most inventors don’t train their inventions personally.]

F: You’re saying that it’s a different model from sales? That’s interesting. [I hadn’t said that, but my Facilitative Question™ implied it.] I guess if we kept using the same selling model we’d keep getting the same results. [He’s selling himself now.] Different from sales, and yet it will close more. Hmm. Will I be able understand the Model from what I’m going to read? [I was dying to give a pitch somewhere in here, but Frank never asked me to explain anything. All of his learning criteria were based on reading something, not hearing something.]

SDM: Correct. Just to sum this up: you’d like to understand the Model and how it’s different from sales, how it will give you the results you require, and who I am.

F: You’re right. But I bet Joe did his homework already and has this under control. [Seems he’s sold himself and has alleviated his risk.] Besides, it seems the reps want to learn from you. [His level of trust was now pretty high for both me, Joe, and the team. And notice he’s now sold himself… and I’ve given him no pitch!]

SDM: I think we all hope you’re right.

We all laughed again.

SDM: What would need to happen for you to get comfortable enough for us to move forward in the time frame that best suits your company given the revenue increases you’re seeking for next year? [Notice I keep facilitating him toward his own unconscious decision making so his fears of risk are alleviated. And I’m not biasing his response – he can still respond that he wants to read the material and meet me before going forward.]

F: Tell you what. I’ll read whatever you send me. An article would be great. If it’s as good as I assume it must be for Joe to go out on a limb like this, given that he’s had to do some hard thinking to figure out how to meet the objectives I’ve given him, and that the team is excited to learn from you, I’ll give Joe a tacit agreement to move forward. [It seems I’ve proven myself, and the money objection is gone. Note: he still doesn’t know what Buying Facilitation® is, what the values is, or who I am! And I haven’t sold a thing, although I’ll pitch when we meet.] But I’d like to call you with questions if you don’t mind. And, when we’re ready to sign the contract, let’s do it over lunch – my treat – and we’ll each drive and meet halfway.

Joe and I burst out laughing. After a moment Frank starting laughing too. Frank had figured out his own solution, sold himself, trusted both me and Joe, used the phone for business, and had no more objections. He even was willing to drive halfway to buy me lunch!

F: I suppose you just used the model on me, right?? You haven’t sold me a thing – no pitch, no presentation. You just helped me decide how to choose you and manage my own objections. [Smart man.]

I hope this is what you’re going to teach my folks as I see how it will shorten the sales cycle and capture folks who don’t think they need to buy anything. Not only did I not want to sign the contract when I began, I didn’t believe it was possible to use the phone for anything more than getting an appointment. Thanks, Sharon-Drew. I’m excited. I can’t wait to meet you. And I can see this model isn’t only for sales, and more of us in the company could learn your model for difficult conversations with each other and with clients.

MONEY OBJECTIONS

Objections happen only when someone’s criteria are being pushed against their will; money objections occur when folks don’t understand value, or as a stop gap to change (i.e. not about money itself). And explaining value by pitching what you believe needs to be pitched, handling objections the way you think they should be handled, or presenting the information you believe needs to be presented, only presents the seller’s biased viewpoint doesn’t help.

When two things appear equal, the only differential is money. When value is understood, money is not the criteria.

Of course, I still needed the sales model, but only later, after he’d already figured out his own criteria. In this conversation, I did several things to help him decide to buy:

Frank was smart. He figured it out himself as I guided him through his unconscious concerns. I didn’t pitch, present or propose. I didn’t have to handle objections or prove my value. I used the phone to help him make a six-figure decision and didn’t have to meet him in person to do so. All I did was lead him through his own decision criteria to his own best decision.
Frank’s fear of spending ‘that kind of money’ on something he thought should cost ‘a lot less’ (He was comparing me against traditional sales programs which do, indeed, cost a lot less than bringing in the inventor of original IP) and over-rode his trust in a senior executive;
Because Frank couldn’t say that he didn’t trust Joe, he used the excuse of money and proven value – but then they’d be using the same sales skills they used when they weren’t getting the success he wanted;
Frank hated doing business on the phone and didn’t understand why Joe’s team would be learning how to prospect using the phone;
Frank had no idea who I was and assumed his comparison of the pricing of Buying Facilitation® with sales (different pricing structure), he wouldn’t be able to figure out the program’s value. There was a good chance he wouldn’t have let the training go forward.

If you go back to the conversation, you’ll note I kept enabling Frank to figure out for himself how to choose me and my material. And the sequencing and wording of my Presumptive Summaries and Facilitative Questions™, both enabled by me listening for systems and patterns instead of content, led him to understand that what I was selling would meet his criteria. Plus I’d proven my value as a Partner because I respected him.

This, btw, is the difference between facilitating the Buy Side and sales. I would still have to ‘sell’ Frank my training over lunch, but I wouldn’t need to offer as much content or manage objections.

Also it was a very ‘pushy’ dialogue. The conversation might appear at first glance to be soft, but indeed it was very controlled and relentless: I kept leading him into making the decisions he needed to make and avoided any pitch or contradiction to his objections.

At no point did I defend my price or change it. Note that if I started pitching product and defending price, the conversation wouldn’t have gotten very far. Price wasn’t the issue: it was his discomfort not knowing how to spend ‘that sort of money’ for something that was new to him.

FRANK MADE HIS OWN DECISIONS

In conclusion: as I led Frank through his own issues, he figured it out himself. I didn’t pitch, present or propose. I didn’t have to handle objections or prove my value. I used Buying Facilitation® on the phone to help him make a six figure decision that he was initially opposed to: He had to recognize his own criteria and make a judgment call as to whether or not it was being met.

Remember: Frank’s criteria were not only hidden from me, but initially hidden from him! Even if I understood what was going on it wouldn’t have mattered. HE needed to understand for himself. And he did. And I didn’t sell a thing. All I did was lead him through his own decision criteria to his own best decision.

I believe that before we sell – the Sell Side, based on placing solutions by finding folks with ‘need’ and introducing relevant product details – we must facilitate buyers through to their own best decisions, using their own criteria, and the internal, unique decision criteria that outsiders can never understand – the Buy Side.

Selling doesn’t cause buying. But it’s possible to facilitate prospects through their change management, risk management, buy-in, and unique cultural impediments, we can position our product as their own solution. It’s ethical, based on win-win, truly supportive of a collaborative Partnership, and uses no manipulation or influencing strategies. Ultimately, it trusts that the Buyer will come up with his/her own best answers, and if me and my product fit into the Buyer’s solution, I’ll be chosen.

Would you rather sell? Or have someone buy. If you wish to learn Buying Facilitation®, please contact me: sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com

_______________________

Sharon Drew Morgen January 19th, 2026

Posted In: News

Dear Vendor:

I assume you want my business and care about keeping me as a loyal customer. I also assume that whatever you do, whoever you hire, is paid for by my contributions to your coffers and you need me to keep your business afloat. Why, then, do you disrespect me? Insult me? Waste my time? Infuriate me?

I’m writing to tell you that your voice bots and virtual receptionists stink. They waste my time keeping me on hold for hours – Best Buy once kept me on hold for 13 hours (!). When the tech called at 3:10 a.m. and asked (in a perky voice, no less) ‘So how are you today!?’ he hung up on me when I replied: ‘Angry. Why have you kept me on hold since yesterday? Do you know it’s the middle of the night here now?’ – transfer me to incorrect departments, keep playing that insipid music that makes me want to vomit, offer me useless choices and otherwise make it impossible for me to get through to you.

WHY ARE YOU USING VIRTUAL RECEPTIONISTS?

I’d really like to know why you’re using these insulting bits of software. Are you trying to save money? I would think the customers you lose would cost you money in the long run. Not to mention you’re thinking short-term and fail to remember you’re in business to serve. Indeed, every product you sell is a promise to serve. You’ve apparently forgotten your promise. And while large companies can weather some lost business, smaller companies can’t…not to mention they’ve lost an opportunity to touch customers and brand themselves as a caring company that serves customers.

Do you not realize that by not touching customers when they call, you’re giving up the ability to serve and generate trust, hear what’s going on, or understand and resolve the repeating complaints that might eventually lead to new sales? I can’t tell you the number of times good receptionists have led me to resolutions I hadn’t known about, or given me new ideas and ways to use your products.

Maybe there are other reasons: you think your phone bots and virtual receptionists offer me better help than a real human? Maybe – and this seems most likely to me, your customer – you just want me to stop calling. When I call and get these infuriating ‘voices’ and inappropriate options, and am left on hold forever, I’m sorry I purchased anything from you. I certainly won’t do so again. And when friends ask for referrals, I share a story of how you wasted my time and suggest they find another supplier.

PLEASE CALL IN TO YOUR OWN COMPANY

I have a great idea. Call in to your own company. You might be surprised to find you’re offered unhelpful choices. Or face long hold times (and then get dropped). Or get sent to the wrong department – if you ever even get through. Make sure you call when you have no meetings planned because you’ll be put on hold for minutes/hours to ensure you waste your time.

Oh – here’s a hint. Don’t bother telling the bot what you want as you’ll be misinterpreted or given bad/inappropriate choices (Regardless of the question or offered choices, just keep repeating REPRESENTATIVE until you’re screaming it.). You might find yourself annoyed that you’ll need to call back again and again to get through to anyone or anything! Even your own reps don’t want to place a call into your receptionist to help me find the right department after I’ve been sent down a rabbit hole and some sympathetic employee tries to help me.

WHAT IS YOUR GOAL?

I wonder if you even want me as a customer. But maybe that’s your plan – to get me so frustrated that I’ll not call again? That you’ll hope my problem will disappear itself? I recently failed to get through to UPS to file a complaint against a driver for deeply unprofessional behavior. As he was leaving his van to make a delivery, I asked him to move it from my marked parking spot so I could park. He refused, kept walking away, called me a Bitch, then gave me The Finger. Does UPS want their drivers doing that? I would think they’d want to either fire this guy or at least offer him further training. Are they happy to have this guy represent them? Or maybe they just don’t care about their employees or brand either?

Here’s a question: What do you expect me to do when I need you for information, or product support? If you cared about me or your brand, I’d speak with a human to make sure my complaint gets through to the right place, or my problem gets solved.

It seems you don’t care. I, for one, won’t buy from you again. I look forward to the old days, when companies cared about me and keeping my business. What a shame we all have to be at the wrong end of this nonsense now. Fix it.

________________________

Sharon-Drew Morgen is a breakthrough innovator and original thinker, having developed new paradigms in sales (inventor Buying Facilitation®, listening/communication (What? Did you really say what I think I heard?), change management (The How of Change™), coaching, and leadership. She is the author of several books, including her new book HOW? Generating new neural circuits for learning, behavior change and decision making, the NYTimes Business Bestseller Selling with Integrity and Dirty Little Secrets: why buyers can’t buy and sellers can’t sell). Sharon-Drew coaches and consults with companies seeking out of the box remedies for congruent, servant-leader-based change in leadership, healthcare, and sales. Her award-winning blog carries original articles with new thinking, weekly. www.sharon-drew.com, https://sharondrew1.substack.com/, and https://medium.com/@sharondrew_9898/. She can be reached at sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com.

Sharon Drew Morgen January 12th, 2026

Posted In: Communication, Listening

I wonder why I rarely hear the word Dignity used in business. Not only do we each seek to do work and have relationships that encourage and include dignity, we aspire to promote products and have client connections in ways that maintain the self-worth and self-respect of all.

But I’m certain we could all do a lot more to achieve it. Let me share a personal story that first alerted me to the importance of dignity.

In the 1980s I moved to London to start up a tech company and simultaneously started up a non-profit to support folks with the neurological disease my son suffers from (We just had our 40th year anniversary!). The woman I partnered with (Joan) was a long-time sufferer of the illness and had great difficulty opening her eyelids or lifting her neck. But she worked hard to type notes (just a few typos!) to other sufferers sending resources, and setting up ‘meet and greets’ with doctors and medical schools around the UK where we’d travel to share the latest treatment information.

Every Wednesday night Joan and I went to dinner prior to getting down to work. And every Wednesday night I picked up the check, knowing Joan – age 75 at the time and obviously disabled – was living on state assistance. But one Wednesday as I reached for the check, Joan’s hand came down onto mine.

Joan: I’ll pay tonight.

SD: That’s okay. I’m working and have more available cash than you have.

Joan: I said I’ll pay. I may not have money, but I have dignity. Don’t take away my dignity.

I then realized that by always paying I was taking away her agency, her dignity as an equal partner. Seems it wasn’t about the money at all. In fact, my decision to pay for each meal suddenly seemed like a power thing. How many times had I substituted money and power for dignity?

PROMOTING DIGNITY IN THE WORKPLACE

Dignity is a private, personal consideration we each hold that matches our beliefs about who we are; we gravitate toward people who honor it. Through our personal dignity we show up authentically and remove ourselves from people and situations that threaten it.

In our personal lives we observe the dignity of our friends and family. But I am unaware of this term being applied in the workplace with specific actions that will ensure we provide dignity to those we touch. This article discusses how to impart dignity and what to do to achieve it.

As entrepreneurs and business owners we must

build dignity into our norms, policies, communications and conventions,
make sure we treat each other, our employees and our clients, with respect at meetings, interactions, emails, etc.,
act in ways that respect each other’s self-worth,
minimize the stress our employees feel when being disrespected.

But how do we ‘do’ dignity?

1. Fair pay: I can’t say this strongly enough. Paying people fairly enables them to feel respected and valued, and take care of their families and their health. Without fair pay, the rest of this article is moot.

2. A culture of diversity: Diversity is a word thrown around a lot, but what does it really mean? Sure, it means racial and gender diversity in hiring and advancement practices. But what about neurodivergent folks who get ignored because their ideas don’t seem to fit in? What about folks who think or act differently? Each difference expands possibilities and enables a broader range of ideas and promise.

As someone with Asperger’s and highly out-of-the-box ideas, I spent years being ignored and denigrated when in fact my concepts would have prevented many situations, facilitated successful projects without resistance, and closed a lot more sales. How do we create and maintain a culture of real diversity in which everyone’s voice gets appreciated and no one faces indignity?

3. Transparent communication: Too often management omits making the full data set available, making it impossible to gather the full fact pattern or inspire creativity. Worse, good ideas get dismissed or go unheard and employees end up being disincentivized. The cost is incalculable to companies, employees, and clients: not only does creativity falter, but people lose trust in their employers.

4. Work-life balance: When we expect our folks to work weekends, long hours, lots of overtime, we take away their dignity as human beings, not to mention their time to destress, think, relax so they can return to work invigorated and creative. We not only harm them, we harm our own productivity and success.

If there’s a frequent problem causing staff to work excessive hours, it becomes a stress/health issue. We need to either hire additional staff or allow the problem a lengthier solution process that doesn’t require employees to regularly give up their private time.

When we exploit our employee’s dignity, we cause folks to go home crying, face sleepless nights, feel disrespected. I know this from the countless interviews I’ve had with unhappy employees: They may not tell us, but their work will fall off and eventually they’ll leave for a job that will respect them.

Sample

PROMOTING DIGNITY WITH CLIENTS

Promoting dignity must extend to clients and customers. Here are a few factors to consider:

Communication: Too often we fail to let our clients and customers know if there’s a problem from our end: delivery/time issues; delivering the solutions promised with the same people they’ve become accustomed to. When I ran my tech support company, I checked in with each client for 15 minutes every month. That went a long way to resolving brewing issues. And when some companies find a flaw in their product or service, it’s vital they formally announce the issue and resolution so clients aren’t left in the dark.
Value our promises: As per above, our clients and customers must be notified if there are disruptions in service or quality. It’s respectful and maintains the dignity of our promise as suppliers.
Respect clients/customers as partners: There are plenty of other providers our clients/customers can go to when/if they feel we’re not respecting them. In other words, no overly long hold times; delivery as promised; follow up to ensure quality as promised; no pushy sales practices.

Remember: without addressing and maintaining our client’s dignity, we wouldn’t even be in business.

DIGNITY IS A PRIMARY BUSINESS PRACTICE

It’s necessary to add dignity as a necessary element for creating and maintaining integrous business practices for our staff and customer base. Here are some Facilitative Questions™ to help you think through any changes you might need to make and inspire compliance:

How will you know when/if your current business practices need upgrading?
What criteria will you and your team need to meet to decide on what practices might need improvement?
What skills/tools will you use to let your clients/customers know of changes or problems, to insure your communication enhances their dignity?
What skills/tools do you and your team need to learn to ensure you consider Dignity as a standard business practice?

Should you wish to enhance your skill set to include Dignity in your staff training as a soft skill, marketing, promotions, decision making practices and projects, please contact me to discuss: sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com

______________

Sharon-Drew Morgen is a breakthrough innovator and original thinker, having developed new paradigms in sales (inventor Buying Facilitation®, listening/communication (What? Did you really say what I think I heard?), change management (The How of Change™), coaching, and leadership. She is the author of several books, including her new book HOW? Generating new neural circuits for learning, behavior change and decision making, the NYTimes Business Bestseller Selling with Integrity and Dirty Little Secrets: why buyers can’t buy and sellers can’t sell). Sharon-Drew coaches and consults with companies seeking out of the box remedies for congruent, servant-leader-based change in leadership, healthcare, and sales. Her award-winning blog carries original articles with new thinking, weekly. www.sharon-drew.com She can be reached at sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com.

Sharon Drew Morgen January 5th, 2026

Posted In: News

Have you ever wondered why folks who get trained don’t retain the new knowledge? According to Harvard studies, there’s a 90% failure-to-retain in instructor-led classrooms. Surely students want to learn, trainers are dedicated professionals, and the content is important. But the problem goes beyond the students, the motivation, the trainer, or the material being trained.

I suggest it’s a brain change issue: current training models, while certainly dedicated to imparting knowledge in creative, constructive, and tested ways, may not develop the necessary neural circuitry for Learners to fully comprehend, retain, or retrieve the new information. You see, learners may not naturally have the proper pathways to understand or retain the new knowledge.

The primary problem is how brains ‘hear’. Due to the nature of how brains handle incoming words (puffs of air that face distortions and deletions before being translated by neural circuits to meaning), an instructor’s content may be mistranslated, misunderstood, or misappropriated. Certainly there is no way to retain it as intended unless the learner has precise circuitry that matches the instructor’s content.

Trainers assume their content will be heard accurately. But it’s not, due to the automatic, habituated, physiological, neurological, electrochemical, biological set up of how brains listen. But it can be mitigated by helping students generate new circuits specifically for the new knowledge.

For those interested in learning how brains ‘listen’, my book WHAT? explains it all (with lots of funny stories and learning exercises) and offers workarounds.

Sample

As an original thinker who’s been inventing systemic brain change models for decades, I’ve developed a Learning Facilitation™ model that first trains the brain before presenting the core content.

When training begins by first generating new neural circuits, students can accurately translate, understand and retain the new knowledge and avoid any misunderstanding or failure-to-retain.

I presented my Learning Facilitation™ model at the Learning Ideas Conference in June 2024. Here is a link to the full one-hour presentation. Enjoy.

If you have questions, please get in touch: sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com

____________________

Sharon-Drew Morgen is a breakthrough innovator and original thinker, having developed new paradigms in sales (inventor Buying Facilitation®, listening/communication (What? Did you really say what I think I heard?), change management (The How of Change™), coaching, and leadership. She is the author of several books, including her new book HOW? Generating new neural circuits for learning, behavior change and decision making, the NYTimes Business Bestseller Selling with Integrity and Dirty Little Secrets: why buyers can’t buy and sellers can’t sell). Sharon-Drew coaches and consults with companies seeking out of the box remedies for congruent, servant-leader-based change in leadership, healthcare, and sales. Her award-winning blog carries original articles with new thinking, weekly. www.sharon-drew.com She can be reached at sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com.

Sharon Drew Morgen December 22nd, 2025

Posted In: Communication, News

AI has become integrated into our lives. I’m sure we will continue discussing whether it’s constructive or destructive for quite some time. Certainly it’s been a boon to science and medicine. But does AI squelch creativity? Plagiarize? Important discussions to have. Surely we’ve all benefited.

But to date, AI doesn’t enable the systemic journey a user’s brain must take to discover and apply their core values for personal decision making.

HOW VALUES-BASED, BRAIN-BASED DECISIONS ARE MADE

When people ask AI for advice, they’re largely provided with amalgams of historic information. But this doesn’t enable the neurochemical, very complex, values-based and largely unconscious decision process that would guide users to the:

core values-criteria in their brain
that represents their beliefs, culture, norms, and history
and form the singular, unconscious, and subjective outputs (actions, decisions, behaviors)
that emerge when a mixture of the brain’s limbic system, prefrontal cortex, and dopamine
cull choice criteria from the decision maker’s
- - history
  - mental models
  - personal beliefs
  - time comparators
  - private assumptions
  - norms/culture
and represent the neural activities
beyond the amalgamation of external sources.

In other words, there’s a whole lotta neural processing that must occur before a values-based, personal decision can be reached. And it can’t be done with information.

INFORMATION DOESN’T GENERATE PERSONAL DECISIONS

Don’t get me wrong. Information is vital once values-based criteria are in place. But providing information before the neural work has been completed causes resistance – the reason sales pitches, leadership requests, coaching interactions face so much opposition: the Other’s beliefs, norms, history, assumptions are overlooked and potentially provoked.

Decision making is largely unconscious and uniquely personal – a complex, systemic process that involves much neural organization. Until

the system (the person, family or team) understands and agrees to the risk of doing/thinking anything different;
the system (person, family or team) understands the full set of foundational elements (history, rules, beliefs, etc.) that have mitigated the status quo and must be shifted;
the system (person, family or team) understands its risk of change (and the risk of change must be less than the risk of staying the same) and knows how to manage it with minimal disruption;
the new is congruent with the core beliefs and values of the system;

no new decision will be taken regardless of the need or the efficacy of the information. And the time it takes the decision maker to figure all this out – sometimes a protracted period as we work at piecing together all the elements residing in our unconscious – is the length of time it takes to “come to a decision”.

To make a personal decision, people must align the presenting facts against their biases, values, assumptions, emotions, history, beliefs, reasoning approach, future needs, hopes and fears, then understand and manage risks, all before choosing the actions to take, before making a decision.

Otherwise the new information will compete with what we already assume is true and has been logged in our neural circuits. But it won’t shift core decision criteria, regardless of how necessary or important the information.

AI could help by sequencing and simulating neural processing and actually make values-based decisions quick and efficient.

Sample

WHAT IS A DECISION?

Decision making arises from our neural circuits. Outcomes – behaviors, actions – are merely expressions of the originating beliefs and identity of the system, and require Systems Congruence for change to be acceptable. Even the most necessary information won’t be accepted unless the system believes it’s not at risk.

To choose a new action, to ensure any decision is congruent with the system and won’t cause disruption, specific neural circuits must be discovered, and the systemic, personal elements at the core of all values-based decisions must be managed:

Mind/brain: AI largely focuses on adding ideas (content) to the mind. But the brain is where decision criteria are stored, and that’s unconscious.

Misinterpreting incoming content: Due to the way brains ‘listen’, people only accurately understand 10-35% of the information offered. I wrote a book on this.

Managing the status quo: We are each comprised of several systems administered by our mechanical brain processes. Each activity we perform, all of what we believe, resides in neural circuits that maintain Systems Congruence. New decisions threaten congruence and must be approved by the original system so it doesn’t feel at risk.

Repositioning/reevaluating belief hierarchy: Making a final decision involves a process of weighting values, history, assumptions, and cultural norms and comparing them against future gains/losses…a process unique to each individual and largely unconscious.

Comparators: All change/values-based decisions require comparing historic activity and the decisions that led to the status quo.

Once these have been addressed (a sequential process) and the system feels congruent with the change, users are ready to make a decision and information is needed.

WHAT IS A QUESTION?

AI requires prompts to trigger answers. But the questions currently used prompt historic, amalgamated information and don’t get to the unconscious elements of values-based decision making. Here’s why.

Standard questions elicit data and are biased by the wording, intent, and goals of the questioner – often making assumptions that don’t comport with the user’s unconscious or getting to their specific circuits necessary for decision making. Additionally, people interpret what’s said or any information offered according to their existing neural circuits that represent their history and personal beliefs.

When writing my book WHAT? Did you really say what I think I heard? I discovered that we ‘hear’ (understand, recognize) according to the historic circuits that have been developed over time in our brain ensuring we interpret incoming words according to what we already know and believe. Anything outside these circuits get misunderstood, or misinterpreted.

Due to the way brains ‘listen’ (filled with distortions and deletions) listeners accurately hear only 10-35% of what’s been said. In other words, what we hear, or read will be translated into some version of what we’ve heard or read before and not necessarily an accurate interpretation of the initial intent of the question.

Certainly information that’s far outside what’s already known has no neural circuits to accurately translate it. (Note: I’ve invented a Learning Facilitation™ model that works with the brain to first generate new neural circuits to accurately translate and retain new knowledge.)

When coaching sites use AI to pose questions to help users manage their emotions or make personal decisions, they offer stock questions in hopes of inspiring introspection. But these, largely, don’t enable one individual, with one set of unique problems, a unique history, and unique set of neural circuits to make a values-based decision that is congruent for their beliefs and values. They certainly do not enable users to self-generate unique queries to sequentially lead them through their neural decision making.

To make a values-based decision people must generate unconscious prompts through their own neural circuitry.

FACILITATIVE QUESTIONS™

In 1988, I read Roger Schank’s book Tell Me a Story that said the only way to find an answer that was tucked away in the brain was to pose a good question. But he never explained what a ‘good question’ was. I already recognized that questions are biased and assumptive and couldn’t understand how it was possible to discover bias-free answers. I became intrigued by the possibility of generating a question that

had no biases, assumptions, or principles that would prejudice the answers;
would get to the specific, unconscious, neural circuits where values-based answers are stored.

As an original thinker, I then spent 10 years figuring out the elements involved to ensure personal decisions could be easily made:

the sequence necessary for the Responder to discover their existing values, patterns, specific reference points;
the route to the specific neural circuits that held the values-based criteria to match a congruent answer;
the specific words, sequences, and sentence structures that would get to the specific neural circuits where values-based choice criteria could be found and managed for congruent, systemic change;
the ability to hear/recognize the next question to formulate to enable the listener’s (user’s) brain to take the next step in the decision-making sequence;
the specific hierarchy of decision criteria that lead to a values-based decision;
the perceptual position the Responder had to be in to hear the question without bias.

I eventually invented a new form of question (Facilitative Questions™ FQs) that is brain-directional and leads the Other to the specific neural circuits necessary to cause change and values-based decisions.

To enable AI to facilitate personal decisions, I believe a rules-based FacilitationAI is needed to prompt sequences of self-generated FQs. Since each FQ that appears is self-generated from a user’s answers, and formulated singularly in unique sequences, none are generic. They can also be used singularly in specific circumstances, like helping customers provide feedback.

FQs can provide a new area for AI:

life/personal coaching;
personal/team decision making;
customer feedback.

I’m happy to discuss and provide examples in detail, but fear adding more specifics in this article will lead to AI developers stealing my IP without the full set of rules. Please contact me to discuss. sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com

_____________________

Sharon Drew Morgen December 15th, 2025

Posted In: Communication

Neurodiversity is now considered a variation of human experience rather than a disability. Indeed, 20% of the workforce is neurodiverse including 50% of sales and technology professionals. That means there’s a good chance there are neurodivergent (ND) employees working in your company. But you may not know who they are: 75% of ND employees avoid disclosure.

CREATING A SAFE PLACE FOR NEURODIVERSE EMPLOYEES

Diversity, generally defined as race and gender diversity, is included in most hiring practices these days. Some companies go further and specify inclusive hiring practices for neurodiverse people in their job specs and include requests for applicants to state their needs for the interviewing process.

But companies without specific neurodiversity hiring practices may not know the ND employees already working for them, making the problem of self-disclosure and individual support a big one for both the company and the employee: ND folks are often afraid of losing their jobs or facing discrimination if they self-disclose and, because there’s no structure for it, may not get the services they need to be as successful as they otherwise might be.

To find and serve these highly creative, hard-working individuals, to ensure they’re accepted and integrated, your company culture must embody inclusion so they’re accepted and integrated onto teams; given work that matches their unique skills; and get supervised by managers who know how to communicate with them – all areas fraught with obstacles unless there are accepted practices in place.

The question for the HR professional is: are you willing to create an inclusive workplace environment – a culture – that offer unique hiring methods? In which NDs are offered supervision or needed allowances? Can choose to self-disclose? In which communication practices are shared and discussed? Where everyone can learn from each other and thrive?

CULTURE CHANGE

ND people think, understand, act, and communicate differently from their neurotypical (NT) colleagues. And because they are in the minority it’s been left up to them to fit in – challenging since their needs may defy standard practices.

Creating a culture in which neurodiverse employees not only fit in but are active, successful, accepted members of the community takes work. It’s not merely doing a few things differently but having a commitment to an inclusive workplace where everyone thrives, welcomes diversity, and collaborates. It means a culture change.

TO DO’S

Here are some specific suggestions if you currently have no dedicated plan (or want to add to what you’re already doing):

Rethink hiring practices. Some neurodiverse people may be overwhelmed during standard interviews. Ask applicants to provide examples of their work on email; ask them how they’d like to communicate with interviewers.
Discover the barriers to inclusion within the company. You can use confidential surveys, questionnaires, suggestion boxes to gather information and suggestions from current ND employees, including what they would need from HR or their managers to have a safer, more comfortable situation so they can succeed. It’s a good idea to use a consultant to assist you with these as they know the best vocabulary and topics to include.

Doing this puts out a clear message to all employees that you’re taking ‘workplace inclusion’ seriously. And don’t forget to publish the findings from this outreach so everyone is working from the same fact pattern.

Inclusive communications. Employee communiques must be written clearly and directly with a visual component if possible. In written communiques there is sometimes a note at the bottom that invites anyone seeking clarification to contact the sender.
Internal campaigns: Begin running internal campaigns targeted to inclusion: stories from leaders about how they learned to be better at providing directions for their ND team members or what they learned from their ND employees; great ways to manage problems that might arise; or stories from disclosed NDs themselves on best practices for collaborating with colleagues. This not only provides stories for other leaders and folks with neurodiversity but plainly affirms the company’s dedication to inclusion.
Questionnaires: Send out questionnaires that request employees share what they need from management to be even more successful. Make sure they’re unmarked and unnamed so undisclosed NDs can respond without fear of discrimination.
Management training: bring in consulting firms (Orchvate https://www.orchvate.com/) that specialize in best practices (integration, sensitization, awareness) on communicating with NDs. These could also be taught by ND employees who have disclosed and are willing to share their personal knowledge. Btw the secondary gain here is that all your employees will communicate – collaborate, ideate, work – more successfully.
Time management training programs for all employees. This will naturally include ND folks but would be useful for all. ND folks have strict time issues – always on time, very organized to get stuff done on time, etc.
Physical issues: Neurodiverse people have a greater sensitivity to their surroundings – overhead lights, noise – than neurotypical folks and may have physical challenges that require flexible work arrangements and accommodations. Provide Quiet Spaces for anyone who needs them.
Advertise inclusive job opportunities in other departments: i.e.’ Seeking folks with strong pattern recognition, or great job for people who enjoy hyper focusing.’
Hold frequent discussions via intranet, bulletins, house organs written by NT staff about their resolved work challenges or great conversations.
Peer coaching: where possible, set up peer coaching relationships between self-disclosed ND folks and those who have not yet self-disclosed, or between managers who have ND employees and want to support and learn from each other, or…
Publish corporate guidelines on inclusion: by clearly stating in all corporate communiques that the company has a culture of inclusion, it becomes obvious to employees and potential hires that all are welcome, regardless of difference.

NDs may be overlooked and burned out – certainly not contributing fully. Doing this lets all employees know they must be more accepting and learn new skills.

These practices will generate trust: trust that the culture has changed; trust for NDs to self-disclose without discrimination; trust that the company values their input; trust that any existing problems will be resolved.

CONCLUSION

Neurodiverse employees offer great advantages. In addition to being loyal, hardworking, relentless, creative, and honest, they bring new points of view otherwise not considered that stimulate creative solutions and outside-the-box thinking,

Create a culture in which they want to work, and once employed, to thrive. Find those in your company and serve them. Generate a culture of inclusion and acceptance. Design hiring and outreach procedures that find people who would not only fit but be an asset.

Bio: Sharon-Drew Morgen Morgen Facilitations, Inc. www.sharon-drew.com sharondrew@sharondrewmorgen.com

Sharon-Drew Morgen is a New York Times Business Bestselling author and inventor of systemic change models for sales, leadership, coaching, change, System Dynamics and decision making. She is neurodiverse and believes her neurodiversity has enabled her success. *This article appeared in the 11/25 issue of HR.com magazine.

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Sharon Drew Morgen December 8th, 2025

Posted In: Communication

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