Summary of Doesn’t Hurt to Ask Book by Trey Gowdy

Persuasion is all about making people see things from your perspective. We’re all humans and, for very good reasons, we almost always see things from different — often conflicting — perspectives, hence the need for persuasion. When you think about it, you’ll find that persuasion happens in our lives daily. We’re either persuading others or being persuaded ourselves.

Most of our daily interactions are persuasive. Convincing your boss about why you deserve a raise takes persuasion. Getting your kids to bed early is another form of persuasion. Convincing your spouse about why a vacation in Dubai is better than one in your home country when they don’t like the idea of traveling takes persuasion. And on and on. If persuasion is such an important skill, why then do most people seem to fail at it? On a general note, we are better at persuasion when it involves friends and family because we know them inside out; we know the thing that makes them tick and so we can tailor our words to strike them properly.

How do effective communicators do it? Is there a magic formula for the art of persuasion? You bet! Persuasion is a skill, and there are underlying principles that every effective persuader is using consciously or subconsciously. You’ve applied many of these principles yourself at certain points. We all have, but the difference between an expert persuader and one that only lucks out once in a while is that the experts know the rule of the game.

Lawyers are about the most persuasive people on Earth because it’s what they do every day. How do you feel about learning trade secrets from a former congressman and prosecutor? Sounds exciting? In this summary, you’ll be learning the persuasion tactics Trey Gowdy learned and used in the course of his career as a lawyer and lawmaker. Let’s proceed.