Why Trumps Cant Ket the Art of the Deal Go

A version of this postal service was published on Medium .

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The president-elect has honed his deal-making skills over decades. He made some good deals and well-documented bad deals. When Trump claims that he is one of the world's greatest businessman and worth $10 billion  —  it's laughable based on his bankruptcies, lawsuits and near-total lack of transparency most his assets. But it'southward hard to argue with the fact that he pulled off 1 of the great deals in history in condign the 45th president of the United States.

Serving every bit president of the U.S. is many orders of magnitude more than daunting, complicated and serious than negotiating to put your name on a hotel or building a luxury golf course belongings. Experience as the CEO of a company with a few billion in assets, a handful of direct reports and legion of lawyers is quite different from managing an $18 trillion economy, 538 term-limitless members of Congress and 325 million citizens.

But and so, the junior senator from Illinois Barack Obama didn't come into office with extensive experience in armed services, economic and domestic affairs on a global calibration, either. Nonetheless, Obama did come into part having served in government for a decade, with deep experience in the rule of law, a disciplined arroyo to problem solving and an intellectual curiosity that made him less vulnerable to the opinion of whoever last had his ear.

President-elect Trump, on the other hand, seems to get his information from watching Telly (and lament well-nigh how unfair the coverage is, and claiming he didn't say what he said), his Twitter feed and a small circle of advisers called based on loyalty. And as nosotros have seen, his positions on issues tend to be fluid, a moving target, and non just because he likes to keep people guessing. Trump has proven to be impulsive and to play very loose with the truth.

What can nosotros expect from President Trump now that he volition occupy the White House and all the responsibility that will come with the job of leader of the free earth?

Much tin be learned from the lessons shared in Trump'south all-time-selling book, "Trump: The Art of the Deal" (co-written with Tony Schwartz). Four principles from the book capture the techniques Trump applies to accomplishing his business concern goals, and now his political ambitions:

Get the word out: "One thing I've learned about the press is that they're always hungry for a good story, and the more sensational the better ... The point is that if you are a petty different, a fiddling outrageous, or if you practice things that are bold or controversial, the press is going to write near you."

Play to people's fantasies: The final key to the mode I promote is bravado. I play to people's fantasies. People may not e'er think big themselves, merely they tin can yet go very excited by those who do. That's why a little hyperbole never hurts. People desire to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular.

Fight Back: "In most cases I'm very easy to get along with. I'thousand very good to people who are good to me. But when people treat me badly or unfairly or try to take advantage of me, my general mental attitude, all my life, has been to fight dorsum very difficult."

Deliver the goods: "You tin can't con people, at least non for long. You can create excitement, you tin do wonderful promotion and get all kinds of press, and you can throw in a little hyperbole. But if yous don't deliver the goods, people volition eventually catch on."

Trump's interactions with the press, in particular what he often refers to as the "failing New York Times," is a adept instance of Trump's principle of promotion. For his unabridged entrada, and after his unexpected ballot, Trump has been getting the word out with bombastic, outrageous and controversial speeches, tweets and Tv and radio appearances, adding upward to more than than a billion dollars of free media. Trump also plugged into what he learned condign a reality show TV personality on "The Apprentice," this time creating a 24/7 reality bear witness that played to people's fantasies about a more aggressive and whiter America.

He energized his base with hyperbole, insults and epithets such as "Kleptomaniacal Hillary," chiming in with his fans at rallies with calls to "lock her up." And the media could non resist covering the show 24/7, and the audition, no affair what political persuasion, could non turn it off.

When the mainstream press came to the realization that the outlaw creator of fantasies Donald Trump wasn't going to flame out, despite his bullying, lying and barrage of sexist, indigenous and religious taunts, it got more serious and ambitious in covering the candidate.

Exercising his principle of fighting back very hard, Trump found the perfect foil for advancing his crusade in the mainstream media. It further energized his base and diverted attention from facts almost his checkered business concern by, associations with the alt-right, sketchy Trump Foundation and history of sexism (locker-room talk), undisclosed tax returns and more than. People in the Trump camp didn't trust the insitutions and people who promised them change over the concluding decade, and the brash New York billionaire was promising alter in a spectacular, baroque and visceral fashion.

Trump'south battle with the New York Times is a perfect illustration of his get-the-word-out and fight-back tactics.

Just prior to meeting with the NYT on Tuesday, with the hope of a more tempered and "presidential" president-elect emerging from his cocoon, Trump threw a flurry of tweet jabs at the beacon of mainstream media:

This is the president-elect trying to bring an adversary to heel, staying in Trump archetype peachy, hyperbolic graphic symbol, continuously antagonizing the opponent, hoping to get into their head and give him a better negotiating position. Then, when he shows up with his softer, "we should all exist friends" side, he expects that the antagonist volition soften up, feeling relief and surprise that the egomaniacal flame-thrower is really a reasonable human existence who didn't mean all those unkind words.

True to his negotiating playbook, when Trump met with the NYT, he softened the edges and chosen for anybody to "go forth."

Putting on his magnanimous cocky, Trump called the paper "a world gem," and said he had "great" and "tremendous" respect for information technology. He noted that the Times had treated him "very rough" and that he'd "like to turn it around." He concluded that having a better relationship with the NYT would make his job much easier, equally if the job of the press is not to ask hard questions about what he says or does and make information technology easier for him to push button through his agenda. Trump is applying his negotiating tactics to move the New York Times closer to an American version of the People'south Daily in Prc. And if the NYT doesn't go easier on him, Trump will exist back to threatening First Amendment protections, every bit he did during the entrada when he promised to open up federal libel laws to make it easier to sue the Washington Mail service, NYT and other news outlets.

NYT op-ed columnist Charles Blow wasn't ownership into the softer version of Trump:

I will say proudly and happily that I was non present at this coming together. The very idea of sitting across the table from a demagogue who preyed on racial, ethnic and religious hostilities and treating him with decorum and social grace fills me with disgust, to the point of overflowing. Let me tell y'all here where I stand on your "I hope we tin can all get along" plea: Never.

Y'all are an aberration and abomination who is willing to do and say annihilation  —  no affair whom it aligns you with and whom it hurts  —  to satisfy your ambitions.

This brings us to another lesson cited in "The Art of the Deal." Ultimately, all the bombast, birtherism, self-promotion and brow-chirapsia of opponents won't win the deal. "If you lot don't deliver the goods, people will take hold of on," Trump wrote.

Trump hasn't yet fully switched gears from becoming the most powerful human in the world and understanding the job requirements, with help from his new "friend," President Obama, to focusing more on delivering the goods he promised during his campaign.

It turns out that a lot of what he promised he doesn't fully intend to evangelize. For Trump the negotiator, everything is negotiable. He has created his ain reality-baloney field that ignores facts and inflates his ego, with no clear ideology or detailed plan for addressing the challenges he laid out in the entrada  —  build a wall, kill Obamacare, bomb the shit out of ISIS. Trump may notice that the reality-distortion field surrounding him during the campaign won't protect him from his new reality  —  the bodily chore of being president and delivering the appurtenances.

Information technology'south difficult to understand exactly what Trump stands for or his values, which makes him unpredictable and his ideas subject to whatever scraps of information are floating in the air. Information technology too keeps billions of viewers watching the show across the globe tuned into to see what the next episode will bring. He wants the earth to believe that he is "crazy like a fox," and uses Twitter to keep his adversaries, and even his transition squad, off rest.

His bourgeois supporters, who helped become him elected, aren't sure if he will back up their platform, and liberals are hoping that the Donald J. Trump who used to be a Democrat will miraculously resurface.

As demonstrated during his on-the-record interview with the New York Times, the platform Trump campaigned on has become a malleable mashup of positions. For instance, to all his supporters who he promised that he would lock up Hillary Clinton, Trump told the NYT that he was not inclined to pursue that path:

I think it'southward fourth dimension, I retrieve it's time for people to say let'due south get and solve some of the problems that nosotros take, which are massive issues and, you know, I practise think that they've gone through a lot. I think losing is going through a lot. It was a tough, information technology was a very tough evening for her. I recollect losing is going through a lot. So, for whatever it's worth, my, my attitude is strongly we accept to go forrard, we accept so many unlike issues to solve, I don't call up we take to delve back in the past. I also recollect that would exist a very divisive, well I think it would be very divisive, yous know I'm talking about bringing together, and then they go into all sorts of stuff, I remember it would be very, very divisive for the country.

Trump also now might accept waterboarding off the table. Later speaking with retired Marine Corps General James N. Mattis, a favorite for Secretarial assistant of Defence in the new administration, Trump rambled to the NYT:

I met with General Mattis, who is a very respected guy. In fact, I met with a number of other generals, they say he'southward the finest in that location is. He is being seriously, seriously considered for secretary of defence force, which is  —  I think it'due south fourth dimension maybe, it's time for a general. Look at what's going on. We don't win, we can't vanquish anybody, we don't win anymore. At annihilation. We don't win on the border, we don't win with trade, we certainly don't win with the armed services. General Mattis is a strong, highly dignified homo. I met with him at length and I asked him that question. I said, what do you think of waterboarding? He said  —  I was surprised  —  he said, 'I've never found it to exist useful.' He said, 'I've e'er constitute, give me a pack of cigarettes and a couple of beers and I do better with that than I do with torture.' And I was very impressed by that answer. I was surprised, considering he'southward known equally being like the toughest guy. And when he said that, I'm not saying information technology inverse my mind. Look, we have people that are chopping off heads and drowning people in steel cages and we're not immune to waterboard. Just I'll tell you what, I was impressed by that answer. It certainly does not  —  it's not going to brand the kind of a difference that maybe a lot of people remember. If it's and then of import to the American people, I would go for information technology. I would be guided by that. But General Mattis found information technology to exist very less important, much less important than I thought he would say. I thought he would say  —  y'all know he's known equally Mad Dog Mattis, right? Mad Dog for a reason. I thought he'd say 'Information technology's phenomenal, don't lose it.' He actually said, 'No, give me some cigarettes and some drinks, and we'll practise better.'

Trump besides declined to echo his campaign promise to carelessness the Paris Agreement that addresses climate change, stating, "I'm looking at it very closely," and had an "open mind."

I have some great, bully, very successful golf courses. I've received so many environmental awards for the way I've done, you know. I've done a tremendous amount of work where I've received tremendous numbers. Sometimes I'll say I'chiliad actually an environmentalist and people volition smile in some cases and other people that know me understand that's true. Open mind.

The NYT Editorial Lath welcomed Trump's chastened views expressed during his visit, but questioned his sincerity:

We would applaud any sensible change of position, still arrived at. Mr. Trump's credible flexibility, combined with his lack of depth on policy, might be grounds to hope he will steer a wiser class than the one plotted past his campaign. But then far he is surrounding himself with officials eager to enact only the most extreme positions. His flexibility would be their springboard.

Trump brings a level of narcissism, abrasiveness and lack of authorities experience that will rewrite the book on presidential mien. He will walk an extremely fine line running the country and looking after his businesses at the same time. No one is expecting that Trump tin completely dissever himself from his business organisation interests and entanglements, or that he will share his tax returns with the American people. After all, he told the NYT that "the president of the United States is allowed to have whatsoever conflicts he wants," but noted that he didn't intendance about his concern whatsoever more, his kids (who spend a lot of time advising the president-elect) were running it and he cares simply almost America. At the same time he acknowledged that his new Trump hotel in the nation's majuscule might see more than business, and that his brand is "hotter than it was before."

No doubt, Trump's blurring of business and national interests will be heavily scrutinized and add to the controversy surrounding his administration.

In winning the election, Trump vanquished his opponents, slapped the elites in the face up, and is now dealing with the immensity of the job he won. He is parading potential cabinet members in and out of Trump Belfry similar a beauty pageant. Proposed cabinet members include fellow billionaires, the "king of bankruptcy" to run Treasury, an advocate for privatizing One thousand-12 schools, a climate-change skeptic, a fiercely anti-immigration attorney full general, a HUD secretarial assistant who has said he is not qualified to run federal beauracracy and a U.North. ambassador with little foreign policy experience  —  likewise as a vice president who advocated for anti-LGBTQ laws, believes being gay is a choice and that preventing gay spousal relationship is not discrimination, but enforcement of "God's thought."

The squad Trump is assembling doesn't appear to marshal with the hints of moderation he displayed with NYT editors. In claiming the throne, Trump has an enormous weight on his shoulders. He is hiring people who he instinctively likes and for the optics, not based on resumes. Equally the host and star of the testify, he will play them off against one another, hiring and firing them like on an episode of "The Amateur."

When he started his campaign, Trump said, "I will exist the greatest jobs president that God ever created." Now he needs to create those good paying jobs he promised for those who helped catapault him into the White Business firm, likewise equally those who didn't. That includes the coal-mining jobs and mill jobs, mostly lost to automation, that he said he would bring back. He needs to offering a replacement for Obamacare and explicate how he will create a more secure America that doesn't accept away ramble freedoms and discriminate against Muslims or those who disagree with his policies.

Given his lack of involvement about the affairs of state exhibited during the entrada, it'south not expected that President Trump volition immerse himself in briefing books, lengthy policy debates and the incredibly circuitous and nuanced issues that demand difficult decisions multiple times a day. He will gravitate toward what he knows best  —  building projects, such as a wall (or argue) with Mexico and rebuilding U.Due south. infrastructure, and rewriting those trade deals he despises. He'll authorize drone strikes and sentinel the large-screen TV in the Situation Room as missiles obliterate their targets. Equally Trump told "Play a trick on and Friends," "When you become these terrorists, you have to take out their families. They care nearly their lives, don't kid yourself. When they say they don't intendance nigh their lives, you lot have to take out their families," as if there were no Geneva Convention.

Information technology may be that Trump delegates the daily running of the land to his ambitious favorite progeny and experienced pols similar Vice President Pence, and spends his fourth dimension hosting dignitaries, building walls, redecorating the White Firm with gold faucets and pictures of himself, and promoting his real estate holdings around the globe and his newfound prowess as a statesman.

Hopefully, that will non be the case, and President Trump will surprise us over again, this time not simply winning the election but winning the respect of all Americans and the earth. Given the signals emanating then far from Trump Tower, the Trump presidency doesn't announced to be moving in that direction.

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Dan Farber is the senior vice president for strategic communications at Salesforce ; he has also been an editor at CBS Interactive, CNET and Ziff-Davis. Attain him @dbfarber .

This commodity originally appeared on Recode.net.

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Source: https://www.vox.com/2016/11/28/13752670/trump-art-of-the-deal-goes-to-washington

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