Towards people are always striving to achieve an outcome.

They always want to move towards something.

They want to achieve a certain outcome or goal and find it difficult to recognise what should be avoided. Instead they concentrate and focus on what they will get when the outcome is achieved.

Other the other hand, Away from people do things because they want to avoid a certain situation. They don't want to experience loss or discomfort and want to move away from something.

Question? How do you know what type of person they are?
Answer - Ask them this type of question:

What do you want? What will having xyz give you? What do you want in xyz?

What their response will tell you:

Toward people will tell you what they want.
Away from people will tell you what they don't want.

Using this in the real world:

How to communicate to people who have a TOWARDS and AWAY FROM strategy.

In Negotiations with these people:

Towards

Work out what the goals are and what you can do to help achieve these goals. Focus on the outcome and what it will give you.

Away

Work out what you can do to help them avoid what they don't want. Work out and anticipate potential problems and assure them that these can be minimised or avoided.

In Managing these people:

Towards

Offer incentives, i.e an outcome. Emphasis goals and what they can achieve and attain.

Away

Use sanctions. Be aware that these people are usually the ones to bring up problems.

Influencing Language

Towards

Get, achieve, attain, include, obtain, have, wants

Away

Not have, avoid, don't want, keep away from, get rid of,