How To Negotiate For Win-Win Results
By Amy
What does negotiation mean to you? A fight where you’d have to compromise?
If so, it must be very hard for you to think clearly in negotiations. This is because when your brain is in the fight or flight mode, the logical part of your brain is almost completely shut off.
The Inner Game of Negotiation
You can only use the rest of clever techniques, once you get out of the fight or flight mode.
It’s all about how you view the situation. You can look at it as a fight where nobody gets everything they want, or an opportunity to work out a solution that benefits both parties.
Essentially, a negotiation is just a discussion, where everyone state what they want and figure out if there is a deal that everyone wants. If there is a deal, then everyone’s happy. If there is no deal, you both walk away. That’s it.
If you think about negotiation as the process of finding a win-win solution, then there is nothing to be worried about.
Dealing With Conflicts
What if it’s a conflicting situation?
Let’s take salary negotiation as an example. Of course, money is not the only thing that matters, but it does matter.
In this hypothetical scenario, you are reasonably good at your job, and are happy with it. You as an employee want more money. The boss doesn’t want to pay more money.
At first, it may seem like a conflict. But if you look at it objectively, it becomes quite different.
Your goal could be to have the best job you can get. Boss’s goal could be to minimise costs of the business.
To your advantage: it costs money to train up someone new to replace your skills, and your team is already used to working with you.
To the boss’s advantage: it takes effort for you to find other jobs, and there is a risk that you may not enjoy the new job as much.
Now it’s no longer a conflict, but a collection of conditions and decisions to be made.
The 2 Most Important Rules of Negotiation
Once you can get over the anxiety and think rationally again, you are already a lot better at negotiating. To go a step further, there are 2 rules you need to know about the dynamics of negotiation.
- Your negotiation power depends on your ability to walk away, also known as, your best alternative option.
- It’s easier to come to a solution, when everyone puts more than one thing on the table.
Best Alternative Option
This is the determining factor of any negotiation.
Think about the extremes. If your life depends on the subject of negotiation and there is no alternatives, then you’d give everything you’ve got and possibly more. On the other hand, if someone wants sell you a roll of toilet paper when you aren’t in desperate need, then there is no way they can charge you a huge amount.
You should always be aware of your options before you walk into any negotiation. If you don’t have alternative options yet, then look for them. The result of your negotiation directly relates to how much you can walk away from it.
On the other hand, when the odds are in your favour, it’s not recommended to squeeze everything out of the other person. Relationships are more important than most things in life. Build a reputation of not taking advantage of others, then people would like to make deals with you again in the future.
Putting More On The Table
The thing to realise is that everyone cares about different things to different degrees.
Since negotiation is about finding solutions, having more items for discussion will give you more to work with.
It may help to ask what the other person really wants. What problems are they facing?
Let’s go back to the salary negotiation example. Maybe working from home 1 day each week is equivalent to a $5000 raise to you, but the boss would rather have the dollars. Maybe you and your boss can both benefit from you working more or less hours. What if you could take on a slightly different role? What if the boss has a problem that you could easily solve? When you can solve their problems, you can get what you want in return.
To find the solution that satisfies everyone, it takes communication. Intentionally or not, if everyone holds back what they actually want, it’s much less likely to find a satisfactory solution.
Conclusion
Negotiation is the opportunity to create win-win solutions. First calm your mind, then you can think rationally. If you learn to negotiate well, you can create a lot of value for yourself and for others.