Negotiating Secrets You Should Know
The Five Underlying Facts You Must Understand About Negotiating
- You are negotiating all the time.
- Everything you want is owned or controlled by someone else.
- There are predictable responses that you can count on in the negotiating process
- There are three critical factors in every negotiation - power, information, time.
- The proper "mesh" of personality types is important to negotiating success.
The Three Underpinning of "Win/Win" Negotiating
- Never narrow negotiations down to just one issue.
- Different people want different things.
- Price is not always all-important
The Three Stages of Every Negotiation
- Learning your opponent's stated goals; stating what you want.
- Gathering information on your opponent and their needs.
- Reaching for compromise.
The Five Things That Make a Good Negotiator
- Knowing that both sides are under pressure so you don't feel intimidated
- Wanting to learn negotiating skills.
- Understanding negotiating skills.
- Being willing to practice.
- Wanting to create "win/win" negotiating situations.
The Eight Kinds of Power
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How to Gather Information
- Ask open-ended questions.
- Repeat statements as questions.
- Ask for responses.
- Ask for restatements.
- Ask others who deal with your opponent.
- Ask your opponent's subordinates.
- Mix you company's specialists with their specialists.
Personality Styles Chart
Find your own type and that of your opponent. The hardest type for you to negotiate with is the type in the kitty corner opposite yours.
Where to Sit in Negotiations
- When you're negotiating with two people: sit where you can watch both.
- When you have two people on your team: sit apart so you "speak with two different voices."
- When you have a large group opposing their small group: keep your group together for power.
- When they have a large group opposing your small group: intermingle to diffuse their power.
Five Characteristics of a Successful Negotiation
- Both sides feel sense of accomplishment.
- Both sides feel sense the other side cared.
- Both sides feel sense the other side was fair.
- Each side would deal again with the other.
- Each side feels the other side will keep the bargain.
Checklist of Negotiating Gambits
- Bracketing
- The Nibble.
- The Hot Potato.
- The Higher Authority gambit.
- The Set-Aside Technique for avoiding impasse.
- Use arbitrators to break deadlocks.
- Good Buy/Bad Guy.
- Feel, Felt, Found formula.
- Dumb is smart; smart is dumb.
- The Flinch.
- The Vise technique.
- The Printed Word technique
- The Withdrawn offer.
- The Fait Accompli.
- The Funny Money gambit
- The Red Herring.
- The Puppy Dog technique
- Reluctant Buyer/Reluctant Seller.
- The Want-It-All technique
Checklist of Rules and Principles
- Never say "Yes" to first offer.
- The Call Girl principle (the value of services diminishes rapidly after the services have been performed).
- Always maintain your "walk away power."
- Make a big deal of any concession you make, and get a counter-concession for doing so.
- Don't be the first to name a price.
- Position opponents for easy acceptance.
- Be the one who writes the contract.
- Make your offers low but flexible.
- Never be the one to offer to "split the difference." Get your opponent t make the offer to you.
- 80% of concessions are made in the last 20% of the time - so don't 'leave details" till later.
- The person under the greatest time pressure generally loses in negotiations.
- Never reveal it if you have a deadline.
- Don't negotiate on the phone (you can't read your opponent's body language).
- Watch for sudden changes in body language, rather than just the body language itself.
Checklist of Conversational Clues
- Statements that mean just eh opposite ("In my humble opinion...")
- Throwaways that precede major announcements (" By the way," "As you're aware").
- Legitimizers ("Honestly," "Frankly,").
- Justifiers ("I'll try").
- Erasers ("But," "However,").
- Deceptions ("I'm just a country boy...").
- Preparers ("I don't want to intrude, buy...").
- Exaggerators ("This is very embarrassing...").
- Trial balloons ("Off the top of my head...").