Guerrilla Negotiating

Guerrilla Negotiating has to be one of the most interesting books on Negotiation which I've read in quite a while. It kicks off with the premise that in life no matter what you do, negotiations are unavoidable and such negotiation skills are a necessary skillset to have. However, throughout the book, a strong emphasis is placed on using the tricks and techniques outlined ethically because these can all slide into the unethical grey areas if not applied correctly.

And then, the rest of the book jumps into the wide array of strategies which lead you from the opening maneuvers to controlling the negotiation to the followup work of keeping the deal together. Interestingly, there has also been mention of Cialdini's 6 Principles of Influence which I thought melded in nicely with the understanding the art of influencing your counterpart.

One of the most interesting chapters in the book was one exploring the effects of price on a deal. These days, too many people deal with too great an emphasis on pricing without consideration of other factors and if you meet people like this, one way to deal with them may go something like this :

"I don't care about anything but price. Give me your best price or get out." You might be tempted. Instead, call their bluff.
"Okay, here's the deal. Find the best price you can find. I'll beat it by 10 percent, guaranteed! But I get to choose when I deliver."
"I don't think so." they'll retort.
"All right, I'll beat the best price you can find. But i get to select the quality to ship."
"Uh ... no!"
"Hmm. so I guess price isn't more important than on-time delivery or quality after all?" You've made your point

Highly recommended whether you're in the sales profession or just want to improve your general negotiating skills!

Low-down on Negotiations (Part III)

Ok, the final part cometh ...

Alright, just some final quick thoughts on negotiation I have :

1) Always go for a win-win deal. These are the ones which help seal lasting partnerships and promise greater trust and cooperation in the future. Win-Lose deals in your favour only act as once off advantages and trust me, you won't be seeing much of the other party after this deal is concluded.

2) Think of what you can offer instead of what you want. You may not think so but there may just be something you can offer at very little or no cost to yourself but may make a world of a difference to the other party. Even if you try to offer something which is not so helpful to the other party, at least he or she will appreciate the fact that you tried and maybe try to do the same for you.

3) Be professional and attack the points not the people. Lets face it, there will always be times when you will be fighting with your counterpart for a better deal and even be tempted to go into personal biases like "He's always so stubborn" or "Why can't she just see it from our perspective". Its common for both sides to fight on the points of the deal but one should always recognise the the people sitting across the deal table is just doing his/her job, just like you. Respect that fact and be professional enough to duel on subject matter.

4) Have fun with everyone. Just like everything else in life, having fun will go a long way in deal crafting. Take some time to know who you are working with because chances are if you pull it off right, you will all be working closely a lot more. Work with people on the deal and get to know them more. And just when you see more turf of your recently-pulled out hair starting to appear on the table, it may just be time for a break, which is excellent for bonding. All work and no play make for pretty long and fruitless discussions.

Hope this trilogy of posts on negotiation has been as fun a read as it was for me to pen it... Good luck and have fun!

Low-down on Negotiations (Part II)

And now on to part II ...

Basically, there are 3 main elements of every negotiation. These can be easily remembered using the mnemonic TIP - Time, Information and Power.

Time - This refers to the amount of time you have to close a deal. Generally speaking, the side with the tightest deadline is one hanging on the short end of the stick. If the other party has a tight timeline to work with (due to their superiors, financial positions or external conditions), playing the delay card can force them to make a favourable settlement in your favour at the last moment. But this only works if they absolutely have to close the deal. Likewise, it would be wise not to reveal the deadlines that you may have for your schedule and play it cool during the negotiation process even when you know you need to settle the deal soon.

Information - Knowledge is power and this old adage weighs especially well in negotiations. In some sense, one needs not only to know what the opposition needs/wants/fears/can give up/cannot give up, but also needs to know oneself well. What this means is that before entering a negotiation stage, one should always at least set out the parameters of the deal into a list of items that are must haves and which are nice to haves. From experience, I have seen a lot of people going into deal-making without knowing what they even want to achieve. And frankly, this just translates into a tremendous waste of time for all involved. On the flip-side, one should also try to find out or deduce what the other party has up his sleeves and which of items they can give up and live without.

Power - Here, power does not mean actual power per se, but perceived one. A lot of people commonly mistake this negotiating element to equate to financial, postitional status or otherwise. However, this is not the case. For example, if a common businessman has a multi-billion dollar deal for millionaire to invest in, you can guess where the perceived power lies. Personally, I've also seen situations where people with pretty good and interesting deals just shrivel up in front of people they are pitching to because they believed that they were just small fries to someone richer and more powerful. This is not the case as the one last shred of power that virtually everyone at the deal table has is the power to say no and walk off on a bad deal.

So, these are the 3 parts of deal making that you can watch out for and prepare and work on. Hopefully with enough practice, they would become second nature to you as a negotiator soon.

( to be continued ...)

Low-down on Negotiations (Part I)

Though it may not feel so, negotiation is actually a pretty big part of our daily personal or working lives. The skills and knowledge behind crafting a deal are thus essential to pick up.

In a general sense, one can approach negotiation with basically 2 types of mindsets, the "Win-Win" or the "Win-Lose".

In the highly competitive environment today, a lot of us have grown accustomed to a zero-sum mentality with the attitude that someone has to lose out in order for ourselves to get ahead or get added benefits. This is common in cases for example in typical employer-employee relations -- Employer wants to pay less and Employee wants to get paid more. This clearly illustrates the "Win-Lose" mentality at work. "Your loss is my gain" is the name of the game here. However, with both sides playing the same way, its easy to get stale-mated or end up with less than desired mutual benefits.

On the flip side, there is the "Win-Win" Mentality in which both sides stay aware of the needs and wants of the other party and find a common ground for mutual benefit. In some cases, a better working agreement or scenario may even be found if the spirit of trust and open-ness can be established. This is why more deals are actually sealed away from the meeting table rather than at it. In the local context, the term "makan diplomacy" has even sprung up from the Singapore delegates who negotiated the US-Singapore FTA. This shows the importance of establishing a common ground of trust as the foundation for talks and discussion.

There was a story of a management research done to compare managers' negotiation styles from the States with those from Japan. An experiment was carried out and for both cases, a line was drawn on the floor between 2 managers, who were then tasked with just one simple objective : getting the other party to come over to your side.

The American managers tried all ways and means to bribe, coerce, trick or force the other party to budge and cross the line. And guess what? No progress whatsoever was achieved with both parties staying firm on their sides. The Japanese managers took a wholly different approach though. The thought about the situation and discussed about it, saying " Hey, if I cross to your side and you cross to mine, doesn't that make us both winners?" And so they shook on it and did just that.

So, think win-win and negotiation with both sides' welfare in mind, and you just may end up with more than you expected in a shorter time.


(to be continued .... )

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