Negotiation Rule #1: "No-deal" is better than a bad deal.
The #1 Component of Power is Balance
There was an article written in the early 1980's called "The Seven Components of Power". It was about physical power in hand-to-hand combat. In many ways this article correlates directly to negotiation. In this article, the #1 component of power was not strength (strength was actually 6th on the list). The #1 component was "balance".
There is an old saying in negotiation, "He (or she) who cares least wins". The minute you get it firmly fixed in your mind that no one can make you say "yes", you begin to get control over your balance.
If you're in a deal or some kind of negotiation that you feel you have to have, that you can’t say “no”, you've just taken yourself hostage and you’ve lost your balance. This instruction is here to help keep you from taking you hostage.
Once you've taken yourself hostage via anxiety, your performance abilities actually decrease. If it’s not a good deal, say “Thanks, but no-thanks” and move on. You’ll spend less time finding a better deal that works then you’ll spend trying and hoping to make a bad deal good.
What is most likely to make a deal bad will be a single term. In many cases, it won’t be price. Price is only one term. (We’re going to take a deeper dive into price in Lesson 10). Truly dangerous cutthroat negotiators know that you will be seduced by price, or you will think the negotiation is over because you’ve reached a price, and then they will kill you with another term. Some Chinese manufacturers are famous for this. Ever hear of Chinese dry wall? They certainly have in Florida where there are thousands of uninhabitable houses because of it.
The deal that taught us this rule was a highly lucrative deal early in our history, with one killer term. Our reports had to be “satisfactory”. They later changed what they thought was “satisfactory”, which meant they weren’t going to pay us. 2 years and 5 law firms later, we finally found the right law firm to help us and got every dime. No word resembling “satisfactory” has appeared in any of our contracts since.
Hope is not a strategy. Because of that – here is your 2nd rule.
Negotiation Rule #2: “Yes” is the last thing you want to hear.
“Yes” Seduces
It has been contended that the word "yes" is the most beautiful word in any language. It's the word we are seduced by. The desire to hear it may blind you to what is really being said. Some negotiation advice tells you to come up with a "yes-able" proposition. There is also the ridiculous idea of building a "yes" momentum. This is someone getting you to say “yes” three times in a row to a succession of different closed-ended questions. The theory is that momentum has built to the point that when they ask you to buy you will automatically say “yes”! This is so over used in sales and argument construction that the moment anyone starts trying to get you to say “yes” your guard likely goes up immediately.
What goes through your mind when you pick up the phone and hear – “Have you got a few minutes to talk?” We can promise you it's at least this: “How long is a few minutes?” and "If I say ‘yes’, I may not like what I gotten myself into."
Most closed-ended questions that you encounter are designed like this. The questioner is quite clearly pushing for a "yes". It's likely that this sort of thinking comes from a lawyer based argument approach – "never ask a question that you don't know the answer to in advance". While this may be a good strategy for a lawyer interrogating a witness, it's not a good negotiation strategy. It diminishes rapport, which is the opposite of what you want in a negotiation.
3 Kinds of “Yes”
You will find that there are three kinds of "yes". 1 – Commitment; 2 – Confirmation and 3 – Counterfeit. Some people are so used to others trying to drive them into commitment “yeses” they fling the counterfeit “yeses” around quite freely. Have you ever heard a "yes" and found out later it wasn't a "yes"? This is the counterfeit “yes” and is often used to gather information from you before they tell you "no". (You may have been guilty of trying to corner them with the “yes” momentum.)
The minute you stop the practice of pushing others for “yeses” via closed-ended questions is the minute you stop a self-defeating behavior and you begin to increase your sophistication in your approach to negotiation.
Negotiation Rule #3: “Yes” is nothing without “how”.
“How am I supposed to do that?”
The 1st way to say “no” with elegance to a bad term is “How am I supposed to do that?” You have to say it with the right tone of voice and Lesson #2 goes into that. Lesson 21 goes into saying “no” in much more depth, so for now, this should be your go-to “no”. Test-drive it. You’re going to end up loving it.
Is their “yes” counterfeit?
If you’ve gotten a “yes”, but they can’t answer “how”, the “yes” they gave you is an illusion. It’s counterfeit. Think about how we get fixed on “Yes” in the first place.
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