Tapping The Power of Relationships Through Negotiation

I imagine that you all have heard and read - to the point of cliché - that we all negotiate, to a greater or lesser degree, each day. What may fall by the wayside is the importance of relationships and the ways in which we leverage those relationships in our every day negotiations.

Thinking back to when I was a lot younger and a bit less responsible with my choices, my parents often leveraged our relationship to help me "see" that what I wanted to do and what I should do were two different things. While I don't recommend guilt-tripping your vendors or telling them that "you aren't upset, just disappointed" there are plenty of ways to leverage your relationships within the context of negotiation.

We are all going to have varying viewpoints with respect to what constitutes a "good" relationship with our negotiation counterparts.  In their book Getting Together - Building Relationships As We Negotiate, Roger Fisher & Scott Brown suggest that a good working relationship is one that can deal well with differences. We don't have to see eye-to-eye on every issue that crops up between us. In fact, if we did, there would be little need to negotiate in the first place. The important facet of the relationship is that we can work together to come up with creative solutions without wanting to gouge out the other person's eyes. Avoid sweeping disagreements under the rug, but at the same time be willing to use trade-offs to balance your competing substantive interests.

When someone says that they are "leveraging a relationship" this often has a negative connotation - something like a nice way of saying "I'm going to use them to achieve my ends." However, you can leverage relationships without damaging them.  Try some of these ideas from the Getting Together book:

1. Be unconditionally constructive.  If your negotiation counterpart sees that you are consistently seeking to build rather than tear down, they will be encouraged in their efforts to help reach mutually beneficial solutions to do the same.
2. Be wholly trustworthy, but not wholly trusting. Follow through is probably the most important way to establish and maintain a good working relationship. If you don't do what you say you will do, the other side looses incentive to perform. 
3. Persuasion, Not Coercion. It is easy to feel hijacked when one side begins making demands on you in a "my way or the highway" manner. Seek to bring your counterpart around to your point of view rather than cramming it down their throats.

By utilizing these tips you will be able to maximize the value of your good working relationship!

Fun With Seesaws, Or In Other Words: Leverage!

All right, we've got you all prepped for your negotiation and we've got you thinking about the importance of where you're going to hold your negotiations. Now, we need to spend some time thinking about how LEVERAGE will affect your negotiations and how you can affect the leverage in any deal.

Begin by evaluating the Leverage situation as early as possible into the Negotiation. Time is a huge factor in determining Leverage and many times, the seconds ticking off the clock alone can change the balance of power in a negotiation. If you know that deadlines and time pressures will only become greater for yourself or the other party based on the timing of negotiations, this can be a powerful tool for you to affect the outcome.

Next, take some time to think about the surrounding environment and circumstances in which you are negotiating. Sometimes things are great, everyone is amicable and life is good.  Sometimes it's not quite like that. If you can identify the points of friction and understand how the underlying circumstances within the organizations at the table could affect the outcome of the negotiation, you'll be prepared for stormy weather if you encounter it.

Your actions and those of your negotiation partner can also be indicators of Leverage. Some things to watch for:

• Neediness - Are you eager, willing, bending over backwards to get things done? 
• Emotions - People blowing their tops and becoming emotional can signal important crossroads in your negotiation that might have otherwise seemed unimportant.
• Drafting Control - Often times, the initial draft becomes an anchor for the negotiations. If drafting the agreement is taken up by the other party, don't be sucked into using their paper as your anchor.
• Individuals Involved - The number of people involved and their prestige within the organization is a great barometer as to how important this negotiation will be. 

During the course of your negotiation, there are several actions you can take that will either help you to boost your own Leverage or to reduce the strength of your opponent's Leverage.

Boosting Your Leverage:

• Create alternatives
• Match your offerings to their needs
• Discount their alternatives
• Create a deeper relationship

Reducing Their Leverage:

• Be disinterested
• Identify deficiencies
• Expand the scope of your project
• Establish an exit strategy

Finally, remember that when dealing with Leverage, PERCEPTION IS REALITY.  So when you are prepared to serve up your Leverage, remember that this can be done in a variety of ways:

• Present it - Just let the other side see the strength of your position
• Leak it - Drop hints, provide strategic leaks, don't give it all away, but show enough to bolster your position.
• Feign it - Fake it until you make it! (We don't really follow or like this strategy, but it is often employed and you should be aware that it could be used against you!)

Have fun on the Seesaw! We hope you have the tools to stay ahead of the leverage game and keep yourself in as strong a position of Leverage, from beginning to end, as possible.

Next week: Negotiation Strategies - Let The Mind Games Begin! 

Leverage!

One of the most important concepts to understand when negotiating contracts is LEVERAGE. At the Studio we strive to drive home the importance of LEVERAGE, ways you can develop leverage, and how your behaviors affect your leverage.

The whole point of having leverage is to be able to obtain your goal, your NEED. So the first step is to identify the object of your leveraging. Think about this as your NEED rock. It's big, it's heavy and you can't move it without some help!

Next up, think about ways you can develop leverage. Every situation is unique, but there are often ways to increase your own leverage or decrease the leverage of the other side. For a great discussion of ways to do this, read Roger Volkema's book - Leverage. The primary point here is to avoid tunnel vision when negotiating a deal. What are your options? Are there competitors that you could go to instead of the person/company you are negotiating with? Could you alter the scope of the deal/project to create alternatives?

Finally, the way you act often speaks volumes about you and your needs in a negotiation. If you act "needy" the other side will sense this - they will believe that you believe that you need them more than they need you. This is often played out in subtle ways: Drafting Control, Individuals Involved, Willingness to Travel, etc. Always ensure that you are meeting the other side half-way instead of bending over backward to please them and meet their schedules.

Always keep LEVERAGE in mind. It's almost never too late to consider how to develop leverage and to consider how to change your behaviors to give you more leverage!