- It stars with the universally accepted premise that people want to be understood and accepted. Listening is the cheapest, most effective concession we can make to get there. By listening intensely, a negotiator displays empathy and shows a sincere desire to better understand what the other side is experiencing
- When individuals feel listened to, they tend to listen to themselves more carefully and openly evaluare and clarify their own thoughts and feelings
- When we embrace negotiating’s transformative possiblities, we learn how to get what we want and how to move others to a better place
- Instead of prioritizing your argument – in fact, instead of doing any thinking at all in the early going about what you’re going to say – make your sole and all-encompassing focus the other person and what they have to say
- It’s how we are – our general demeanor and delivery – that is both the easiest thing to enact and most immediately effective mode of influence
- Your most powerful tool in any verbal communication is your voice
- A mirror is when you repeat the last three words (or the critical one to three words) of what someone just said
- Use a clam even voice, say “I’m sorry…”, mirror then silence for at least four seconds. Repeat
- The intent behind most mirrors is “please help me understand”
- People who view negotiations as a battle of argumenets become overwhelmed by the voices in their head
- It’s a process of discovery
- If you can perceive the emotions of others, you can turn them to your advantage
- Empathy is the ability to recognize the perspective of a counterpart, and the vocalization of that recogniztion
- Labeling is a way of validating someone’s emotion by acknowledging it
- Empathy doesn’t demand agreement
- Label your counterpart’s fears to diffuse their power
- A negative provides the opportunity for you and your counterpart to clarify what you really want by eliminating what you don’t want
- People need to feel in control
- There are three kinds of yes: counterfeit, confirmation and committment
- We need to persuade from their perspective, not ours
- They need to feel safe, secure and in control. If you satisfy these needs, you’re in the door
- Saying “no” gives the speaker a feeling of safety, security and control
- If the other party won’t say “no”, you’re dealing with people who are indecisive, confused, or have a hidden agenda
- Being pushed for “yes” makes people defensive
- Use a summary to trigger a “that’s right”
- When you allow the variable of time to trigger your thinking, you’ve taken yourself hostage
- Peopel will take greater risks to avoid losses than achieve gains
- Job applicants who named a range achieved significantly higher salaries then those who offered a fixed number, especially if their range was a “bolstering range”, in which the low number in their range is what they actually wanted
- Anything you throw out that sounds less rounded feels like a figure you came to as a result of thoughtful calculation
- Once you’ve negotiated salary, make sure to define sucess for the position
- Sell yourself, and your success, as a way they can validate their own intelligence and broadcast it to the rest of the company
- Ask: “what does it take to be successful here?”
- Use calibrated questions early and often. “What is your biggest challenge here?” is one of the most common calibrated questions
- When people feel they are not in control, they take on a hostage mentality
- Ask calibrated questions that start with the words “How” or “what”
- Don’t ask questions that start with “why” unless you want your counterpart to defend a goal which serves you
- The first and most common “no” question you’ll use is some version of “how am I supposed to do that?”
- There are two key questions you can ask to push your counterparts to think they are defining success their way: “How will we know we’re on the right track?” and “How will we address things if we’re not on the right track (this is good a/b thinking as well). When they answer, summarize their answers til you get a “That’s right”