Reap what you sow

RULE NUMBER 7 ACTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES In negotiation, and in life, everything that you do has repercussions. Things will come back to you one way or another. You cannot escape the consequences of your actions, and you will eventually see the long-term effects of your earlier decisions. “What goes around comes around,” as they say.

Sometimes we get screwed over and there is nothing we can do about it. Really? I have never subscribed to this view, and a cold, hard look in the mirror by its proponents is generally very revealing. Let’s take a look at this from two different perspectives: l If the other party feels they have lost at the negotiating table l How our behaviours impact our results.

IF THE OTHER PARTY FEELS THEY HAVE LOST IN THE NEGOTIATIONS Of the four potential outcomes from a negotiation, two include the word “lose” – as the negotiating spectrum (opposite) indicates.

Any agreement or settlement that leaves one party a dissatisfied loser is not clever in the long run and will come back to hurt you later, sometimes in ways you cannot predict. This is a typical “win:lose” scenario, which ultimately turns into a “lose:win” scenario...

Let me explain more. A very tough negotiator told me about a hard deal he had wrung out of one of his customers. He had demanded, threatened and bullied the buyer, ultimately negotiating a deal that paid considerably more than any other customer his business had supplied. The customer was a major one (about 15% of the total sales revenue), but the supplier had a technological edge, which it felt it could exploit to its advantage. So the salesman did, and he was proud of his achievement in “screwing the customer for every last penny I could get”.

We happen to know the customer in question and a couple of years later we enquired of its procurement team if the story was true. The buyers told us it was and that, at that time, they had no option but to buy the items at the inflated cost. However, they subsequently felt so manipulated and “trampled all over” that they decided immediately after the price increase to

find an alternative supplier that would work with them to find a mutually attractive solution. It was difficult, but they found one. Some 18 months later, they terminated the contract with the original supplier and shifted all their business to the new one, with whom they felt they had a better level of mutual respect. They described a bittersweet moment as they negotiated with the original supplier, who was completely oblivious to his customer’s alternative plans. The seller was ashen as he left, having been told that the contract was terminated with immediate effect. He lost his job, his business was left with a catastrophic hole in its revenue, and a new competitor was introduced into its market with a cheaper but equally effective product. He most certainly reaped what he had sown.

HOW OUR BEHAVIOURS IMPACT OUR RESULTS In another real-life situation, one of my team had a notoriously difficult “If the other party leaves the negotiating table feeling they have lost, they customer who was threatening to terminate the contract with us. I was told he was awkward, unsmiling, will not forget and they will short of time, unfriendly, look for an alternative only interested in his own solution” agenda and generally tough on all aspects of our service. I was invited to meet him to defend our position. My account manager was tetchy about this contract – he found the relationship tough going. Consequently, he himself was also unsmiling, curt and relatively cold in his dealings with the customer – he was on edge. His briefing to me initially led me to expect a similar scenario. However, I took the opposite view, and rather than leap straight into a confrontation, I decided to engage and disarm the individual. I would not talk about the contract, but only wanted to understand the buyer’s situation. So, we talked about life, family and values. It was a very different conversation from the one I had been led to expect. The buyer visibly relaxed and we built some rapport and trust in just one meeting. As a consequence, I replaced the account manager with someone with more relationship-building skills. This new account manager was warm, smiling and a good listener. The result was a step-change in the relationship: the customer felt THE NEGOTIATING SPECTRUM appreciated and the revenue grew significantly as we gained an increased share of the spend. Win:Win Win:Believed Win Win:Lose Lose:Lose So, it transpires that our own behaviours impact those of our customers – and we reap what we sow. You see, all our actions have consequences, especially in the difficult world of commercial

negotiations. The market can and will change from a buyer’s market to a seller’s market, and vice versa, in double quick time. Don’t ever be fooled into thinking that your actions don’t have consequences, or that there is nothing you can do to change the outcome. Don’t think you can get away with bad, short-term or tactical choices, even if you don’t seem to get caught. If the other party leaves the negotiating table feeling they have lost, they will not forget and they will look for an alternative solution, even if it takes a significant amount of time and effort to do so.

We can and should still negotiate firmly, striving to get a good deal while also treating all involved with warmth, integrity and honesty. It’s amazing how discerning people are. They quickly pick up on this type of behaviour and, consciously or not, they start to respond in the same way. Remember, people are generally infinitely more valuable than any transaction, regardless of the size of the potential upside. Treating people right will always come back around to benefit you in the long run. In the end, you invariably get to reap what you sow.

RULE NUMBER 8 LEARN TO COMMUNICATE In order to negotiate, people must have the ability to exchange ideas, concerns, proposals and arguments – in short, they must be able to communicate effectively. Spare a moment for this simple thought: if we communicate poorly, this will dramatically increase our chance of failure in any negotiation.

If you’re lucky, poor communication might merely mean a mildly prolonged discussion – irritating, but not serious. But it might mean something far more damaging. Imagine the potential consequences of negotiators getting their communications wrong in the following circumstances: l Politicians and diplomats negotiating for peace in conflict and war (or Brexit!) l Hostage negotiators seeking to bring home loved ones and the afflicted from war torn and dangerous countries l The emergency services having to negotiate in difficult situations to help the innocent and prevent wrong-doing l The Good Samaritan trying to persuade a would-be suicide victim to pause and think again l The parent persuading their children that Santa will only come at Christmas if they settle down to sleep early...

So, you see that communication and negotiation are inextricably linked, and good

SIMON BUZZA is a Fellow of the ISM and founding partner of the NewDawn Partnership, an advisory service that focuses on delivering operational improvements to the buyer and seller interfaces of a business. Visit: www.newdawnpartners.com negotiation skills are crucial – not least for buyers and sellers in business seeking to deliver true value for money.

If you want to be successful in a negotiation, there is no room for communication breakdowns and misunderstandings.

How much have you thought this through? It is a broad topic. We are not just talking about words, although we seem to spend a disproportionate amount of time on words, at the expense of the all the other important areas of communication. Body language, tone of voice, dress and appearance, handshakes, listening skills, emotional intelligence, timekeeping and courtesy all play a key role in a

“Make sure you don’t send the wrong signals by saying – or doing – things that conflict with the message you really want to get across”

human’s extensive communications skill set.

Based on external cues, including dress, people assess one another positively or negatively. We make a flash judgment of someone as trustworthy, capable, friendly, intelligent – or the opposite – and we deal with them based on those impressions. People make inferences about one another’s motives based on first impressions, which occur extremely quickly. We only need 100 milliseconds to form judgments of others on all sorts of dimensions, including likeability, trustworthiness, competence, and aggressiveness.

If you want to start the negotiations on the right note, you need to communicate the right messages from the outset. Even more interesting, our first impressions of others are generally accurate and reliable. For instance, first impressions about a person’s competence have been shown to be good predictors of important outcomes, such as who will win a democratic political election.

The best negotiators rehearse saying and doing things in ways that send precisely the message they want to send. The bottom line is that the better you become at using non-verbal communication and reading the non-verbal messages others send, the more effective you can be as a negotiator. Realise that everything you do at the bargaining table is part of the communication and negotiation process. So, make sure you don’t send the wrong signals by saying – or doing – things that conflict with the message you really want to get across.