Negotiation: Two Things That Matter

Over twenty-five years I have built up a curious collection. I have hired and fired people, argued in courts and before arbitral tribunals, dealt with the authorities in the difficult circumstances of armed conflict and — the classics — haggled over purchases, had the car repaired and hired builders.

I suspect you have a similar collection of your own. Being able to reach agreement is a useful skill, you will agree. And I would wager that many people think a negotiation has succeeded when they got what they wanted: a lower price, a longer instalment plan and so on. Let us call that the immediate gain. My experience says it is not quite so.

There are two things I suggest you think about.

1. The frame

Life does not end with the immediate gain. You will meet this person again, and you may well need something from them again. How did you part last time? Did they remember you? Was your last conversation a good investment in the next one? Ask yourself these questions before a negotiation, and after it.

2. Win-win

This is a well-known idea, connected among other things with the mathematician John Nash’s work on game theory (Nash was a Nobel laureate in Economics and the hero of the film A Beautiful Mind; I have written about him before). In short, by cooperating, the parties can find a solution in which their combined gain is greater than it would be without cooperation. Game theory shows that there are outcomes in which every party to a dispute comes out ahead, not just one. Trust and empathy help in the search for such solutions.

Here is some homework. The next time you are in a café, ask your waiter’s name, and introduce yourself and your companions. Pay them a compliment. Then notice what changes.