9 Essential Traits Of Results Focused Negotiators

Monday 31 October, 2011

by Paul Archer

Learn the 9 essential traits of effective, results focused negotiators. You may never want to use them yourself when negotiating - that’s your choice - but beware ... they’ll be used on you.

1. Pressure
   
   All good negotiators aim to put pressure on the people they're negotiating with. The pressure is designed to make them give way to your demands or requests or at the very least, to offer concessions to their requirements.
   
   So whenever you're negotiating, try to think about some pressure you can create. Effective negotiators don't pile on the pressure with aggression or games, they create it purposely and cleverly. And the two greatest techniques they use are time and their own inner game control:
   
   
   1. Time or lack if it, is the one pressure that all negotiators use. I like to buy my goods towards the end of month when most salespeople's commission periods are ending. They want to get as many sales as possible in the last few days of the month to secure big fat commissions. So I like to negotiate around the end of the month to create this pressure.
      
   2. The other form of pressure comes from within. Good negotiators learn how to control their inner game and the pressure this puts on you to secure a deal at all costs. One of the best ways to do this is not to "cross the line". In other words, convince your brain that you need the deal and now. Do that and you've crossed the line and have to do a deal. That makes you negotiate less effectively because the slightest amount of pressure put on you by the other side will make you cave in.
      
      A strategy to use here is the BATNA - the Best Alternative To A Negotiated Agreement. Have a plan B up your sleeves so if the deal isn't looking good, you can calmly walk away. Always have your walk away power.
       
2. Increase desire
   
   This is a selling skill as well as a negotiating tactic. Simply to increase the desire from the person you're looking to negotiate with means they might be more inclined to accept your terms or to reduce their demands.
   
3. Have a structure
   
   Powerful negotiators know that a process, a structure is what's needed in negotiation. Even the smallest deals, those lasting minutes, should follow a process. The structure is even more vital for those long drawn out negotiations. In your structure you should factor in preparation, good negotiators do.
   
4. Desire a win-win
   
   Winning at all costs, beat the competition, grind them down, hammer out a cracking deal regardless, pull the wool over their eyes - it just annoys people. If you want a long term deal, win-win is the only way.
   
   OK, both parties won't have what they both want entirely. Both parties should achieve most of their aims and have conceded a little as well, but both parties must feel they have come out in a win-win situation. This is why preparation is so important for both sides.
   
   Knowing the minimum you'd accept, your ideal position and a middle ground of what you'll be happy to accept, helps with a win-win. Since both parties are able to concede in certain areas, give in others, means ultimately both sides get some benefit.
   
5. Build trust
   
   Effective negotiators have trust on their side and work on providing trust in the dealings with the other side. Trust comes from rapport, working together, having a believable proposition, actively seeking a win-win, being open, inclusive, sharing.
   
   Trust comes from following a structure which includes an initial discussion where both party's shopping list is put on the table without any negotiation at that stage. Open questions to seek out what they're looking for to build trust. With trust comes open negotiation.
   
   The greatest hurdle to a successful outcome is risk, where there's no trust, you see risk and this causes less concessions and more focusing on one or too variables, such as price.
   
6. Know that people always want different things
   
   To be a great negotiator you've got to find out what these are. Yes they'll tell you their main needs and demands ... but have you been able to get the smaller less tangible needs from them.
   
   People want different things. Effective negotiators seek out these different things and offer concessions or extras particularly if they have no cost to them but give massive value to the other side.
   
7. Always get a concession
   
   The rule that powerful negotiators use is to always seek a concession whenever they give something away. This should become a habit. Always seek something, however small, when offering a concession. So use the phrase "If we do this, then would you do this?". It's a habit thing. It works.
   
8. Believe in uncomfortableness
   
   All good negotiators tell me that when they are negotiating well, they have an uneasy sense of uncomfortableness. That feeling in the tummy when you are worried about what someone thinks about you, whether you've overstepped the mark, asked for too much, about to be thrown out of the store. Only then do you know that you are truly negotiating.
   
   So welcome the feeling, seek it out and remember all good negotiators feel unease and uncomfortable.
   
9. Higher authority
   
   Seasoned negotiators realise that pressure is a strategy that brings results, and the more pressure you can put on the person without losing trust and rapport, the better. And that's the fine balance - pressure and trust and rapport. So if we personally pile on the pressure we might lose the trust. Not good.
   
   The answer is to relate the negotiation to some form of higher authority. Someone who has the say to approve or disapprove the negotiation outcome. This can be an ego thing, since most people like to think that they have the power, but the higher authority is merely a tactic used.
   
   Any thing, person or committee that you can refer the details to becomes a higher authority that you can bring in to put pressure on the other person without losing the trust you've built up. Principles and values can also be used.
   
   Your higher authority can also be a bad guy and you remain the good guy. This puts extra pressure on.

Source:ceoonline.com