Originally published in Romanian.
Why am I writing a guide to negotiation? Lately I’ve been “negotiating” various partnerships with various people, some I knew, some I didn’t.
The topics vary and the situations differ, but I noticed something common to all these discussions. Whether they had negotiation courses behind them or years of experience, or whether it was their first deal and first negotiation, everyone I talked to was trying to do one single thing: get the maximum advantage for themselves and the maximum disadvantage for the other side.
I don’t know if it’s a native instinct, something acquired, or the result of some uninspired courses, but I do know that a negotiation strategy like this, which might work for door-to-door sales, teleshopping and the like, is completely wrong when it comes to partnerships or long-term business with a high degree of interdependence.
Why? Well, let’s assume one of the partners, the more skilled negotiator and better manipulator, manages to close the negotiation with 100% of the advantages for himself and 0% for the other (or 90%-10%, or 80%-20%, it doesn’t matter).
What happens next? Over time, the disadvantaged partner will start to feel and understand that he was tricked into a deal that isn’t mutually beneficial, and he’ll look for any opportunity to break it (or he’ll create that opportunity). Then come the conflicts, the breakup, and lost time, money and brain cells for both of them. In the end, the “negotiator” partner will have made a bit of extra cash for a limited period of time, after which he’ll lose a lot more (even if only in the form of a missed opportunity).
After these experiences I thought I’d write a short guide to negotiation, a bit different from the usual ones:
1. talk openly, together, about each side’s interests and what matters to each of you: it might not just be money, but also position, reputation, market advantages, security or enjoyment;
2. go over the points of disagreement together and, for each one, look for the solution that produces the minimum of disadvantages and the maximum of advantages for each side, or at least for both sides combined
3. when you can’t get a concession from the other person, swap places: each of you imagine yourself in the other’s position, how you’d feel, what solution you would or wouldn’t accept, and why;
4. you have to understand (and apply in the negotiation) that the final result, the terms of the partnership, must allow both sides to start and keep running that business over the long term, and for that, the satisfactions that come with the business must clearly outweigh the frustrations, the advantages must exceed the disadvantages, and the business must be mutually profitable and enjoyable (more than once, businesses have fallen apart even though they were making money, because one of the partners had non-material grievances about the other’s position);
5. finally, we all know that as time goes by and businesses evolve, new situations and positions come up – so be flexible when your partner comes to you after x months or years and says he wants to renegotiate because the original deal no longer feels fair / beneficial from his point of view, he’s no longer getting any satisfaction out of it and is thinking of walking away.