08.30.06
The Art of Negotiation
English politician Henry Boyle once said, “The most important trip you may take in life is meeting people half way.” It more then adequately sums up the importance of negotiation. From an early age, we are taught the importance of give and take. As a child, it proved a tremendous challenge for most of us, and for some adults, it still does. Yet, it’s a skill, which when mastered, can reap tremendous rewards in terms of not only gaining what we want but in solidifying relationships both business and otherwise.
Deepak Malhotra, an assistant professor in the Negotiation, Organizations, and Markets unit at Harvard Business School, recently wrote an article called, “Four Strategies for Making Concessions”. The article presents strategies to help you maximize the likelihood that others will acknowledge your gestures of goodwill and reciprocate in kind.
They include:
- Labeling your concessions – don’t assume your actions speak for you. By labeling your concessions you make them relevant to the other part.
- Demand and define reciprocity – increase the likelihood that you will receive something in return for your concession, try to explicitly and diplomatically demand reciprocity.
- Make contingent concessions – don’t nickel and dime each other to death. Be prepared to make good-faith efforts to achieve joint gains.
- Make concessions in installments – research suggests that we like to receive good news in installments. Therefore, those same concessions you were ready to throw down on the table all at once, may be more positively received if broken into installments.
Non-reciprocity can sour any relationship, making it difficult to facilitate trust and work together in the future. Good negotiators not only ensure that their own concessions are met, but that they acknowledge and reciprocate the concessions that others make as well.
