Table of contents

Child pages

Negotiating with people from different cultures

• https://hbr.org/2015/12/getting-to-si-ja-oui-hai-and-da

Exploding Offers

Sam Altman (YC) - Exploding Offers Suck
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8285994
http://blog.ycombinator.com/exploding-offers-suck

Articles / Videos

• Quora - Why are some people better negotiators than others?
  

• 1930s - How to Win Friends and Influence People (book)
  
• 1983 - Getting to Yes (book)
  
• 2006 - Bargaining For Advantage (book)
  
• 2007 - Getting Past No (book)
  
• 2010 - Difficult Conversations (book)
  
• 2011 - Start With No (book)
  
• 2013.04.23 - QZ.com - The secret to a higher salary is to ask for nothing at all
  
  • Related discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5600674
    
  • I thought the article was pretty interesting. I'm not sure if the technique described would always work, though.
• 2018.01.09 - FreeCodeCamp - Ten Rules for Negotiating a Job Offer
  • Summary:
    • Get everything in writing
    • Always keep the door open
    • Information is power
    • Always be positive
    • Don’t be the decision maker
    • Have alternatives
    • Proclaim reasons for everything
    • Be motivated by more than just money
    • Understand what they value
    • Be winnable

• Quora - Why are some people better negotiators than others?
  • Yishan Wong:
    I'm not a great negotiator myself, but this is what I observed from carefully watching the best negotiator I've ever known:
    
    Most "okay" negotiators are simply good at talking a lot. I've observed this in a lot of BD people. They just talk to fill the empty air, and by doing so they blot out your mind from thinking critically and manage to get you to agree with them that way. Some of them may be charismatic, and apparently research shows that charisma can help shut off the parts of a brain responsible for skepticism and vigilance (see http://www.newscientist.com/arti...), so maybe they exploit this.
    
    However, the best negotiator that I've known (and this guy was better than all the others, by a long shot) operated completely differently. When you met with him, he really didn't talk much. He would just ask you questions about what you wanted and listen really carefully. He would then follow up with more questions trying to get at how you felt about different possibilities or formulations of what you'd just told him. People like to talk about what they want and how they feel about it, so they will tend to go on about things if you let them, and he would just let them do that, all the while listening really carefully. By doing this, he'd gain this unusually detailed understanding about their core motivations and what they personally wanted, specifically, from a potential deal or in general (like, from life) as well as their disposition towards how offers would ideally be presented. He would then sort of go away for awhile and figure out how to structure the right deal given the resources/abilities at his (or his company's) disposal, and then present them with a deal. He didn't seem to need to "talk them into it" very much, the key seemed to be all about carefully using his data to get into their heads to find out what kind of deal would be most appealing to them.
    
    I personally had the experience of being interrogated (gently) by him once when I first met him, which I considered a non-threatening enough experience, and then later to have worked with him on the same side where he remarked on some of these things and I got to observe him in action. Later I put it all together and realized what he was doing with me the first time we met. I think what's most interesting to me is that he was so different from all the other guys and (I think as a result) far more effective.
    
    It also gives me hope, personally, that I can become a better negotiator, because I'm not really one of those endlessly blathering individuals (I can talk good, but not forever), but I am reasonably good when it comes to listening carefully.

Props

Books

Francis Bacon - Of Negotiating

• ~1600 - Francis Bacon - Of Negotiating
  • Felix Dennis quotes this in his chapter on negotiation in How to Get Rich.
  • Here's what he said broken into separated lines:
    
    • It is generally better to deal by speech than by letter; and by the mediation of a third than by a man’s self.
    • Letters are good, when a man would draw an answer by letter back again; or when it may serve for a man’s justification afterwards to produce his own letter; or where it may be danger to be interrupted, or heard by pieces.
    • To deal in person is good, when a man’s face breedeth regard, as commonly with inferiors; or in tender cases, where a man’s eye upon the countenance of him with whom he speaketh may give him a direction how far to go; and generally, where a man will reserve to himself liberty either to disavow or to expound.
      • NW: A related example I can think of for the first case ("when a man's face breedeth regard") is LBJ intimidating people by leaning over them.  It's not quite the same thing but it seems to be roughly the same idea.
    • In choice of instruments, it is better to choose men of a plainer sort, that are like to do that that is committed to them, and to report back again faithfully the success, than those that are cunning to contrive out of other men’s business somewhat to grace themselves, and will help the matter in report for satisfaction’ sake.
    • Use also such persons as affect [enjoy] the business wherein they are employed; for that quickeneth much; and such as are fit for the matter; as bold men for expostulation, fair-spoken men for persuasion, crafty men for inquiry and observation, froward [stubborn] and absurd [stupid] men for business that doth not well bear out [justify] itself.
    • Use also such as have been lucky, and prevailed before in things wherein you have employed them; for that breeds confidence, and they will strive to maintain their prescription.
    • It is better to sound a person with whom one deals afar off, than to fall upon the point at first; except you mean to surprise him by some short question.
    • It is better dealing with men in appetite, than with those that are where they would be.
    • If a man deal with another upon conditions, the start or first performance is all; which a man cannot reasonably demand, except either the nature of the thing be such, which must go before; or else a man can persuade the other party that he shall still need him in some other thing; or else that he be counted the honester man.
    • All practice [scheming] is to discover [reveal / do recon], or to work [manage / make use of / take advantage of recon].
    • Men discover themselves in trust, in passion, at unawares, and of necessity, when they would have somewhat done and cannot find an apt pretext.
      • Translation: People speak the truth when they trust the person they're speaking with, when they're emotional, when they don't recognize the situation as one in which they should lie, or when they need to reveal the information to get something done and no lie would work.
    • If you would work any man, you must either know his nature and fashions, and so lead him; or his ends, and so persuade him; or his weakness and disadvantages, and so awe him; or those that have interest in him, and so govern him.
    • In dealing with cunning persons, we must ever consider their ends, to interpret their speeches; and it is good to say little to them, and that which they least look for.
    • In all negotiations of difficulty, a man may not look to sow and reap at once; but must prepare business, and so ripen it by degrees.

Getting Past No by William Ury

********
Contents
********

***I. Getting Ready***

[[Overview: Breaking Through Barriers to Cooperation]]

Joint Problem-Solving
Five Barriers to Cooperation
i. Your reaction
ii. Their emotion
iii. Their position
iv. Their dissatisfaction
v. Their power
The Breakthrough Strategy

[[Prologue: Prepare, Prepare, Prepare]]

Mapping Out the Way to Agreement

1. Interests
Figure out your interests
Figure out their interests
2. Options
3. Standards
4. Alternatives
Identify your BATNA
Boost your BATNA
Decide if you should negotiate
Identify their BATNA
5. Proposals
What do you aspire to?
What would you be content with?
What could you live with?

Rehearse

Preparing to Navigate


***II. Using the Breakthrough Strategy***

1. Don't React: GO TO THE BALCONY

2. Don't Argue: STEP TO THEIR SIDE

3. Don't Reject: REFRAME

4. Don't Push: BUILD THEM A GOLDEN BRIDGE

5. Don't Escalate: USE POWER TO EDUCATE

***III. Turning Adversaries Into Partners***

Conclusion: Turning Adversaries Into Partners

Getting to Yes

• Summary
  • There's a summary of Getting to Yes in the book "Never Split the Difference":
    
    "Fisher and Ury's approach was basically to systematize problem solving so that negotiating parties could reach a mutually beneficial deal–the getting to 'Yes' in the title. Their core assumption was that the emotional brain–that animalistic, unreliable, and irrational beast–could be overcome through a more rational, joint problem-solving mindset.
    
    Their system was easy to follow and seductive, with four basic tenets. One, separate the person–the emotion–from the problem; two, don't get wrapped up in the other side's position (what they're asking for) but instead focus on their interests (why they're asking for it) so that you can find what they really want; three, work cooperatively to generate win-win options; and, four, establish mutually agreed-upon standards for evaluating those possible solutions."

********
Contents
********

***I. The Problem***

1. Don't Bargain Over Positions



***II. The Method***

2. Separate the People from the Problem
3. Focus on Interests, Not Positions
4. Invent Options for Mutual Gain
5. Insist on Using Objective Criteria



***III. Yes, But...***

6. What If They Are More Powerful?
(Develop Your BATNA--Best Alternative To a Negotiated Agreement)
7. What If They Won't Pay?
(Use Negotiation Jujitsu)
8. What If They Use Dirty Tricks?
(Taming the Hard Bargainer)



***IV. In Conclusion***



***V. Ten Questions People Ask About Getting to Yes***

1. "Does positional bargaining ever make sense?"

2. "What if the other side believes in a different standard of fairness?"

3. "Should I be fair if I don't have to be?"

4. "What do I do if the people are the problem?"

5. "Should I negotiate even with terrorists or someone like Hitler? When does it make sense not to negotiate?"

6. "How should I adjust my negotiating approach to account for differences of personality, gender, culture, and so on?"

7. "How do I decide things like 'Where should we meet?' 'Who should make the first offer?' and 'How high should I start?' "

8. "Concretely, how do I move from inventing options to making commitments?"

9. "How do I try out these ideas without taking too much risk?"

10. "Can the way I negotiate really make a difference if the other side is more powerful?" And "How do I enhance MY negotiating power?"

Never Split the Difference

• It's written by a former top FBI negotiator who has now opened his own negotiation consulting firm.
• recommended to me by Tucker C. from Upwork: "The biggest thing that helped me get my rate up was the book, Never Split the Difference, recommended to me by my fiancée".  But when I followed up and asked which of the many tips were most helpful, he couldn't seem to remember any of them: "Nothing too tactical, hard to remember those individually in the moment--I just remember to never split the difference lol. Do value pricing on what you actually think your services are worth (meaning, how valuable are your services), and don't budge. Oh, and there's never any consequences for not missing a "deadline," no such thing really. Always good to slow negotiations down."

The new rules

• Summary: He gives two anecdotes of him out-negotiating Harvard negotiators (one time it was professors, another time it was students) to demonstrate that the FBI's emotion-manipulation approach to negotiation is superior to the academic, intellectual, "Getting to Yes" approach.  He then relates how the FBI came to develop its negotiating capability after several disastrous hostage / stand-off situations, and that they had to transition from a Getting to Yes approach to the emotional approach because the intellectual approach wasn't working in hostage situations.  He briefly argues that learning this approach will help you in your everyday life.  He then gives a summary of what each chapter of the books discusses.

Be a mirror

• Summary:
  • avoid the assumptions that blind neophyte negotiators
  • use Active Listening techniques like
    • Mirroring
    • Silences
    • the Late-Night FM DJ Voice
  • slow things down
  • make your counterpart feel safe enough to reveal themselves
  • discern between wants (aspirations) and needs (the bare minimum for a deal)
  • laser-focus on what the other party has to say

Don't feel their pain, label it

• Summary:
  • recognize your counterpart's perspective and then gain trust and understanding through Labeling–that is, by repeating that perspective back to them.
  • defuse negative dynamics by bringing them into the open.
  • disarm your counterpart's complaints about you by speaking them aloud in an Accusation Audit.

Beware "Yes"--Master "No"

• Summary:
  • make your counterpart feel understood and positively affirmed in a negotiation in order to create an atmosphere of unconditional positive regard.
  • strive for 'That's right' instead of 'Yes' at every stage of a negotiation
  • identify, rearticulate, and emotionally affirm your counterpart's worldview with Summaries and Paraphrasing.
    • I don't understand how the "Summaries and Paraphrasing" is different from the "Labeling" mentioned in the chapter 3 summary.

Trigger the two words that immediately transform any negotiation

• Summary:
  • it's vitally important to get to 'No' because 'No' starts the negotiation.
  • step out of your ego and negotiate in your counterpart's world, the only way to achieve an agreement the other side will implement.
  • engage your counterpart by acknowledging their right to choose
  • an email technique that ensures that you'll never be ignored again.

Bend their reality

• Summary:
  • there are a variety of tools for framing a negotiation in such a way that your counterpart will unconsciously accept the limits you place on the discussion.
  • navigate deadlines to create urgency.
  • employ the idea of fairness to nudge your counterpart.
  • anchor their emotions so that not accepting your offer feels like a loss.

Create the illusion of control

• Summary:
  • Use Calibrated Questions, queries that begin with 'How?' or 'What?'.
    • By eliminating 'Yes' and 'No' answers they force your counterpart to apply their mental energy to solving your problems.

Guarantee execution

• Summary:
  • employ these Calibrated Questions to guard against failures in the implementation phase.
  • nonverbal communication is important.
  • use 'How' questions to gently say 'No'.
  • get your counterparts to bid against themselves.
  • influence the deal killers when they're not at the table.

Bargain hard

• Summary:
  • How to prepare.
  • How to dodge an aggressive counterpart.
  • How to go on the offensive.
  • How to use the Ackerman system used by the FBI for setting and making offers.

Find the black swan

• Summary:
  • In every negotiation there are between three and five pieces of information ("Black Swans") that, were they to be uncovered, would change everything.
  • You'll learn how to recognize the markers that show the Black Swan's hidden nest.
  • You'll learn simple tools for employing Black Swans to gain leverage over your counterpart.

How to Get Rich

The Art of Negotiating

• He opens the chapter with this proverb: "The fortress that parleys is already half taken".

The Balance of Weakness

• He disparages "highfalutin nonsense" that politicians have said about negotiation, giving a quote by JFK as an example.
• He also disparages "big fat books from US corporate management pundits".
• He gives this summary of his most-important points:
  • Most of us are rather poor negotiators.
  • Most negotiations are unnecessary.
  • 'The other side' is often just as smart (or stupid) as you are.
  • In the end, 'the balance of weakness' almost always decides the issue.
  • In Greed vs. Need, the former usually 'wins'.
• Most 'negotiations' are not negotiations at all; they're problem solving.
  • Examples of things that he does not consider "negotiating": "[whether an employee can leave early to pick up his kid from school], mid-level salary negotiations, most human-resource issues, job-title dickering, job-performance reviews and the price of wet fish"
  • This seems to be an explanation of his idea that "Most negotiations are unnecessary".

Management Bargaining vs. Serious Negotiations

• "Do not mistake serious negotiations with management bargaining. They require very different skills."
  • He then goes on a tangent discussing several things related to management but the motivating idea seems to be that the skills required for managing employees aren't the same as the skills required for extremely high-stakes negotiations (e.g. with potential acquirers).
• "Serious negotiations are very different from day-to-day bargaining and should be approached differently. They imply a weakness in the position of at least one of the parties involved in the negotiations, unlike day-to-day bargaining, where no such weakness need exist. The first thing to be done, perhaps the most vital thing, is to establish exactly where those weaknesses lie."
  • I don't understand why he thinks day-to-day bargaining doesn't involve weaknesses.
• He gives an example of how, in the UK, supermarket chains are able to out-negotiate farmers.
  • His analysis seems to suggest that the main issue is BATNA: the supermarkets have a good BATNA, the UK farmers don't.  I guess the farmers aren't allowed to bargain collectively?  I'm not sure what's going on.
• He then gives an example from the USA where a company that manufactured lawn mowers decided to pull their products from Wal-Mart rather than meet Wal-Mart's demands, because agreeing to Wal-Mart's demands would force them to make changes (lowering quality) that would give Wal-Mart even greater leverage over them in the future.
• He then relates how it's impossible to get a loan from a bank when you really need one and asserts this is an example of the balance of weakness working against you: "The balance of weakness is so obvious and utterly immediate, nobody will want to waste time listening to your entreaties".
  • I don't understand how this demonstrates the effect of the balance of weakness in negotiations, since presumably this would be a situation where the bank could charge enormous interest.  Loan sharks do this to poor people.  I think he's wrong here.  Maybe he had an outline where he had written "loans" as an example to discuss and then when it came time to flesh it out he called to mind the wrong situation.

The Elephant and the Flea

The Elephant Misjudges His Need

Another Elephant Comes to Call

A Few Tips on Negotiating

• There's a ton of great advice here.
• People tend to fill silences with jabber, often weakening their bargaining position as they do so.