My takeaways from Negotiations Workshop with Berkeley Professor
Yana shares her feedback and insights from the Negotiations Workshop with Holly Schroth
I spend roughly 70% of my time at work in meetings (let’s put aside the question of when I actually do my work for now) while being an introvert by nature. Given this and the fact that literally all my meetings are around finding common ground and prioritisation with other teams and stakeholders, negotiations are important. The tricky part about negotiations, though, is that you can’t simply master it in a four week course - it’s not a skill per se, but rather a helping tool that can improve your other skills, and thus requires constant focus and brushing up. So whenever there’s a negotiations workshop or training, sign me up!
A few weeks back, I attended the communication workshop featuring Berkeley Professor Holly Schroth. The workshop focused on communication and negotiation tactics vital for the day-to-day work of a product manager. Overall, I’d score it to 3 out of 5, mainly because it was designed for the audience with no background in negotiations. However, I’ve taken some useful insights for myself as well. Here are my main takeaways:
Take Social Psychology into Account
Communication skills include both what is said during a social interaction and how it is said. So whenever you conduct negotiations, try to apply social psychology knowledge and tactics to turn a competitive mode of negotiation into a cooperative one and avoid behaviours that shut the other party down. This includes tone of voice, facial expressions and body language, and even choice of words. For example, studies show that the confidence level associated with various agreeing words substantially differs depending on the cohort of employees you’re talking to. A simple word like “sure” translates into 50-100% agreement if you are talking to marketers and sales, 30-100% agreement for technical cohorts (e.g. engineers and tech leaders), and 0-95% agreement if you are talking to Gen Z. And even when the person on the other side says something like “100%, let’s do this”, it’s almost never 100% agreement.
As a non-native English speaker I personally use “sure” quite often when I mean 100% agreement. This observation in the workshop made me think of finding a better word to use moving forward!
Prepare Your AP and RP
Preparation is the most important aspect of being a good negotiator. Before entering negotiations, always prepare your Aspirational Point (AP) and Resistance Point (RP). The AP contains the value packages for you and your opponent and answers the question: “What do I/they want?” It must be optimistic but realistic. The RP describes the non-acceptable terms of negotiation and answers the question: “When do I/they walk away?” Never reveal your RP in negotiations!
According to Pr. Schroth, the biggest mistake people make in preparation is not taking the other side’s perspective. To be a good negotiator, you have to do that. I’ve read about this tactic long ago, and always use it since then when preparing for negotiations. It helps a lot to find mutual benefits with the other party, and craft your “crawl-walk-run” plan.
Always Leave the Door Open
If the final offer is below your RP, it’s time to walk away, but with the door open. Even if you weren’t able to reach an agreement in this negotiation round, never burn bridges, as the opportunity might come in the future. Put your emotions aside, and focus on building trust. Instead of being strict and assertive, you can simply say, “Let’s stay in touch and explore some opportunities in the future.” You never know what comes ahead!
2 cents from Dina
Yana’s takeaways intuitively make sense, however, applying them in practice is hard and I believe day-to-day communication is more reactive rather than proactive. To me this means that in the moment it’s easy to be caught off guard when explaining point of view or negotiating and understanding what can be beneficial for both sides.
I really liked the Aspiration Point and Resistance Point preparation. This comes handy during offer/salary negotiations or vendor negotiations. As I mentioned, I think it’s harder to apply this in daily work, however I believe this can be trained and it is something I personally need to start working on.