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© Copyright 2007
Lindsay Sherwin
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Negotiating Overview
What makes a good negotiator? There have been a number of studies in
this area, two important ones being carried out by Professor Gerald R
Williams who specialised in legal negotiating and Neil Rackham of the
Huthwaite Research Group who focussed on sales negotiating.
The table below summarises their main findings, more details of which
are included below and also under
Negotiating - Planning and
Negotiating - Behaviours.
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Summary
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Negotiating Styles
There are two broad negotiating
styles which Williams labelled as "Cooperative problem-solvers"
versus "Competitive adversarials".
The key conclusion of his
study was clear. A Cooperative problem solving approach is
generally far more effective than a Competitive Adversarial
approach. Cooperative problem-solvers
were more likely to be rated
as "effective" or even as "average".
97% of Cooperative problem-solvers got positive reviews as opposed to the
67% of the
competitive adversarial negotiators. |
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Neil Rackham
Neil Rackham studied effective and
non-effective negotiators from two aspects; Planning &
Preparation (see
Negotiating
- Planning) and Negotiating Behaviour (see
Negotiating - Behaviours). |
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Effective negotiators use Stages.
Six typical negotiation stages are:
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Stage 1: Preparation
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Stage 2: Relationship Building
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Stage 3: Exchanging Task Related Information
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Stage 4: Persuading
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Stage 5: Making Concessions
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Stage 6: Reaching Agreement
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| 2 |
Effective negotiators prepare and plan well.
Not just the basics like location, timing,
and attendance; but particularly looking at the issues, options,
common ground, differences, settlement ranges, and best
approaches. See Preparation. |
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Effective Negotiators use ranges
Each side has a range of positions in mind -
sometimes called the
settlement zone, sometimes described as "Fallback - Realistic -
Ideal).
One other indicator of expert flexibility is that
expert negotiators approach the negotiation table with these ranges in mind.
Average negotiators don’t. They have a fixed figure in their head and if
they don’t get that figure they have, by definition, failed.
Expert
negotiators come to the negotiation table
prepared to craft a wise outcome that meets the long and short-term
interests of the parties, an agreement that will last the tests of time.
They know that standing in cement will not help them move.
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| 4 |
Effective Negotiators face negotiation as a problem solving event
Unlike many an ineffective negotiator who views
the Other as either a friend to be won over or as an adversary to be
beaten, effective cooperative negotiators focus their energies first and
foremost on solving the problem that got their clients to the
negotiation table in the first place. Hence, the effective cooperative
asks at all times, "How will what I am proposing solve the problem?
Sometimes called Principled Negotiation. |
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Effective Negotiators focus first on building common ground
Average negotiators, even when they focus on the
problem that brings them to the negotiation table, address their
differences first. Expert negotiators do not, choosing instead to
identify common ground. They recognize human realities.
This is the approach that Senator George Mitchell
reportedly took when facilitating the negotiation in Northern Ireland.
Well aware that all parties were deeply entrenched in their positions,
the Senator spent the first year of the negotiations helping each party
recognize the humanity of the other. People ate dinner together, went to
each other’s children’s sporting events, saw movies and discussed them,
and through this process they learned how very much all parties had in
common. This permitted them to reframe their argument from one of sheer
power politics to one of shared economic interdependency, embedding
their future across-the-table negotiations deeply in common ground.
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| 6 |
Effective Negotiators do not fear differences
Experts do not pretend common ground exists when
there isn’t any and they don’t hide show-stoppers when there is one.
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| 7 |
Effective Negotiators behave effectively in
negotiations
They employ the sort of interpersonal behaviours that lead to
successful outcomes. Some behaviours help the negotiating process,
others inhibit it. Those adopting "pulling" behaviours were more
effective than those using "pushing" behaviours. Rackham covered this
fully and the results are summarised in
Skilled
Negotiators 2. |
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Effective Negotiators manage the need for both assertiveness
and empathy
One of the hardest things for law students to
learn is that, if they want to be effective cooperative negotiators,
they need to be both assertive about the interests of their client and
empathetic to the interests of the Other. Failure at either makes
reaching a negotiated agreement all the harder.
- Without assertiveness,
the Other can never fully appreciate the needs of your client.
- Without
empathy, you can never fully understand the needs of the Other, and
without that knowledge you will always be unsure what to concede, what
to propose, and what to shy away from.
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In the early eighties, Professor Gerald R.
Williams asked negotiators, after a negotiation, to rank the Other,
their goals and their attributes. The Other being those they were in
negotiation with.
- Sixty-five percent of the negotiators were reported to
be cooperative problem-solvers.
Of these 38 percent were rated "effective", 59 percent were
rated as "average", and only 3 percent were rated "ineffective".
- Twenty-four percent competitive adversarials.
Of these 25 percent were rated as "effective", 42 percent were rated
as "average", but 33 percent were judged as "ineffective".
- Eleven percent could not be readily classified.
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The key conclusion is clear. Cooperative problem-solvers
were more likely to be perceived
as "effective" or even as "average" with ninety-seven percent of them
getting positive reviews as opposed to the sixty-seven percent of the
competitive adversarial negotiators.
Rackham
For this insight we have to turn to
one of the first studies where trained observers actually sat in on
negotiations and measured what the negotiators were doing, before and
during the negotiation, to reach settlements that would stand the tests
of time. These researchers, led by Neil Rackham, found that expert
negotiators plan and communicate differently than average negotiators
-the difference is measurable; it can be learned.
Rackham defined experts as negotiators who
- routinely came to agreement;
- shaped agreements that were routinely
implemented successfully; and
- who left the negotiation table with the
Other willing to negotiate with them again.
Average negotiators lacked
one or more of the three measures. For example, some could come to
agreement, but their agreements were not always successfully
implemented. Others could come to agreement, but their Other did not
want to negotiate again.
The detailed results are tabulated in
Skilled Negotiators 1
and Skilled negotiators
2.
All research into this field indicates that:
- A Cooperative problem solving approach is
generally far more effective than a Competitive Adversarial
approach.
- Preparation works.
Effective problem-solving cooperatives enter the
negotiation with a whole lot of strategic and tactical thinking already
done, so they can react flexibly and concentrate on listening with the
goal of understanding. They know what they very much need and what
concessions they can readily make. They even recognize what can do them
in and they have thought of clever and credible ways to undermine those
weaknesses in the eyes of the Other, maybe even turning them into
strengths in the process. They have even thought through settlement
options just as thoroughly.
Why so much emphasis on preparation? Because as
Rackham’s findings proved, they who prepare best, most
deeply and most broadly, usually "win." They get their clients'
interests met. Solid preparation provides the
problem-solving negotiator with:
- A better understanding
of the problem facing them.
- They know the strengths and weaknesses of
their perspective as well as those of the Other.
- It also gives them a
game plan that permits them to set their perspective aside and listen
understandingly, especially for new information, and respond
empathetically to the Other.
Experts base their starting, target, and
reservation points and their concessions on a solid grasp of the
strengths and weaknesses of their case and that of the Other, as well as
on a broad and deep mastery of the contours of the market and a nuanced
appreciation of the short and long-term value their client brings to the
table. And they do not do it alone. They do it with their client, as
legal ethics make clear the shape of any settlement is for the client to
determine.
Before they involve their client in their
estimations though, experts repeat the same thinking, this time from the
vantage of the Other. They know that the Other is going through the same
exercise in an effort to set their settlement box. So the expert stands
in their shoes, trying to figure out with whatever information they have
what the Other’s starting point, target point, and resistance point may
be, for armed with that knowledge, the expert can knowingly advise their
client what a good settlement may look like.
How do they do that? They take the information
they have collected and tested to the extent that any information
unilaterally devised can be tested - and lay it out as follows:
Note: Alternative descriptions of the three positions are :
- Ideal Outcome for Starting Point
- Realistic Outcome for Target Point
- Fall-back Position for Resistance Point
It is the area that lies between the two
resistance points (or fall-back positions) that is of most interest to them, for within this area
both parties can find room to settle.
- Are the resistance points close to
each other and the settlement zone tight? Could be problematic if both
parties hold on to their guns; everyone will get shot. However, if
counsel can maintain their heads, they can point out that the costs of
walking away probably exceed the costs of getting closer.
- Are the
resistance points spread? Now is the time to start thinking creatively
with the goal of not just closing the gap, but of creating value in the
process.
Experts communicate specially, transmitting
information in a way that will allow it to be received
When Rackham sat in on negotiations, he measured discrete communication
behaviours that fell into three primary categories:
- Initiating
- Making a Proposal
- Building on the Proposals of Another
- Reacting
- Supporting
- Disagreeing
- Defending/Attacking
- Clarifying
- Testing for Understanding
- Summarizing
- Seeking Information
- Giving Information
Also noted were two additional behaviours observed
mostly in group interactions: bringing in, that is soliciting input; and
shutting out, that is interrupting, cutting off and the like.
Some negotiators relied primarily on Proposing,
Giving Information, and Shutting Out to get across their ideas. Others
used those three behaviours in part, but relied mostly on Building on the
Proposal of Another, Testing for Understanding, and Seeking Information
to persuade.
The difference was so measurable that Rackham could
classify the two respectively as "Pushers" and "Pullers." Both types of
persuaders enjoyed successes, but the expert negotiators most often fell
into the Puller category. These negotiators used communication
behaviours
to help the Other persuade themselves. In other words, if there were any
persuading to be done of the Other, the Other was the one who was helped
to do it.
Unconvinced about the value of Pulling? Let’s
return to the data. Research shows that twenty percent of an expert
negotiators' behaviour revolves around using questions; they seek
information from the Other nearly three times more often than the
average negotiator. Ten percent of their behaviour has them testing for
understanding more than twice as often as the average negotiator. That
means at least fully a third of their behaviours involve pulling. When
they do make statements, some 8 percent of their behaviour involves
summarizing what they heard the other say. And they use this
summarizing, a clarifying technique, nearly twice as often as the
average negotiator. Putting those percentages all together, some forty
percent of expert negotiators' behaviour involves clarifying the other’s
thinking twice as much as average negotiators' behaviour.
Why do expert negotiators rely so heavily on
questions and other clarifying behaviours? For many reasons. Perhaps the
most compelling is that questions help you persuade the Other. Test it
out in the quiet of your home. Try to alter your significant other’s
behaviour by telling him (or her) what to do.
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Listening