Thanks also go to the extraordinarily committed people who work at the Institute, including those who made special contributions to this revision: Todd Lenhart, Michael Blackstone, and Jeff Cochran. My friend and counsel, Michael Maas, our intern, Matt Legg, and my executive assistant, Kim Talbott, eased the burden of accomplishing the task through an array of contributions made by each of them. Andres Lares's and Samer Jassar's technology skills helped make the end product more contemporary.
I appreciate the efforts of my editor, Shannon Vargo, whose gentle guidance and belief in this revision inspired its publication. I also want to thank members of Shannon's team, Elizabeth Gildea and Deborah Schindlar, and my agent, Joe Spieler, for their support.
The editorial advice of Joann Davis and the legal guidance of Arthur Levine were given out of friendship and were crucial to bringing about the end product.
Introduction
Why Change What Works?
It's what you learn after you know it all that counts.
After you write a book about negotiation, and it turns out that, yes, it works in the real world – enables people to get what they want more often, facilitates deals and partnerships, ends stalemates, heals wounds – why change it at all, why rewrite it, why update it? Because Harry Truman was right. Because in practicing what I preach, in teaching, in one after another real-life experiences, my approach evolved, was refined, got better, and became even more effective.
“Ron, can you help the new head of the Department of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins negotiate the terms of his deal? He knows everything about the human mind but could use some help to change minds in this situation.”
“Mr. Shapiro, you don't know me but I am a freelance web designer who feels I have been subjected to a fee–double standard compared to male counterparts. I'd like to raise my hourly rate....”
“I've been named sales manager for the Network and I want to hone my skills at selling our sponsors and not discounting our rates.”
“I'm a Deputy Fire Chief for Baltimore City and I have to make the case for the firehouse renovation program to a bunch of high-powered business leaders and I'm intimidated… What do I do?”
“Ron, we have the opportunity to join the Big Ten. Can you help us negotiate our way in?”
“Pops, I have a problem with a friend and Mom said, ‘talk to your grandfather.’”
In responding to these situations and countless others, I practiced and imparted the Power of Nice. But in each case the Power of Nice evolved, the tools were sharpened, the outcomes enhanced. Moreover, whether because of feelings of inferiority due to gender, age, culture, or experience, people who found themselves disadvantaged in negotiations, who felt they lacked power, utilized our systematic approach and became empowered. And, amazingly enough, there were successful negotiators who gained a whole new sense of empowerment by being systematic.
And in the course of those negotiations, and reflecting afterward, I continued to learn, and this book now reflects that learning. For example, the concept of WIN–win, or Big Win–Little win, is modified to “maximizing your win” – you get the maximum you can achieve at the time, but the other side doesn't leave the table in defeat.
What used to be the Preparation Planner is now the Preparation Checklist. It's a more streamlined, two-step system – Information Gathering Steps and Action Planning Steps – that facilitate the preparation process. Additionally within the Checklist, items such as the importance of knowing your bottom line, or, as described in the Checklist, your Walkaway, receive new emphasis. Also, the practice of Scripting has emerged to be so important to negotiation, with so much influence over outcomes, that it is now a step unto itself.
In this new version of the book, you will find some older stories updated, some older ideas modified, and some brand new stories and anecdotes that illustrate and teach today's Power of Nice. The systematic approach has evolved and, in total, is even more effective in more situations, more challenges, in more aspects of business and life. You will see the system at work. Most of all, you will find more than power; you will find empowerment. And nothing is nicer.
“We're going to try to negotiate first.”
Dana Fradon © 1992 from The New Yorker Collection. All Rights Reserved.
Chapter 1
Negotiation
Let us never fear to negotiate. But let us never negotiate out of fear.
Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.
“I'll Burn That Bridge When I Come to It”
Early in my career, I had a law partner who loved his work. He was smart. He knew the law. He always had his clients' best interests at heart. And he liked nothing better than the challenge of negotiation. He had no fear of the other side. In fact, he relished confrontation. He paced outside a conference room like a blitzing linebacker. He had that same hungry look in his eyes, pacing and revving himself up for the kill. He couldn't wait to charge in and nail the quarterback (or the other lawyer) to the Astroturf (or the deal he was after). If a few bones were broken along the way, so be it…or so much the better.
He often got what he and his client wanted. But he only got it once. Nobody wanted or could afford to deal with him twice because he left nothing on the table. Winner take all. Why take a share of the profit when you can take all of it? Why have investors when you can have sole control? Why pay commissions? Why give concessions to a union when you can break the union? Why not squeeze all suppliers to rock bottom? Why not drive all offers up to the last dollar? Why negotiate when you can dictate? My partner literally destroyed the other side, and he reveled in it.
One day he strutted out of yet another of his “eat-the-opposition-for-lunch” meetings, fresh blood dripping from his teeth, having dismembered yet another adversary in the name of dealmaking. Instead of congratulating him, I asked him a question that took him by surprise. “What did the other side want?”
He looked at me with a combination of curiosity at my naiveté and astonishment at the irrelevance of the question. “I don't know, but they didn't get it,” he answered.
I persisted, “Maybe they could have gotten what they wanted and you could have gotten what you wanted. What would have been wrong with that?”
Then he sighed like a wise old tobacco-chewing veteran and laid it out for the rookie who just didn't understand how to play the game. “Don't you get it? We won.”
“Yeah,” I protested, “but what if, some time in the future, the tables turn and the other side gains the upper hand and then they're in a position to change the deal?”
That's when my wise old veteran partner put his arm around me, took a long, dramatic pause, and said, “I'll burn that bridge when I come to it.” That wasn't just his snappy comeback. He meant it. It was the embodiment of his negotiation philosophy.
That's the way a lot of people look at negotiation. Two S.O.B.s locked in a room trying to beat the daylights out of each other and may the biggest S.O.B. win. Even way back then, I thought there was a better way to make deals.
Over the years I practiced and perfected what made sense and worked for me: You can be “a nice guy” and still get what you're after. In fact, embracing the systematic approach of this book gives you