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    How To Outnegotiate Anyone
    How To Outnegotiate Anyone
    How To Outnegotiate Anyone
    Ebook184 pages2 hours

    How To Outnegotiate Anyone

    By Leo Reilly

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Come out ahead when dealing with the IRS, lawyers, ex-spouses, and other potentially unpleasant people.
    How to Outnegotiate Anyone shows:
    • Why you should never disclose your deadline
    • How to get the other side engaged and into a positive mindset
    • When to deadlock (and when not to)
    • How to tell the real final offer from the not-so-final offer
    • And much more!
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster
    Release dateAug 1, 1997
    ISBN9781440501968
    How To Outnegotiate Anyone

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      Book preview

      How To Outnegotiate Anyone - Leo Reilly

      Introduction

      Why You Should Never Take a Win-Win Negotiating Book onto a Car Lot

      For 15 years, it was my job to negotiate for people. As a trial lawyer, I negotiated everything from the selling price of a business, to the payment plans a debtor would undertake in bankruptcy. I negotiated the mergers of businesses, the dissolution of partnerships, and how much audited taxpayers would pay to the IRS. And, like almost every lawyer or businessperson I have ever met, I did this with no formal instruction on how to negotiate. My entire experience was basically limited to trial-and-error and an occasional seminar that tended to raise more questions than it answered. Negotiating is a fundamental business skill, yet most of us are ignorant of how to handle the most basic negotiations. Even people who are known as professional negotiators are usually just as ignorant of the process. The negotiations between Eastern Airlines and the mechanics union (discussed in chapter 3) prove that even the most tested and experienced negotiators can make mistakes with disastrous consequences, mistakes that were easy to avoid but embarrassingly predictable. Today, largely because of these mistakes, Eastern Airlines no longer exists and the airline's mechanics have lost their jobs.

      The fact is, Americans do not know how to negotiate. This is especially true when it comes to bargaining the price and terms of a product, whether the parties involved are well-paid businesspersons running corporations or homeowners negotiating the sale of their residence. Our inability to effectively bargain is not the result of our being less intelligent as the Japanese or less street smart as the Irainians, as some would have us believe. Rather, it is the result of a basic condition.

      Americans, more than any other people in the world, live in a highly industrialized consumer-oriented society. Other nations may be richer than us (on a per capita basis Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, and a dozen other oil-rich nations are wealthier), or more industrialized (Japan's infrastructure is arguably superior to ours in many respects), but no other nation is so thoroughly oriented to the consumer, or has been for such a long period of time. We have the luxury of being able to purchase standardized goods at standardized prices. In fact, the hallmark of a highly industrialized society is this push to standardize everything. For example, if you walk into a grocery store to purchase a box of com flakes, you will notice that all brands come in similarly sized boxes, and their quality is fairly consistent. Furthermore, when you check their various prices, you will notice they are all priced within a narrow price range. So when you get to the check-out, the price is non-negotiable, because there is really nothing left to negotiate. The price and quality of this product (along with its package size and bulk weight) have already been negotiated for you at the manufacturing and distribution levels.

      The advantages of not having to constantly negotiate price in a modern industrialized society are substantial: First, because we purchase products in a free enterprise economy that rewards competition, we are able to get the best products at the best price the market will bear. The price we pay is not determined by our skill as a negotiator. Second, we need not spend time participating in the negotiating process. We are able to simply purchase the goods we want and go home to do other things we find more rewarding or interesting.

      The major disadvantage, however, is that when we do need to negotiate a price we don't know how. Only in highly developed societies do we find that most people are uncomfortable with the negotiating process and are anxious to get it over with as quickly as possible.

      Contrast this with someone who lives in a lesser developed society. While I lived in London, I had a friend named Peter who was Nigerian. Peter used to tell me stories about his family life in a small village located several hours outside of Lagos, Nigeria. Once a month, they would all go to market to sell the produce or livestock they had raised and, at the same time, purchase provisions to live on. At the agrarian marketplace, everything is negotiable — produce, clothing or fabric, furniture, jewelry, and livestock — because the buyer is purchasing each item directly from the manufacturer. Standardization is out of the question; in the agrarian marketplace, quality varies from product to product, making each one somewhat unique and different from the others. Individuals in the marketplace, then, negotiate the price of each item according to its individual merits. It's a way of life for these societies, but the negotiating skill is tremendously important outside the marketplace, too. It's little wonder why our professional negotiators did such a poor job in dealing with the Iranian government during and after the hostage crisis. After all, the most important political and social institutions in Iran are the bazaars, where negotiations are the nucleus of activities.

      As such, the purpose of this book is not to instruct you in the skill of conflict resolution, or win-win negotiating. How to Outnegotiate Anyone focuses on the type of negotiating we call bargaining. Certainly, win-win negotiating is a valuable tool to resolving conflicts inside your company, your marriage, your community or your nation, but I would never recommend taking a win-win negotiating book onto a car lot or into a middle eastern bazaar. Chances are, they would take you to the proverbial cleaners if you did! There are a number of similarities between win-win and bargaining in the approach one takes to the negotiation process; being patient, knowing your needs, and maintaining a positive attitude are all essential characteristics of the effective negotiator in any situation, not just bargaining. However, one of the fundamental problems with using a win-win approach is that it generally requires a cooperative attitude from the other side. What happens if the other side doesn't elect to play along? What if their entire strategy is win-lose? In fact, this is precisely the attitude many people have when they are negotiating the purchase or sale of any item that has a significant impact on them in terms of cost or benefit.

      In fact, mastering the art of bargaining is essential if you are going to successfully maneuver in those settings where bargaining is inevitably going to occur, such as buying a product or negotiating a contract. And it is my firm conviction that this process can be learned.

      Bargaining effectively is relatively easy to do. You do not need any innate talent, special skills, or ability to argue effectively or to eloquently present positions in order to negotiate effectively. In fact, the bargaining process can be mastered by simply paying attention to certain fundamentals and applying them consistently.

      The problem with the bargaining process is that there are many serious misconceptions about it. People tend to think that bargaining is a process of winning through intimidation, that it is a difficult process to master, or that a fair outcome or an improved relationship with the other side cannot be achieved. It is even argued from time to time that the bargaining process is fundamentally irrational and destructive. These arguments could not be further from the truth.

      Bargaining does not have to be, and should not be, destructive to relationships. Indeed, if you are a successful negotiator, you have the ability to bargain effectively for price and terms while, at the same time, creating a positive relationship with the other side. The entire first chapter of this book shows why this is essential to your success and how it can be accomplished.

      Bargaining is also not a fundamentally irrational process. It is only as irrational as we allow it to be. That is why this text pays particular attention to important decision-making skills, such as setting bottom lines, knowing when to deadlock, how to make an opening offer, and how to set and realize negotiating goals.

      It is my hope that this book will enable you to master the bargaining process instead of being afraid of it.

      One

      The Power of Patience

      If You Absolutely, Positively Have to Have Something Today, Buy It Tomorrow

      Have you ever see that cartoon where some poor soul is crawling on his belly across the Sahara Desert calling out, Water! Water! Imagine you owned the only oasis for the next three hundred miles. Needless to say, this is not a person you would take seriously if he tried to negotiate the price of a bottle of Perrier. This is one person who is willing to pay full price.

      Unfortunately, most buyers are like this fellow, willing to pay full-price because they urgently need the particular item. They get an impulse, and they act on it as if they were without a bottle of water in the desert. It's called impulse buying, and sellers love it. Impulse buyers are the mother's milk of car lots and stereo stores.

      The sad fact is, impulse buyers perpetually suffer from another buyer's disease called buyer's remorse. Buyer's remorse usually happens when the buyer buys something he doesn't need. High pressure sales that lead to buyer's remorse have gotten so bad, many states now have cool down laws to protect car buyers from their own lack of patience.

      Impatient negotiators are likely to reveal their bottom line early, make the opening offer unnecessarily, make poor opening offers, capitulate to intimidation or pressure tactics, make unnecessary concessions, and always pay too much — often without negotiating. Ironically, this attitude, which a seller can smell a mile away, usually has the effect of hardening the seller. Instead of causing negotiations to conclude quickly, the result is the seller heings in there and becomes even more demanding.

      Patient negotiators look confident, relaxed, and in control. They compare prices, determine if they really need a particular product and they always require justification for any concessions the sellers request. As such, they find it easier to control the process because they are not as anxious to close a deal. Car dealers, bank loan officers, sales and marketing personnel, building contractors, and others know this. As such, they generally do whatever they can to discover when or how you are likely to lose patience. Intimidation tactics, negotiating against your deadline, emotional outbursts, good guy-bad guy, and other assorted tactics are usually used with this in mind.

      Be patient! Take your time! As an old trial lawyer friend of mine once said, If you feel that you have to strike while the iron is hot, you are about to get your hands burned.

      If You Insist On Having It Today, Know What You Want And Be Prepared to Pay For It

      Know What You Want…

      Recently, I was talking with a client who owns a string of fast food outlets in California. At the end of his fiscal year, he totaled up his sales and analyzed them. To nobody's surprise, one of the most successful tactics used by his employees was to ask the following question at the end of each order: Would you like fries (or an apple turnover) with that order? In over twenty percent of all cases, the answer was affirmative. The total increase in sales resulting from this question had a significant

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