{"id":1055,"date":"2019-03-06T10:00:42","date_gmt":"2019-03-06T10:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/?p=1055"},"modified":"2025-07-01T17:20:22","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T17:20:22","slug":"a-few-guidelines-for-negotiating-successfully","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/a-few-guidelines-for-negotiating-successfully\/","title":{"rendered":"A Few Guidelines for Negotiating Successfully"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Jack Kaine is an expert negotiator.\u00a0 He has written about negotiation, given speeches about it, and he has taught it at Stanford.\u00a0 He reminds us that the people sitting at a union bargaining table are not the only people who negotiate.\u00a0 We all negotiate.\u00a0 Every day.\u00a0 We negotiate with employees over pay, benefits, working conditions, and a host of other issues.\u00a0 We negotiate with vendors and with customers.\u00a0 We negotiate with our spouse and kids about where we\u2019ll go on vacation, who does what around the house, and who gets the car on Saturday night.\u00a0 We negotiate with our friends about where we\u2019ll meet for dinner.\u00a0 So negotiating is a life skill, but a skill that some of us are better at than others.\u00a0 If you suspect that your own negotiating skills are not what they could be, and if you believe some expert tips from Jack Kaine might help you up your game, please continue reading below.<\/p>\n<p><strong>A Few Guidelines for Negotiating Successfully<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>First, according to Kaine, most people think negotiating and bargaining are just two different names for the same activity.\u00a0 Wrong.\u00a0 Bargaining is a zero-sum game, and as such, it\u2019s competitive.\u00a0 One of us it going to win, the other is going to lose.\u00a0 Negotiating, on the other hand, is not competitive, it\u2019s cooperative . . . particularly when there is a symbiotic relationship whereby the parties depend upon one another.\u00a0 In those circumstances, each party has more to\u00a0gain by negotiating than not negotiating.<\/p>\n<p>That said, here are some pearls of negotiating wisdom from Jack Kaine.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Be the first to speak. That gives you an opportunity to set the tone for the negotiation that\u2019s about to begin.\u00a0 Try to use words and body language that will promote openness, cooperation, and trust.\u00a0 If the negotiation opens in an atmosphere that is adversarial, it will be very difficult to get it back onto a positive track.<\/li>\n<li>If you want to be the best negotiator in the room, be the best listener. In the end, you need to understand what the other side is trying to do and how they\u2019re trying to do it better than they understand it themselves. You\u2019ll only get that by being a great listener. Not only will you learn something about what the other side wants, but since you\u2019re listening and not speaking, you won\u2019t be able to say anything that might get you in trouble.<\/li>\n<li>Don\u2019t argue. Arguing will only cause each side to get defensive and to solidify its position.\u00a0 Instead, ask questions, lots and lots of clarifying questions aimed at understanding where the other side is coming from.<\/li>\n<li>Don\u2019t negotiate with yourself. Kaine asks you to imagine proofreading your proposal before entering a negotiation.\u00a0 You get to the last page, look at the price that\u2019s there, and say to yourself, \u201cThis is nuts!\u00a0 They\u2019ll never accept that.\u201d\u00a0 So you redo the proposal to reduce the price.\u00a0 You just negotiated with yourself.\u00a0 You made a concession that the other side will never appreciate because they didn\u2019t know about it, they never asked for it, and they didn\u2019t have to lift a finger to get it.<\/li>\n<li>Never make a concession without getting something in return. If you make a concession without getting anything in return, you will damage whatever trust may have existed between the parties.\u00a0 You will send a message that you were trying to cheat by asking for something that you didn\u2019t really need.\u00a0 For example, if the other side asks for a lower price, don\u2019t just cave in and give it to them.\u00a0 Instead, say something like, \u201cYes, we can meet the price you\u2019re asking for, but then we won\u2019t be able to provide free delivery as specified in our proposal.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>We want the outcome of a negotiation to last, to have staying power, but that will only happen if both sides get something they want. Work to understand the other guy\u2019s motivation.\u00a0 If you don\u2019t understand what he wants and why he wants it, how can you put together a proposal that he will accept?\u00a0 There has to be mutual gain.\u00a0 Both parties don\u2019t necessarily have to gain equally, but they each do have to gain something they want.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In summary, do not let a negotiation be come a competition.\u00a0 It should be an open and honest exploration of what each side is trying to accomplish, and a commitment by both parties to get everybody as much of what they want as possible.\u00a0 Only in very rare cases do both parties to a negotiation get everything they want.\u00a0 But still, they will consider the negotiation a success if they feel they got more through negotiation than they would have gotten otherwise.<\/p>\n<p>If you want to hear Jack Kaine himself discussing this stuff, just go to YouTube and search for him.\u00a0 You\u2019ll find quite a few of his clips posted there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jack Kaine is an expert negotiator.\u00a0 He has written about negotiation, given speeches about it, and he has taught it at Stanford.\u00a0 He reminds us that the people sitting at a union bargaining table are not the only people who negotiate.\u00a0 We all negotiate.\u00a0 Every day.\u00a0 We negotiate with employees over pay, benefits, working conditions,<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/a-few-guidelines-for-negotiating-successfully\/\">Read More\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[39,36,34,25],"tags":[94,131],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1055"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1055"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1055\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1056,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1055\/revisions\/1056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}