Negotiating in Business

The title of the first podcast I watched was “Entrepreneurship – Part 7: Negotiation”.  The speaker was Jake with The Voluntary Life.  The first concept he covered was the importance of writing everything down in a negotiation.  He believes that negotiations will be more fluid the more you write down so you have an account of everything that happened in the meeting.  He also discussed how important it is to state how you conduct business up front, so there is no miscommunication later.  Laying everything out on the table in the beginning of the negotiation is imperative.  This particular podcast discusses the BATNA as well.  Jake believes that your BATNA is effective in the event that the negotiation fails.  He referred to Getting to Yes when he said, “What determines the fundamental dynamics of a negotiation is your BATNA”. (Jake, The Voluntary Life) He goes on to discuss other topics such as, objective standards and win-win agreements.  What I took away from the podcast was that having a BATNA is critical in a negotiation. I will apply this in my future negotiations in my career by always having a backup plan just in case things to go as planned in my business.

            In the second podcast, entitled “Hardball Negotiating Tactics: Why They Work &How They Can Fail So Badly”, speaker Max Factor III, Esq., Factor Meditation & Arbitration, discusses topics relevant to the ones we’ve discussed in class.  He brings up persuasion tactics, psychological tactics, etc.  One thing that stood out to me was when Mr. Factor said, “One of the top recommended tactics to get a confession was to exploit a relationship of trust by being a good guy when you find out an emotional weakness of an individual, while the other person is on the other side of the issue…you can get them to say exactly what you want.” (Max Factor III, Esq., Factor Meditation & Arbitration) This is one of the interrogation tactics that police use when negotiating with criminals; the good guy bad guy routine.  This is one of the dirty tricks that can be used in a negotiation and Mr. Factor really lays it all out.  I learned that hardball tactics can be effective if that is how you like to negotiate, but if not, then use the best tactics that work for you without compromising your morals and values.  I will apply this style of negotiating in my future business only as a last resort.  I like to be fairer in negotiations rather than use psychological tactics, lies, or pressure to get what I want.

            The last podcast I watched was called “How to Negotiate So Everyone Wins,Especially You” and it relates to mutual benefit.  The speaker, Ronald M. Shapiro, discussed topics such as, getting what you want out of a negotiation, but still keeping good relationships, being concerned about the clients’ needs by listening, and the 3 P’s: Prepare, Probe, & Propose.  He also wrote a book entitled, The Power of Nice: How to Negotiate So Everyone Wins – Especially You!  During the video, Ronald asks this really great question, “Are there ways, when we’re dealing with conflict and we’re dealing with differences between people that we can come up with something that is not of great value, but it is important to someone and allows us to resolve something?” (Ronald M. Shapiro) I thoroughly enjoyed that question because he looks beyond facts and figures in a negotiation and really looks at the underlying interests of both parties and goes after those.  I learned a lot from this podcast, like how important it is to ensure that both parties, no matter what, benefit from the negotiation and that someone’s underlying interests can be more important, at times, than just the numbers and the money.  I will definitely take advice from Ronald in my future business affairs by ensuring that I’m being fair in all of my dealings with people in my business and that mutual gain is always achieved in any and all negotiations.