“Our folks don’t think about the sales process as a negotiation. They think the negotiation is just the back-and-forth at the end. This causes problems. How can we reset our culture so they consider the entire effort a negotiation, from their first contact with a...
My Dad recently passed away at 91. He taught me a ton about life and negotiation. Here are my five biggest negotiation takeaways from his over 60 years of negotiating as a lawyer, political and community activist, and father. 1. Set Aggressive Goals and Go For It!...
Here’s my annual list of lessons learned from my 2021 columns and a reminder to put these strategies into practice in 2022. You won’t get better results if you don’t implement them. Each also has a link to my column with more detail. Don’t scream at negotiation...
Negotiating Nice Pays Off I was exhausted. I had been forced to take the redeye flight from Seattle to Houston in order to make a 10 a.m. meeting and arrived at the hotel at 6:30 a.m. with only a few hours intermittent sleep. I also had been forced to keep my hotel...
You walk into a car dealership to buy a new vehicle. A salesman approaches, introduces himself as “John,” and asks how he can help. You say, “I’m looking for a new SUV. My old one is rusting out. It grew up in Minnesota, just like me.” “Really,” John says. “Where in...
Ambassador Dennis Ross, Chief Middle East peace negotiator during the George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton presidencies, has an “empathy rule” in his negotiations. “To gain the hardest concessions,” he writes in Statecraft, “prove you...
I have an eight and a three year old and, like all kids their ages, they can be challenging. So I recently read the classic parenting book “How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk,” by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish. Interestingly, much of its...