As a former hostage negotiator for the FBI , I have been writing about ways negotiators take themselves hostage and what you can do to avoid making these same missteps .
I ’ ve recently identified three new negotiation tactics that end up putting you in a terrible position at the table . Read on to learn more about each of them and what you can do to avoid having these tactics derail your efforts .
You Believe In Leverage . ( There Is No Spoon
1 . From ‘ The Matrix .’)
Jim Camp , the author of “ Start With No ” ( one of our top 12 must-read books for expert negotiators ), has always said that there ’ s no such thing as leverage .
In the early days of my company , The Black Swan Group , we used to say the opposite : “ There is always leverage .”
How do you sort this out ? Change “ leverage ” to “ influence ” — trust-based influence , more specifically .
If you ’ re not trained in The Black Swan Method™ , you believe that leverage is an external thing ; either the circumstances have given it to you or they have not .
This is a passive stance that surrenders control to the situation . In other words , you ’ ve allowed the situation to take you hostage . When you believe in influence , you take back control — and also your ability to affect the outcome . You switch from the zerosum game of bargaining to the positive-sum game of negotiation .
One of the many insights about life from Molly Bloom ’ s book “ Molly ’ s Game ” is that everyone pretty much has the same luck . In case you ’ re unfamiliar , Molly ran high-stakes poker games in Los Angeles and New York City . To keep the games together and thriving over time , she needed to make sure the players were all at about the same skill level . The players would have good nights where they won big , and they would have bad nights where they lost big . But over the course of a year , if the players were evenly matched , they would all pretty much break even .
Leverage equates to luck . So , what ’ s the difference maker ? The time you spend increasing your skills .
You ’ re Afraid To Stress-Test Whether Or Not
2 . You Actually Understand .
The great misinterpretation of the advice from Stephen Covey that tells us to “ seek first to understand , then to be understood ” occurs when people convince themselves they actually do understand — usually based on prior research or experience — and then tailor their pitch / value proposition accordingly without checking with the counterpart ( prospect or client ) to see if they are right .
No matter what you ’ re telling yourself about this , your win rate is lower than it should be , and you absolutely are leaving money on the table .
If you ’ re not willing to stress-test your understanding with your counterpart , what are you really saying ? What are you afraid of ?
Did you work too hard on your research to be willing to be surprised ? Are you too embarrassed by potentially being corrected ? Many people learned a phrase when they were young that
has paralyzed them for life : It ’ s better to be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt . This may be some of the worst advice in the history of humankind .
Whatever is holding you back , release yourself from this fear ! Please don ’ t allow it to keep you hostage .
You Fear Negative Emotions vs . Proactively
3 . Defusing Them ( The Voldemort Effect ). They Must Not Be Named ! If We Say Them , We Will Speak Them Into Life !
Actually , it ’ s exactly the opposite . Naming negative emotions defuses them more effectively than anything else . And if they don ’ t yet exist ? Inoculation . Ridiculous , right ? You probably do this wrong or inefficiently in 1 of 3 ways :
1 . You deny negative emotions ( e . g ., I don ’ t want to seem , or I don ’ t want you to feel ).
2 . You ignore them ( e . g ., They must not be named ! and Speak about them , and they will appear ).
3 . You let people vent .
Let ’ s start with No . 3 and why you do that . It ’ s primarily a learned response to No . 1 . You tried to tell someone not to feel some negative emotion , and they blew up ! So , you at least learned to keep quiet and wait for them to run out of energy .
The problem with that is it takes a really long time . Most negative emotions have a “ self-righteous ” feeling that goes along with them , and it tends to feed the beast of negativity .
Along those lines , you start to engage in No . 2 — you don ’ t bring them up at all and hope they don ’ t rear their ugly heads . The problem there is that unexpressed negative emotions never die . They fester like an infection . Sometimes they even turn into cancer .
Because of these dynamics , it seems ridiculous to think that naming them defuses them , let alone inoculates us from them . But it does , and it ’ s really that simple .
This may be one of the most powerful aspects of The Black Swan Method™ and one of the key reasons our clients accelerate and make life-changing deals on a regular basis .
To get more expert negotiation tactics from Chris Voss , check out this excellent lesson he shared at Technology Marketing Toolkit ’ s annual boot camp at MSPSuccessMagazine . com / voss-video . n
Christopher Voss is the CEO of The Black Swan Group , a firm that solves business negotiation problems with hostage negotiation strategies . Chris is also an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California ( USC ) Marshall School of Business and Georgetown University ’ s McDonough School of Business , where he teaches business negotiation in both M . B . A . programs . Find out more at BlackSwanLtd . com .