Spring is the time we shed our winter slump by enjoying the sunshine and returning to the fundamentals of gardening, and the beauty it brings. It is the perfect time to refresh your negotiation techniques as well, by returning to the fundamentals that inform how you turn conflicting goals into opportunities for reaching agreement. To do this I re-read the 1980s classic, ‘Getting to YES: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In’ by Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton.

The point that resonated with me this time was ‘Negotiators are people first’. Working in a fast- paced corporate environment where people are focused on results, and forever pushing to meet a deadline, we often forget that we are going through ‘micro-level’ negotiations daily. Negotiation skills are useful in far more situations than just formal contracts. Whether answering your supplier’s questions, checking in on a customer, or discussing issues with your supervisor, recognize that your discussions are often hidden negotiations, and you are negotiating with people. People have ego and emotions, and give more to people they like and trust.

Success at these daily micro-negotiations requires that we spend time building relationships founded in trust, understanding, and respect. “Failing to deal with others sensitively as human beings prone to human reactions can be disastrous for a negotiation.” (Getting to Yes, p. 19). It only takes a few negative interactions to override an otherwise positive connection. For some reminders about building and maintaining good business relationships, check out this blog entry I came across: How to build business relationships.

This spring challenge yourself to be a better negotiator by returning to the fundamentals. And remember to use your daily micro-negotiations as opportunities to build positive relationships with people, the very people with whom you will likely be negotiating issues, big and small.

If you have time to read or re-read ‘Getting to Yes’, you’re likely to find some good reminders. Refresh! 

Are you “on the fence” about your neighbors? I train seasoned business professionals to negotiate in a wide range of industries and professions, and it never fails that I get asked to help with someone’s latest negotiation problem --  not with a key customer or difficult supplier -- but with a neighbor. Everyone has a story to tell! Learn from the mistakes even I succumbed to in neighbor negotiations.

You don’t get to choose your neighbors, and you don’t have to like your neighbors. But unless you are a billionaire like Mark Zuckerberg and can purchase your neighbors' properties in order to protect your own privacy and view, you will have to deal with your neighbors. Here's my tale of hard lessons learned.

My wife and I bought a house next door to a sophisticated widow of considerable wealth - we called her "Lady H." Lady H had previously owned our adjoining lot, with her house being grand and ours being, well, quaint - a more modest guest-house. Lady H lived alone in her old age and wealth, and barely recognized the existence of my family despite our attempts to win her over with fresh picked blue berries and smiles across the lawn.

Years earlier when Lady H owned both parcels, she had a fence placed near our joint property lines but located squarely on my parcel – a chain link fence that was now in disrepair and unsightly. My wife and I were ready to upgrade our property, and assumed that Lady H would appreciate the investment, as it would add to the value of her property as well. We decided to tackle the thing most unbefitting to our properties – the rusted chain link fence on our parcel.

As an expert negotiator who coaches others, I knew exactly what to do – prepare my options and strategies before negotiating a deal with Lady H. We did our research and formed our strategy, and then dropped by to see Lady H. I told her we were taking the old chain link fence down, and handed her a brochure that showed fences with the same open air view as her chain link fence, but added sophistication befitting her estate. While my wife and I were ok with all the options, I didn’t share that with her, as I wanted to see what Lady H wanted first. I had planned to then reluctantly accept her fence preference in exchange for several other things we wanted, like for her to have a dead tree on her property taken down that posed a threat to our safety.

I was ready to discuss options and begin some give and take, but she cut the conversation short. Pointing to the most expensive option, a decorative iron fence, Lady H nicely said, “I like this one. Do what you need to do,” and thanked me for coming by. I was surprised, but pleased at least with the efficiency of our “negotiation."

When our new and very expensive iron fence was installed, I was thrilled. We could see each other’s lovely gardens but without having to look through the eye sore of that rusted chain link fence. My satisfaction was short lived.

A week later, Lady H installed a taller, builder-grade, wood privacy fence on her property, abutting and completely overshadowing the new iron fence. What had I done wrong? Everything, pretty much!

First, know your neighbor's true interests.
I didn't bother to learn Lady H's interests - why she wants what she wants. It turned out that Lady H regretted having sold the adjoining property because she now had a young noisy family that liked to spend time laughing and playing outside - ours. Lady H had grown older since the days when she had installed that chain link fence, and her interests had changed; she now wanted quiet and privacy.

Second, understand who you are dealing with.
Lady H could have simply proposed a privacy fence, and not had to spend her own money to get the privacy she wanted. Why didn’t she? Easy to see why in retrospect:

• Lady H didn’t share her interest with us because we had no relationship (see the 2nd article in this series coming soon), and I didn’t bother to ask her what mattered to her. My assumptions about what mattered to Lady H proved entirely wrong.
   
• I underestimated Lady H’s ego need to control her surroundings. I opened with our decision to take the chain link fence down, when I could have just as easily met her outside and, while not invading her side of the fence, showed her that time had taken its toll on that fence and simply asked if she'd like to see it in better shape again. I could have begun a conversation rather than take control. My ego bruising led Lady H to take revenge rather than discuss a solution.
   
• And last, Lady H’s plan B (BATNA) was very strong (and I didn't bother to think she had one since the fence was on our property); she had resources to out maneuver us. From her side Lady H would now see the nice side of her privacy fence. And she didn't really care that from our side we saw our investment erode, with the ugly side of her privacy fence pressed against our new iron fence.

Third, to negotiate a solution requires collaboration.
I did not trade value to reach a mutually beneficial solution, which is how you capture value in collaborative negotiations. When the other party says “Yes” right away, you can be sure that either you did a great job of convincing them, or like in my situation, you are being outmaneuvered. Maybe you unwittingly offered them more than they ever thought they could get, so they jump at your offer, or maybe like Lady H, they have a strong plan B that they are ready and willing to implement. A quick and easy win in negotiations usually turns out not to be a win at all.

With neighbors and in business, knowing the other party's ego needs, interests and BATNAs, engaging in a collaborative conversation to solve your interests and theirs by trading for value – determines whether you actually get what you want. Robert Frost's famous line - Good Fences Make Good Neighbors -- perhaps should have been Good Negotiators Make Good Neighbors.

Courtship….not necessarily a word that springs to mind when describing a mega-deal taking place in America’s bastion of high tech – Silicon Valley – but that is exactly how Forbes described Mark Zuckerberg’s pursuit of WhatsApp in an article detailing the Facebook acquisition.  This seismic, $19B deal closed in less than a week once the principals sat down at the negotiating table, but only after Mark Zuckerberg and WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum built a true partnership during the previous 2 years.

Technologists typically don’t contemplate relationship building as a cornerstone of their negotiating strategy, but that profound relationship is precisely why the Facebook-WhatsApp acquisition closed so quickly, once $ were in play.  Beginning in the spring of 2012, after Zuckerberg reached out to Koum for a casual lunch, they got together almost monthly- sometimes for dinner, sometimes to hike trails around Palo Alto. Not only did they share philosophies on business strategy and innovation, they built a trust that enabled rapid closure on terms, once Google stirred the pot and made overtures toward WhatsApp.    

Inventors and technologists usually have an innate curiosity – they push the cutting edge of their domain, fostering innovating thinking and breakthroughs in technology. Turning this natural curiosity toward your potential counterpart at the negotiating table, you can gain significant leverage before talking terms. Find or create shared experiences and build rapport – and you are on your way to earning respect and ultimately trust. Cultivating this trust is essential to spur your counterpart to reveal their underlying motivations and deeper interests.    

Once you know what is really driving them, rely on another natural skill of most technologists – creativity. Creativity – and flexibility – allows you to think through a set of alternatives that will meet some, or many, of the interests you have uncovered. If they reject one proposal, you have others ready to propose that might win the day.  But this powerful give and take during bargaining is only possible if your partner trusts you. The $19B WhatsApp deal was done in a few short days because Koum fundamentally liked and trusted Mark Zuckerberg.  

The Forbes article claims that once the deal was “done” - Zuckerberg and Koum had shaken hands on the basic terms - that Mark Zuckerberg broke out a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue Label to celebrate, as he knew this was Koum’s favorite Scotch. Now that is indisputable evidence that the Facebook CEO had done the work to uncover the real interests of the WhatsApp Founder!

To learn more about how to Empower Technologists at the Negotiating Table, listen to the August 17, 2014 IMI Tech Talk radio program, hosted on KFNX News-Talk-Radio 1100, when host Tom D’Auria speaks with Leslie Mulligan of Watershed Associates about this topic.

Everywhere I consult and teach on negotiations, people love hearing stories of the negotiations that didn't go well, and especially stories of the now infamous former US behemoth, Enron. Everyone remembers Enron’s meteoric rise to power in the 1990s – as well as its shocking fall into bankruptcy in 2001. Fewer people remember that the Houston-based energy giant had tasted defeat at least once before, when negotiations over a planned $20 billion power plant broke down with the Government of India. Why did this high-profile, lucrative deal fall through? One major reason harkens back to the most fundamental of all negotiation principles - spending time on relationships is never wasted.

In the late 1990s, Enron seemed to be on top of the world. The Houston-based energy company, named “America’s Most Innovative Company” six years running by Fortune magazine, claimed over $100 billion in revenues during 2000 alone. By December 2001, however, widespread accounting fraud and corruption had brought Enron crashing down in a stunning turn of events.

Although it seemed as though Enron could do no wrong, the company had in fact experienced a serious setback in the mid-1990s, when negotiations over the massive 2,015 megawatt Dabhol Power Plant – the first part of a planned $20 billion effort – broke down with the Maharashtra State Electricity Board and the Government of India.

Why did this high-profile, lucrative deal fall through?  Despite their business acumen, Enron committed two key mistakes during the negotiation process that sowed the seeds of the deal’s demise.

First, by pushing to sign a contract as quickly as possible, Enron negotiators failed to build a longer-term relationship with their Indian counterparts. As reported in Business Week, although Rebecca Mark, head of Enron International, justified their strategy by stating “time is money for us,” for instance, the speed of the arrangement looked suspicious to many key Indian powerbrokers. Influential local leaders immediately began criticizing Enron’s negotiation strategy as an affront to Indian sovereignty and argued that corruption must have been used to speed up the process.

Enron’s failure to cultivate a long-term business relationship with any local partners – (it also rejected the advice of many experts and refused to take on a local Indian partner as a minority equity holder) – meant that Enron possessed no trusted local partners to help navigate the pressures that inevitably accompany such endeavors. This made it virtually impossible for either side to capture valuable trades – and increased the likelihood that India would execute its BATNA.

Second, rather than thinking creatively in search of mutual gain, both sides resorted to positional-based, competitive negotiation strategies that manifested themselves in bitter criticisms and veiled threats. As reported by the BBC News, after local Indian officials characterized the power plant agreement as a “betrayal” and suspended payments, for example, then Enron CEO Kenneth Lay implied that his allies in the US government might cut off aid to the Indian government. Threatening India's relationship with the US crossed the line and sealed the end of Enron's power play.

In high stakes and complex negotiations, all the great financial analysis will not change the need for trust and strong relationships. We can all learn from Enron's missteps.

Negotiations are serious business, which is why it is important to understand, and build trust with, the other party. Great negotiators know that no matter how serious the interaction, laughter is often one of the quickest paths to trust; it can relieve tension, create a bond, improve everyone's moods, and foster the creativity you want for mutually beneficial agreements to emerge.

Researchers in many fields, from medicine to psychology to communications, are increasingly interested in the social power of humor and the physical and emotional benefits of laughter. Public speakers are trained to open presentations with jokes or funny anecdotes. Political candidates are now expected to demonstrate their sense of humor on the talk show circuit to improve their likeability. In 2010 Comedian John Stewart was voted the "most trusted man in America." His social power derives from the fact that he is knowledgeable and funny, which makes him seem more trustworthy.  

A sense of humor is useful during all phases of negotiation as well -- to signal confidence or shift power, to change the environment, to soften bad news, to avoid answering a question, to respond to a ridiculous offer, or to save face.

Telling a funny story or acceptable joke can also help you gauge whether the other party is on the same page with you. If the other side is not laughing, or even engaging in a joking conversation, pay attention: they are not where you hope they are. Not laughing in response to a humorous gesture is a sign of discomfort or disconnection.

So prepare with ice-breakers -- anecdotes or jokes that get a group to laugh before you begin bargaining.

Try these tips for opening an interaction with humor:

Tell a story on yourself: People love to laugh at absurd but real events. Carol Burnett famously said "comedy is tragedy plus time." A story you tell about yourself makes you more human.

Don't take yourself too seriously. Keep the humor light, and your expectations for laughter down. Nothing kills an attempt to develop rapport more than someone who can't laugh at him or herself. Mildly self-deprecating jokes imply trust.

Collect a few jokes that work for you. They're easy to find or to collect. Good storytellers and comedians prepare material in advance, to avoid hitting the wrong note, and to be ready to hit the right one.

What to avoid:

• Stories and jokes about race, culture, gender, religion, politics, or hometowns
• Offensive material
• Sarcasm
• Targeting something sensitive about them you discovered by being empathetic (don't overuse empathy!)
• Stories or jokes that require long, complex setups, or special insider knowledge
• Telling a joke if you are not good at it
• Jokes that rely on an exact understanding of your language

Sometimes puns (ambiguous play on words with multiple meanings) can be fun – just make sure your humor is understood. Let’s say you’re in a tense negotiation and everyone is frustrated. You might say:

“Does any one feel the way I do? Trying to figure out a solution that satisfies us all is like getting ready for a root canal – it’s unnerving!”

Keep these guidelines in mind for successful humorous stories and jokes:

• Make them modest, not ambitious
• Keep them short -- avoid a long setup!
• Try to be topical -- find a story or joke that's relevant to the negotiation at hand, a recent press story, your travel, etc.
• Be yourself!

Be real. Leverage your own style and personality. Be willing to laugh. See how it changes your negotiation results!

You are about to begin a difficult project at work in conjunction with your co-worker, and he asks, "Want to grab a cup of coffee before we get started?" You may not want coffee, you may be busy, you may be dreading working with this person, or you may think chit chat is a waste of time.  But if you are going to successfully complete this project, you would be wise to respond with a resounding "Yes!" You have just received an "emotional bid" that holds the key to you getting more of what you want in the many negotiations that will unfold during this project.

As John Gottman described a decade ago in his book, The Relationship Cure, an emotional bid is a question, gesture, or expression that implies, “I want to connect with you.”  The label "Emotional bids" may be 21st century nomenclature, but the idea is as old as the first negotiation between cave men setting out on a hunt who sharpen sticks together, and will later have to negotiate who gets the best meat of the kill.

Emotional bids are part of all developing relationships, including those between co-workers and negotiating counterparts. If your polite answer to such a bid is "sorry I don't drink coffee" or "thanks but I have too much work right now," you are missing an critical opportunity to connect in a way that supports your inevitable ask for something you want.

Many of us fail to recognize or extend emotional bids. As a good negotiator, you already know that relationships are critical in your negotiations -- with customers you can't afford to lose, suppliers you need, and partners you want. The relationship you develop with the other party, whether positive or negative, impacts every aspect of your negotiation. Yet we spend more time alone completing tasks, and avoiding interaction, only to lament, "We don't have a trusting relationship!"

Recognize emotional bids for what they are -- a prime opportunity to build affiliations, find common ground or interests, and understand each other outside the conflict zone. 

Be on the lookout for "emotional bids" and use them yourself.  An "emotional bid" can be an interesting "tweet" or funny story, sharing an industry related article, a recommendation for a good book or restaurant, and a million other ways to connect.

Remember, institutions don't negotiate. People do. And people give the best deals to people they connect with -- people they like. 

My colleague blogged about Guanxi last month, the age-old concept that we teach in our Best Negotiating Practices workshops. Her post on Guanxi (Get in Touch with Your Guanxi) reminds me of the man who turned Guanxi into a mathematical formula. 

In the 1950s, John Nash took the idea of Guanxi -- that caring about the relationship is as important as the outcome -- and applied it mathematically. Years later Nash won a Nobel Prize for his work. Nash suffered from acute chronic schizophrenia most of his career, and as a young prodigy was obsessed with coming up with an original idea. But did he?

Up until this point, most negotiations in the West were focused on the deal – the outcome – the conditions. What did John Nash introduce as an “original” idea? Relationships matter.

Are relationships new to win-win? No! Ancient cultures have valued relationships for thousands of years. John Nash borrowed the concept of Guanxi to support his theory. What is new is that John Nash and his colleagues proved that a win-win result is predictable and repeatable.

John Nash demonstrated that the then predominant theory of economics – Adam Smith’s premise that individual ambition serves the common good and that the best result comes from everyone doing what’s best for himself – was not complete. Nash showed that the best result comes from everyone in the group doing what is best for himself AND the group. You have to factor in all the relationships and connections – you and your stakeholders, they and their stakeholders. You also have to understand what people need with regard to both ego and outcome. You can get the full effect of Nash's theory from the acclaimed 2001 movie A Beautiful Mind.

When you take these factors into account, you reach a result that benefits all – that’s win-win. And how do you get there? With collaborative interest based negotiation strategies, starting with a healthy dose of Guanxi. Some in the West call this the birth of win-win, because it set us on a new course of negotiation mastery and success, as well as paved the way for successful negotiations with cultures more astute at negotiating.

Famed quarterback Tom Brady will take the field this Thursday in the NFL's season opener when the New England Patriots play the Pittsburgh Steelers. Brady will no doubt demonstrate his prowess in the game, but unlike other seasons, he'll step on the field with one victory already in hand. It turns out that in the pre-season battle of the BATNAs, Brady had the winning strategy.

In July Commissioner Goodell denied Brady's appeal of the NFL"s (US National Football League's) May 2015 4-game suspension for alleged cheating -- involvement in or covering up deflated game balls -- and upheld his own decision. Brady and the NFL Players Association (NFLPA) went to court to fight this battle, as intense competitors will do. Ultimately, Judge Richard Berman ruled in Brady’s and the NFLPA’s favor, vacating the 4-game suspension that the NFL had levied.​

When I wrote about the situation in July, I was keeping an eye on the stakeholders, the parties' interests, and the available BATNAs. Now we know that victory in the battle of the BATNAs led us to the finish.

BATNAs are your Best Alternatives to a Negotiated Agreement, or plan B. The other side doesn't have to agree with your BATNA, because it's the plan you will execute if negotiations don't produce a desirable result.

Knowing the strength of your BATNA relative to your counterpart, and being willing to execute it, is essential as you enter any negotiation, as the NFL regrettably realized this past week. We can all learn from the NFL's missteps.

Every successful negotiator knows that you are more powerful at the negotiation table if you have a strong BATNA, preferably more than one. But remember - your BATNA is your back-up plan, your Plan B. In fact, your Plan A should be to reach a mutually beneficial agreement through dialogue, without having to execute BATNAs. This is paramount, especially if you will need to work together in the future.

Clearly the NFL and the NFLPA have an ongoing relationship and must work together going forward. Executing BATNAs can be risky because you don't know the fall out, unlike the greater certainty that comes with a negotiated agreement. Executing BATNAs can also damage relationships, as we have seen play out in this situation. To that end, Judge Berman urged both sides to negotiate a solution rather than do battle in court. 

But each side evidently thought that its BATNA was the stronger BATNA.

As you enter a negotiation, one critical step is to assess the relative strengths of each side’s BATNA. This assessment is done in the Exchange stage of negotiations, while you are measuring your opponent’s position, understanding their interests, and assessing their trustworthiness and credibility. Depending on the strength of your BATNA and your assessment of the other side, opening offers are made. In Deflategate, both sides had strong opening positions: Brady refused to accept any ruling that included missing a football game because of cheating, and the NFL seemed to require Brady to bear some level of responsibility by accepting the NFL’s Deflategate investigation led by Ted Wells.

These seemed like aggressive opening offers at the time, but both sides must have felt that they had strong BATNAs. If you are confident in your Plan B, you can afford to be very assertive with your opening position. As no negotiated settlement was reached, each side apparently believed that they had the superior BATNA. Clearly, Brady and the NFLPA made the right assessment.

Although the NFL under-estimated the strength of Brady’s BATNA, the NFL did do one thing well. The NFL immediately sought to improve its BATNA by filing a pre-emptive lawsuit against Brady in a New York federal court, rather than the players-friendly venue of Minnesota, where recent trials had been held that went the player’s way.

A good negotiator constantly works to improve short and long-term BATNA’s, before and during negotiations, and certainly when agreement can't be reached. Roger Goodell and the NFL clearly had that on their minds, as they filed the NY lawsuit to reaffirm the NFL's ruling on the same day the ruling was issued – July 28th.

For more on ways to leverage your BATNAs, check out an earlier Watershed blog, the Negotiator’s Keys to a Powerful BATNA.

We have likely not seen the last of the NFL vs Brady case, as the NFL recently stated that it will appeal Judge Berman's decision. But this move should not stop Tom Brady from joining the New England Patriots on the field as the NFL opens its season. Let’s hope that both sides reassess their negotiation strategies to find a way to address their interests and appease their stakeholders. While the battle of the BATNAs has a victor, nothing's certain about who will win the season opener. Let the games begin!

Our clients do extensive business in China, where negotiations tend to be a long involved process. What you thought would be a simple business negotiation often turns into multi-day affairs with many delicious meals, multiple toasts, and tours around the factory. While it takes time, this focus on Guanxi, which roughly translates to “relationships and connections,” is viewed as both effective and efficient in China. Good negotiators everywhere would do well to take a lesson and get in touch with their Guanxi.

The Chinese view their business relationships as cooperation amongst various parties that support each other towards mutual gain, where “business favors” or concessions are readily and voluntarily given, knowing that business partners would also be ready to give. Guanxi is a complex concept that involves respect, reciprocity, and a certain deference to the person with more authority, all in an effort to achieve a mutually beneficial relationship.

One famous story of Chinese relationship building is the story of Microsoft’s growth in China. Urban legend had it that on his first trip to China in the mid 1990s, Bill Gates insulted the Chinese President Jiang Zemin by wearing jeans and only leaving time for a brief visit. The legend had China’s President stating that Mr. Gates would be wise to learn more about Chinese culture, essentially saying that understanding China’s customs would pave the way for better working relationships in the country. This legend of course turned out to be pure myth and was later debunked in the 2006 book, Guanxi (The Art of Relationships): Microsoft, China, and Bill Gates’ Plan to Win the Road Ahead by Robert Buderi and Gregory T. Huang, which explored the success of Microsoft’s software laboratory in Beijing, China. The real story is that Gates and one of his key visionaries, Nathan Myhrvold, executed a strategy that set the company and the country on a long term course to build a mutually beneficial relationship by harnessing the talent from within China and learning the cultural knowledge necessary to be successful.

According to Buderi and Huang in Guanxi and the Art of Business, “So far, the company has invested well over $100 million and hired more than 400 of China’s best and brightest to turn the outpost into an important window on the future of computing and a training ground to uplift the state of Chinese computer science – creating dramatic payoffs for both Microsoft and its host country….” China is reaping the benefit of an elite corps of computer scientists, while Microsoft’s barriers to entry were eased.

The legend, the truth, and also the ultimate success of Microsoft in China demonstrate an important lesson: doing business requires understanding the culture of your counterparts and making an effort to build relationships in the ways that are important to them.

Negotiations in western cultures proceed at a speedy clip more often than not, but relative to the speed and cultural nuances, there is always a need to invest in the relationship. Building a strong connection up front with your supplier, customer or partners provides an invaluable foundation of trust and connection that supports all future negotiations in the relationship. Get in touch with your Guanxi!

Inc. magazine contributor Jeff Haden gives us a list of “10 Things to Stop Doing Right Now”  to be happier. We couldn’t help but point out that if you subtract these 10 things from your negotiations, too, you’ll be happier AND a better negotiator.

Haden's top 10 subtractions on the road to happiness are no-brainers to master negotiators, so we wanted to highlight the biggies from a negotiator’s perspective:

1. Blaming - Take responsibility for your part. If your customer hasn’t kept up with its volume commitment, ask yourself – did you set the bar too high, have you trained their users on your service, what part of this is yours?

2. Impressing – It’s important to sell value – yours, your company’s, your product and service. But if all you do is promote you and yours, you will miss the golden opportunity to learn about your counterpart.

3. Interrupting – Even new negotiators know to ask a lot of questions, but it doesn’t pay off if you interrupt the answers. And fake listening doesn’t count – master negotiators listen with sincere curiosity!

4. Controlling – Even when you have all the power, trying to control the outcome of negotiations is counter-productive. Controlling the discussion or outcome ensures that you will miss opportunities to talk, to find hidden value for both parties, and thereby create a sustainable and viable agreement.

5. Dwelling – Haden tells us “the past is just training.” Negotiators, even the best, make mistakes. They do their homework and they diligently follow the best practices, but to get the best deal they are creative risk takers. Asking questions has risks. Suggesting options has risks. Showing your cards has risks. And with the risks come some mistakes. But master negotiators don’t dwell; they turn mistakes into lessons.

6. Fearing - For negotiators, fear is what keeps us from asking for what we want, the nail in the coffin for achieving a beneficial agreement. Think of the "big ask" as a way to start the conversation. If your request is defensible, then you can confidently ask for it.

Don’t be afraid to negotiate for what you want! You’ll be happier, build stronger relationships, and achieve mutually beneficial agreements.