
Things to Never Say While Negotiating - mjh8136
http://www.inc.com/guides/2011/01/five-things-to-never-say-while-negotiating.html
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joelmichael
I am guilty of the "Fuck you" one. The offered terms insulted me so much I no
longer wanted to do business with the person. Had I taken this article's
advice, I would have stayed calm and moved toward some highly unsatisfying
"middle ground" purely to "close the deal". We are faced with innumerable
opportunities in our lives, and we need to filter out the best ones; for most
negotiations, a successful outcome is not making a deal.

~~~
tastybites
It takes a bit of experience (and some balls) to know which people to tell off
- but! Never underestimate the incredible morale boost a properly crafted
"fuck you" can bring to an overworked team in the heat of battle. When
followed by a company happy hour, I've seen miraculous things happen.

The world is filled with quacks and assholes - as soon as your radar is tuned,
you'll be able to filter the people worth keeping good relations with.

~~~
pasbesoin
Sometimes, a situation is in (desperate) need of some honest feedback.

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semanticist
Perfectly optimal financial value doesn't always equal perfectly optimal
social value.

For my current job my employer's first offer was exactly the amount I'd been
looking for. So I said 'yes' and didn't negotiate at all.

Maybe I could've talked them up, but I got what I was looking for and we
closed the meeting in under 15 minutes with everyone happy.

If someone offers you what you want, why waste time negotiating for more?

~~~
fizx
> If someone offers you what you want, why waste time negotiating for more?

Because you can use the extra amount to provide additional security for your
family, or runway for your next startup?

~~~
semanticist
Possibly, but not necessarily. My target salary wasn't especially low given my
skill set and salary levels where I am, and was a substantial increase over my
previous salary.

There wouldn't've realistically been room to haggle much up, my new employer
being aware of current market conditions. The figure I'm talking about is the
one you give to recruiters when they ask how much you want - it's my
starting/'ideal' figure.

For a job that matched my desired career path almost perfectly, as a
greenfield project at a very early stage start-up, using exactly the
technologies that I'm interested in, offering me the number I've been giving
to slave-traders, I didn't feel like negotiating.

If it'd been a suit-and-tie deal with one of the many local banks and
insurance companies, that might be a different story. Their paperclip budget
will be orders of magnitude more than my current employer's staffing budget.
If I ask for too much money it might simply cut the runway down until it's no
longer viable, and then I've wasted everyone's time.

Ultimately, I think this was an ideal 'negotiation' - they offered me exactly
what I wanted, and I said 'yes'. Sometimes all the negotiation tactics and
stupid head games can distract that whole point is for everyone to get what
they want. I don't have space in my head to deal with second-guessing myself
and my (then potential) employer over it all.

~~~
kleinsch
I've done the same thing before, and only recently have regretted it. It's
much easier and less uncomfortable to accept what they're offering, especially
if it's the amount you were anticipating, but if no negotiating was required,
you definitely could have gotten more. Yes, you got what you were looking for,
but could you find something to do with $5000/year more? Definitely.

I find most people (at least in the US) are uncomfortable negotiating, since
the only times you do it seriously are when getting a job and buying a car. So
long as you don't resort to the "Fuck You", negotiating is a professional
thing to do and all will be forgotten once you come to an agreement and start
the job.

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imcqueen
If I'm the seller I would prefer to throw out a number. That way you can
simply pad the starting point, coming down in price is much easier than going
up.

~~~
marcinw
That's great until the person you're selling to immediately jumps on that. At
this point, you are left wondering, "Gee, was my offer that good? Was it too
low? I wonder what he was expecting to pay. Damn, I could have made 20% more
had he made the first offer." Same goes the other way around. The trick is to
have both people negotiating to leave feeling as if they won. In your case,
you will leave feeling as if you lost.

~~~
larrik
I'm not convinced that that's a good enough reason not to do it.

If you are that much more concerned about getting the best possible price (or
whatever) vs. getting a set number you actually want, then you should go into
the negotiation with enough information to already know what the best possible
price should be.

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gfodor
I definitely think there are certain people who are born with negotiation
skills, and those that are not. You can always get better of course, but some
people have a natural ability (a specific form of empathy) to know what
exactly the other party is thinking, feeling, and expecting, and can exploit
it as much as possible. Its just as much a skill as a talent, and can be used
for both good and evil.

~~~
dpatru
According to what I've seen and read, there is no special talent to knowing
what another side is thinking. It's just good listening, not assuming
anything, and asking lots of questions. People who don't do these things will
rely on guessing to understand the other side and will often be wrong.

~~~
blantonl
Someone who is a good listener, doesn't assume anything, and asks lots of
questions has a special talent.

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keefe
>1\. The word "between.

I largely agree with this article and even this point in particular, but I
think you will often end up in a situation where stating a range can move
things along quickly. If you qualify it properly, it can be a useful way to
turn the tables. For example, if you are discussing rate you could say well,
from the other people I've been talking to it looks like positions like this
one pay between $45 and $65 an hour, depending on various factors, but of
course more detail is required to pin the number down exactly and it varies
for each individual, so what kind of budgetary, time and code quality
constraints are on this project?

I think this is a nice way of turning the tables, it would be socially weird
for them to just ignore the question and be like, "so what EXACTLY were you
looking for?"

Of course, they may end up offering you at 45 to start, but you can just kind
of scoff at that (if you want) and be like well this seems more
complex/difficult because... there's nothing wrong with continually edging
away from the question until they get frustrated.

~~~
nostrademons
Problem is that once you've said "between $45 and $65", you've indicated that
$45 is acceptable. Otherwise, why did you say it?

I've made this mistake before, and find that people always zoom in on the
lower number and think that's your actual offer. And then it's quite awkward
to say "Well, I didn't really mean $45, I won't do it for that little."

I've found that offering a range works much better when I make the _lower_
number of the range quite a bit higher than what I actually want. That gives
me room to come down, so that even once they've talked you down from that
lower range, it's still higher than what you wanted.

~~~
keefe
it depends on how you frame it. Saying that this type of position typically
pays X doesn't mean you're willing to take it.

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atgm
If someone said "fuck you" to me, I would no longer want to negotiate with
them, plain and simple.

~~~
knowledgesale
well, that is the whole point of saying it

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chanri
Is there any way to gain practice on negotiation? As an entrepreneur, are
there any resources on the internet where you can "practice"?

The only thing I can think of is playing poker or something at the casino...

~~~
nostrademons
Have kids or babysit? Kids are _awesome_ negotiators, because they don't care
about the other party at all, they just want to get the best deal for
themselves possible. They also start from a position of weakness in most
negotiations, which means they need to try some wonderfully creative
strategies to get what they want.

Actually, I wonder why most adults lose that ability as they get older. My
guess is that sometime in the teen years, people start caring about what
others think of them, and that is poison to negotiations.

~~~
JabavuAdams
This. Having a toddler has given me a lot of practice in how to negotiate.
Also, a negotiation book (The Secrets of Power Negotiation) helped me with the
toddler.

