There is great power in deference. Deference works with everybody.
In my years as the FBI's lead international kidnapping negotiator, I learned an important fundamental lesson: Hostage negotiation is often nothing more than a business transaction.
Salary negotiations shouldn't be limited to just salary. Salary pays your mortgage, but terms build your career.
Every job that you take, the term that you should always include is, 'How can I be involved in the strategic projects that are critical to the future of the company?' You ask that question. It's a great 'how' question.
The 'Rule of Three' is simply getting the other guy to agree to the same thing three times in the same conversation, it's really hard to repeatedly lie or fake conviction.
The 'that's right' breakthrough usually doesn't come at the beginning of a negotiation. It's invisible to the counterpart when it occurs, and they embrace what you've said. To them, it's a subtle epiphany.
Very few negotiations are begun and concluded in the same sitting. It's really rare. In fact, If you sit down and actually complete your negotiation in one sitting, you left stuff on the table.
Most people offer obvious telltale signs when they're lying.
I was on the SWAT team in the FBI, and I had always wanted to be in SWAT.
Whether we notice it or not, we spend our days negotiating for something: for our spouse to do more housework, a child to eat just three more bites or go to bed on time, an extended deadline on a project, a salary increase, a better rate on a vacation package.
Consider this: Whenever someone is bothering you, and they just won't let up, and they won't listen to anything you have to say, what do you tell them to get them to shut up and go away? 'You're right.' It works every time. But you haven't agreed to their position. You have used 'you're right' to get them to quit bothering you.
Mirroring is simply repeating what someone just said. It creates more reception from the other side, it focuses attention, and it gives them an opportunity to dial in more with you and you to dial in more with them. It causes an almost completely unconscious response for the person to want to go on.
There's great power in deference. You ask somebody 'what' or 'how' questions. People love to be asked how to do something. They feel powerful, and from a deferential position, you've actually granted that power, and you're the one that now actually has the upper hand in the conversation.
What I really think of myself as is a person who's great at negotiation coaching and consulting.
I wanted to be a hostage negotiator.
When you expect to get into a negotiation, you expect to be faced by a guy that's going to attack you, a guy or gal that's going to attack or that they're going to try to get the best of you. Two-thirds of us, that makes us very defensive.
People who are lying are, understandably, more worried about being believed, so they work harder - too hard, as it were - at being believable.
People typically only believe they're in a negotiation when dollars are involved. And maybe sometimes they're smart enough to see if there's a commodity that you can count being exchanged. And, of course, the commodity that we most commonly exchange is money.
If you're going to play the bargaining game, you just need to make the other side mad. You want them to get a little annoyed. Then you know that you've come in with a good price.
The moment you've convinced someone that you truly understand her dreams and feelings, mental and behavioral change becomes possible, and the foundation for a breakthrough has been laid.
