Price Isn’t the Only Thing to Negotiate by Brian Buck
In times of crisis, it’s all too easy to develop tunnel vision in a negotiation and lose sight of other objectives that are just as important as the one you’re fixated on. Negotiators under stress are particularly susceptible to this. The most common point of focus is to achieve an advantageous financial position. However, even in times of stress, there’s more to negotiate than just price or money. Negotiation is a trading activity, whether what’s being traded are circumstances, advantages, objects, or money and products. In a negotiation, you’re looking to trade items of lesser value to you for things that you value more. Skilled negotiators also find the most agreeable terms for that exchange, so that all parties can gain value in the process and would be willing to implement the negotiated deal. It’s Not Always About the Money We’ve always negotiated. We started our negotiation career as kids. In fact, the way kids negotiate with one another — and the way we, as parents, negotiate with our kids — can serve as
— but it’s interesting to think back to moments of our early conflict and consider how wants and needs can be fulfilled when the exchange of money isn’t the sole focus. Instead, as kids we exchanged anything of value that we had. In the
a set of valuable reminders for any would-be negotiation ace. Before we knew the value of money, we negotiated for toys, candies, and other material things. But we also negotiated for more TV time or play time, and we even tried to negotiate our way out of doing our chores or eating our vegetables. Kids are not inherently better at negotiating than adults
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