Without communication there is no negotiation. The latter is a communication process that seeks to support the purpose of obtaining a joint decision. Communication is never easy, not even between people who have many merits or common values and experiences. Couples who have lived together for thirty years still have misunderstandings every day. It is therefore not surprising that there is little communication between people who do not yet know each other well and who may be suspicious of the other or feel hostile. Regardless of what you say, you should wait for the other party to almost always hear something different.
There are three major problems in communication: first, negotiators may not be addressing the other or others, or, at least, not in a way that they can be understood. Ordinarily, each party has given up on the other, and this causes them to no longer attempt serious communication. Instead, they speak only to impress bystanders or their constituents. Instead of trying to steer your opponent toward a mutually acceptable agreement, they try to trip him up. Rather than trying to convince their partner to adopt more constructive skills or take more efficient steps, they go out of their way to convince voters or viewers to split up. Effective communication between the parties is practically impossible if each one is aware of the attitude of the public, that is, of the others.
Even if you speak directly and clearly to the other party, they may not hear you. This is the second problem in communication. Notice how often people seem not to pay attention to what you say. Probably just as often you will be unable to repeat what they have said. In a negotiation, you may be so busy thinking about what to say next, how you are going to respond to that last point, or how to express your next argument, that you forget to hear what the other party is saying. saying now. Or you may be listening more closely to your constituents than to the other party.
After all, it is to your constituents that you are accountable for the results of the negotiation. They are the ones you are trying to satisfy, and therefore it is not surprising that you want to pay close attention to them. But if you don't listen to what the other party is saying, there will be no communication.
The third problem in communication is misunderstandings. What one says may be misinterpreted by the other. Even when negotiators are in the same room, communicating with each other can seem like sending smoke signals when it's windy. When the parties speak different languages, the possibility of misinterpretation multiplies. For example, in the Persian language, the word "compromise" seems to lack the positive meaning that it has in English as "a compromise that both can accept", and have only a negative meaning as in "our integrity was compromised." Similarly, the word "mediator" in Persian suggests "busybody," someone who intervenes without being invited.In early 1980 the Secretary General of the United Nations went to Iran to seek the release of the American hostages. His efforts were seriously thwarted when Iranian radio and television reported in Persian a comment he had made on arrival in Tehran: "I have come as a mediator to try to reach a compromise." An hour after the broadcast, a mob of outraged Iranians stoned his car.
What can be done about these three communication problems?
Listen carefully and acknowledge what they say. The need to listen is obvious, and yet it is difficult to listen well, especially under the pressure of a negotiation. Listening allows you to understand their perceptions, feel their emotions, and hear what they are trying to say. Active or attentive listening improves not only what you hear, but also what they say. If you listen carefully and occasionally interrupt to say, "Did I understand correctly that you are saying that…?" The other party will realize that you are not just killing time, simply sticking to a routine. In addition, they will feel the satisfaction of being heard and understood. It has been said that the least costly concession to make to the other party is to let them know that they have been heard.
Customary listening techniques consist of paying attention to what is being said, asking the other party to say exactly what they want to say carefully and clearly in detail, and asking for ideas to be repeated if there is any ambiguity or uncertainty. Assume that as you listen, you are not thinking about the answer, but trying to understand the other party as they see themselves. Consider your perceptions, your needs, and your limitations.
Many believe that a good tactic is not to pay much attention to the other party's arguments, and not to admit any legitimacy in their point of view. A good negotiator does the exact opposite. Unless you acknowledge what they are saying and show you understand it, they may think you have not heard them. So when you try to explain a different point of view, they will assume that you have not yet understood what they mean. They will say to themselves, "I gave you my point of view, but now you are saying something different, so you must not have understood." So instead of listening to your argument, they will be thinking about how to present their point of view in another way, hoping that now you do understand. In that case, show them that you understand.Let me see if I understand what you are saying. From his point of view, the situation is as follows… ».
When you repeat what you think they have said, express it positively from their point of view, giving full force to your arguments. You might say, “You have a strong argument. Let me see if I can explain. It seems to me that it is as follows… ». Understanding is not the same as agreeing. It is possible, at the same time, to understand perfectly and totally disagree with what the other party says. But unless you can convince them that you understand their way of seeing it, you will not be able to explain your own point of view. Once you have explained the other's point of view, expose the problems that you see to the other's proposal. If you can explain their point of view better than they can, and then refute it,you maximize the possibility of initiating a constructive dialogue based on the merits and minimize the possibility that they believe you have not understood them.
Speak in order to be understood
Talk to the other party. It is easy to forget that a negotiation is not a debate. Nor is it a trial. You are not trying to convince a third party. The person you are trying to convince is sitting around the same table. If a negotiation can be compared to a legal proceeding, the situation is similar to that of two judges trying to agree on how to decide a case. Try to put yourself in that role, treating your opponent as a judge, a colleague of yours, with whom you are trying to formulate a joint opinion. In this context, it is clear that it will not be possible to persuade if you blame the other person for the problem, if you insult yourself, or if you raise your voice. Conversely,It will help a lot to explicitly acknowledge that they see the situation differently and try to handle it as people who have a common problem. To reduce the overbearing and distracting effect of the press, domestic audiences, and third parties, it is helpful to establish private and confidential means of communication with the other party.
Communication can also be improved by limiting the size of the group in the meeting. For example, in the 1954 negotiations on the city of Trieste, little progress was made in the talks between Yugoslavia, Great Britain, and the United States, until the three main negotiators left their delegations and began to meet informally and alone in a private house. A case can be made for changing Woodrow Wilson's attractive slogan "Open Agreements Obtained Openly" to "Open Agreements Obtained Privately".
Regardless of the number of people involved in a negotiation, important decisions are usually made when there are no more than two people in the room.
Talk about yourself, not about them
In many negotiations, each party explains and condemns at length the motives and intentions of the other party. However, it is more persuasive to describe the problem in terms of the impact it had on you than in terms of what they did and why: "I feel disappointed," rather than "You didn't keep your word." "We feel that we are being discriminated against" instead of "You are racist." If you say something about them that they think is false, they will either ignore you or get angry; they will not focus on your concern. But a statement about your own feelings is difficult to object. You provide the same information without provoking a defensive reaction that will prevent them from taking it into account.
Speak with a purpose
Sometimes the problem is not because there is little communication, but because there is too much. When there is anger and misperceptions, it is better not to say certain things. At other times, a full statement of how flexible you are can make a deal more difficult rather than easier to achieve. If you tell me that you are willing to sell a house for $ 80,000 after I have said that you would be willing to pay up to $ 90,000, it may be more difficult for us to agree than if you had not said anything. The moral is: before saying anything meaningful, be sure what you want to communicate or find out, and be sure of the goal that will be achieved with that information.
It's better to prevent
The techniques we have described for dealing with perceptions, emotions, and communication problems are generally helpful. However, the best time to fix people's problems is before the problem occurs. This implies creating a personal and organizational relationship with the other party, which is capable of protecting people from both sectors against the blows of negotiation. It also implies that the negotiation game is structured in such a way that the substantive issues of the relationship can be separated and people's egos are protected from getting mixed up with the discussion about the substance.
Establish a working relationship
It helps a lot to know the other party personally. It is much easier to attribute diabolical intentions to an unknown abstraction called "the other party" than to someone you know personally. Dealing with a classmate, a colleague, a friend, or even a friend of a friend, is very different than dealing with a stranger. The faster you can turn a stranger into someone you know, the easier the negotiation is likely to be. It will be less difficult to know where they come from. This gives you a foundation of confidence that you can lean on during a difficult negotiation. There are familiar and friendly communication routines. It's easier to ease tension with a joke or a casual comment.
The right time to develop this relationship is before the negotiation begins. Try to get to know the others and find out what they like and what they dislike. Try to meet them informally; to arrive early, before the time set for the beginning of the negotiation, and stay a moment when it ends. One of Benjamin Franklin's favorite techniques was to ask his adversary to lend him a book. This made the person feel good and gave him the pleasant feeling that Franklin owed him a favor.
Face the problem, not the people.
If negotiators are perceived as adversaries in a face-to-face showdown, it is difficult to separate their relationship from the substance of the problem. In this context, whatever a negotiator says about the problem seems to be directed against the other personally, and this is how they perceive it. Each party tends to be defensive, to react, and to overlook the legitimate interests of the other party.
A more effective way of perceiving each other is as partners in a difficult common search for a fair and mutually beneficial agreement.
Like two castaways lost at sea in a lifeboat and fighting over limited rations and supplies, negotiators can initially be seen as adversaries. Perhaps each sees the other as an obstacle. However, to survive, the castaways have to separate objective problems and people. It will be essential that they identify the needs of the other in terms of shade, medicine, water or food. They will want to go further and address the solution of these needs as a common problem, along with other common problems such as collecting rainwater, standing guard and reaching the coast. If they find that they are sharing efforts to solve a common problem, the castaways will be able to reconcile their conflicting interests and advance at the same time in the achievement of their common interests.The same thing happens with two negotiators. As difficult as our personal relationship may be, we can more easily reach a friendly reconciliation that brings our various interests together if we accept that task as a shared problem and undertake it together.
To help the other party shift their orientation from face to face to side to side, you can explicitly discuss the matter with them. Look, we are both lawyers (diplomats, businessmen, relatives, etc.). Unless we try to satisfy your interests, it will be impossible for us to reach an agreement that satisfies mine, and vice versa. Let us examine together the problem of how to satisfy our common interests. Or you can start to act as if the negotiation is a joint process and by your actions determine that they want to do the same.
It helps to literally sit on the same side of the table and have the contract, the map, the sheets of paper, or whatever else that explains the problem in view. If a foundation of mutual trust has been established, so much the better. But however precarious the relationship may be, try to structure the negotiation as if it were a common activity shared by both of you, with your different interests and perceptions, and with your emotional commitment.
Separating people from the problem is not something that can be done all at once and then can be forgotten; we must continue working in that sense.
The essential thing is to treat people as human beings and the problem on its merits.
From the book "Yes… okay!" by Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton
