By now you must realize that I do not share the cynical view that people are inescapably greedy or evil. Without underestimating the difficulty of developing trust in a competitive society, experience has shown me that it can be done. In a continuing relationship, the more trust you place in others, the more they will justify your faith. Convey your belief in their honesty and reliability and you will encourage them to live up to these expectations.
What is the alternative? Start out suspicious and distrustful and surely you will have your prophecy fulfilled. Thus, the only way to save ourselves from the worst may just be to expect the best.
And the best is a trusting relationship, in which each party has a firm belief in the honesty and reliability of the other. It’s a mutual dependence—a potential alliance to deal with inevitable disagreement. It’s a climate that lays the foundation for transforming conflict into satisfying outcomes.
This mutual trust is the mainspring of collaborative Win-Win negotiations. Let’s discuss now how and when this relationship can be established. For reasons that will become evident, I have divided the activity of building trust into two time frames:
A. The process stage
B. The formal event
A. The process stage
Previously, in distinguishing between the process stage and the formal event, we used the analogy of mental illness. As you will recall, we said that this condition develops—or is in process—over an extended period. This measure of time would always precede the formal event, in which the patient is diagnosed and certified as mentally ill. The point made was that a negotiation is also a continuous process concluding with a formal interaction between the parties. Therefore, when we say, “The negotiation will begin on March 5 at 2:00 P.M.,” we are referring only to the formal event.
This final step in the negotiation process usually takes the form of a personal meeting between the parties, but it could also occur by telephone or even by way of written messages. Most people persist in thinking that this last stage of the process is the negotiation. However, every concluding formal event is preceded by weeks or months of lead time contained in the process stage of a negotiation.
This concept, which recognizes that the formal event is merely the culmination of a lengthy process, has broad application to everyday life. Whether producing a delicious homemade cake or taking a final examination, the success of these events depends upon forethought and timely enterprise.
To illustrate further, here’s another analogy:
Your daughter and future son-in-law wish to have a formal church wedding and a large reception afterward. As the happy parents of the bride, you agree to make the arrangements and foot the bill. Although the formal event will encompass only a seven-hour period, the preparation will consume a process stage of six months.
Fortunate people are by definition those whom fortune favors—but they are favored because they effectively use their lead time during the process stage. In baking a cake, taking a final exam, or planning a wedding, the efforts expended early determined the final result.
By the same token, it is choice, not chance, that determines the ultimate outcome of a negotiation. Circumstances do not evolve by chance—they are brought about by action or, more often, by inaction during the process stage. It is then, prior to the actual bargaining event, that attitudes are shaped, confidence established, and expectations developed. Should the negotiation event produce a harvest of discord, the likelihood is that the seeds were sown and cultivated during the process stage. As Benjamin Disraeli said, “We make our fortunes and call them fate.”
Therefore, fortune will favor the person who uses his lead time to seed an environment of trust that will grow and ripen during the event. This ability, to use the present in anticipation of the future, will make the difference.
Before the conflict has been formalized is when you can impact most effectively on the other side’s attitude. As I indicated, once the red light glows on the TV camera, the other side is often on guard and becomes reluctant to expose anything that will increase their vulnerability.
Before the process has become a formal event your actions and behavior are taken at face value. But once an event has crystallized, anything you do is often viewed as a ploy, a gambit or a gimmick, especially in a competitive environment.
Let me exaggerate to elaborate upon this point.
You and I meet for the first time during the event, in what could be a prolonged competitive negotiation. Supposing you offer me a cup of coffee and a cigarette, even though you yourself abstain. What will my reaction be? If there’s no trust in our relationship, I might be thinking, “What’s his motive? Is he trying to soften me up?” Conceivably, if I were even more suspicious I might think, “This guy is trying to keep me awake at night. Maybe he wants me to get emphysema!” Obviously, if you made the same offer prior to the event, I would regard it as a gracious gesture from a considerate person.
In short, there are certain actions prior to the event that will give you pluses, goodwill, and credit. Yet during the event in an adversary climate, those same actions will result in minuses, cocked eyebrows, and debits.
Therefore, you must make effective use of the process stage of a negotiation. You cannot afford to wait until the actual confrontation or event. Use this lead time to analyze and diagnose the cause of the potential disagreement. Earlier we said that conflict may arise from differences in experience, information, or the role we have.
Take action before the formal event in these three areas to narrow the variance of viewpoint and to build trust. Constantly hold in your mind a picture of the trusting, problem-solving climate that you would like to see when the event ultimately takes place and take action to bring it about.
Our world may be one of walking paranoia, but trust is the universal lubricant. No one will ever tell you anything worthwhile unless you are trusted with that information. No one will ever make an agreement with you that they intend to keep unless they trust you. So use the process stage to build relationships based upon trust.
B. The formal event
Once a relationship of trust has been established, it elicits recognition of mutual vulnerability, it prevents disruptive conflict from developing, and it encourages the sharing of information. The evolution to this climate will change attitudes, affect expectations, and transform gladiators into problem solvers. If the process stage was used to bring about this transformation, the parties will approach the formal event seeking a solution that will satisfy everyone’s needs.
At the outset of the formal event, continue to build upon the common ground and establish trust. Start off with a positive approach that will get immediate agreement on all sides. If the event is a group meeting, you might say, “Ladies and gentlemen, can we agree on why we are here? How does this strike you? … To fashion a fair and equitable solution to this situation that all of us can live with?”
Obviously, you are not asking for feedback, but your framing of the problem or goal is bound to generate assent. Why, your statement is the equivalent of asking for approval of apple pie, the flag, and a hot lunch for orphans!
The initial focus of the discussion should always be on getting agreement to this general statement of the problem. If you can get everyone looking to this end result, they will spend their energy and creativity searching for different alternatives and new ways that might accommodate the needs of all concerned.
Conversely, if you start out talking about means or alternatives, as in “my way versus your way,” you will quickly get bogged down in disagreement. From this point, demands and counter-demands follow, and the next step is that the group is polarized into winners and losers.
Thus, by keeping the emphasis on ends and not means, those involved will move from general disagreement to general agreement. This will reduce anxiety, defuse hostility, and encourage freer communication of facts, feelings, and needs. In such a creative climate a broad range of new alternatives will develop, enabling everyone to get what they want.
Let me give you an example of this. About a year ago, when conducting a bit of business in Ames, Iowa, I had dinner at a restaurant with a couple I’ve known for a long time. I’ll call them Gary and Janet. After we examined the menu I asked, “What’s wrong? If you don’t mind my saying so, you both seem a little tense.”
Gary fiddled with his fork. “You won’t believe this, Herb, but we’re having trouble deciding where to go on our two-week vacation this year. I want to go to northern Minnesota, or possibly Canada. Janet wants to go to play tennis at a resort in Woodlands, Texas—”
“Our high school son, who’s so crazy about water he’s like the Creature from the Black Lagoon, wants to go to the Lake of the Ozarks in southern Missouri,” interjected Janet. She added, “Our grade school son wants to see the Adirondacks again, because he has a thing about mountains … and our daughter, who’s a junior in college, doesn’t care if she goes anywhere this year.”
“How come?” I asked.
“Because she yearns for peace and quiet,” grumbled Gary. “She’d like to bask in the sun in our backyard and study for her Law School Aptitude Test. But we don’t want to leave her home alone.”
“Hmmm …” I said. “You’re sure all over the lot geographically. Minnesota, Texas, the Adirondacks, the Lake of the Ozarks, and your backyard are about as far apart as you can get.”
“You’d think it would be fun, discussing a vacation, but all we do is argue! Talk about conflict! Gary here doesn’t want to go to Texas because he can’t stand air conditioning.”
“Can you blame me?” said Gary. “I have an air conditioner breathing down my neck five months out of the year! It makes my muscles ache. I also can’t stand humidity, and Texas is humid.”
“That’s not all,” continued Janet. “My beloved husband doesn’t want to wear a jacket and tie to dinner—and I, for one, plan to dine out at a nice restaurant every evening. I’m tired of being the chief cook and bottle washer!”
“I plan to be casual this year,” said Gary. “I want to play golf while you play tennis and then not have to change again for a meal. By the way, our high school son doesn’t want to dress for dinner either. All he wants to do is walk around in his jeans.”
“Are you going to drive or take a plane?” I asked, mentally fitting their information tidbits together.
“We’re going to drive,” said Gary. “I’m a white-knuckle flyer.”
“But once we get to where we’re going,” Janet said, “I don’t intend to get in the car until we’re ready to come back. I spend too much of my time, whatever the season, acting as an unpaid chauffeur.”
After our waiter queried us, then jotted down our entrées, I said, “if you’ll pardon my saying this—and I think I can say it, because I’ve known you for a long time—I have a feeling you may be approaching this problem the wrong way.”
“I’m all ears,” said Gary, fiddling with his fork.
“What you ought to try,” I said, “is to find a solution all of you can not only live with, but be happy with.”
“How?” asked Janet, grinding out her cigarette.
“From what I hear,” I said, “all five of you are acting like adversaries, rather than collaborative problem solvers.” I turned to Gary. “According to your comments, your needs are to play golf, not dress for dinner, and get away from both air conditioning and humidity.”
“Right,” he said.
I turned to Janet. “According to your comments, your needs are to play tennis, eat out, and not have to drive a car.”
“True,” she assented.
“Your real needs aren’t necessarily to go to Texas or Canada. Those are means or alternatives that you think will satisfy your needs.”
They both pursed their lips.
Gesturing to a bus boy to bring us more water, I continued “Your youngest child wants to see mountains; your middle child wants to swim, fish, or do both; and your oldest child wants to study for an aptitude test. Are all those individual needs incompatible?”
“I don’t know,” said Gary. “Maybe not.”
“Listen, I know your family, and you all like and trust each other. So you are already halfway home. Have you tried having a collaborative Win-Win session with the whole family, where you first get agreement on the general problem?”
“Not really,” admitted Janet.
“Why don’t you try it after you leave here?” I suggested. “Huddle with each other and your kids and ask for their help in solving the family’s problem. Don’t discuss individual alternatives or means at the beginning, but keep the focus on the end result. In other words, ‘How can we satisfy everyone?’ ”
Gary cocked an eyebrow. “What do you say, Janet? Want to give it a try? You’re much more tactful than I am. You should be chairman of the family discussion.”
Janet shrugged. “All right. I’m game.”
A month and a half later, Gary phoned me at my office and blurted, “Herb! It worked!”
“What worked?” I asked.
“The collaborative solution to our vacation!”
“Good,” I grunted. “Where did you go?”
“To the Manor Vail Lodge in Colorado,” Gary said. “We did exactly as you suggested. Everyone got together, and we all shared our feelings and desires. Then we got travel folders and looked for a solution that would satisfy all our needs. From this discussion we came up with Vail, Colorado.”
“Why Vail?” I asked.
“Because it met all our needs. You were right about Texas, Canada, and all that. They’re great places, apparently, but this place seemed to really fill the bill for all of us. On paper, that is. And when we got there, it did. Tennis courts for Janet, golf course for me, really big mountains for the little guy, plenty of swimming and fishing for my high school kid (he even went white-water rafting), no air conditioning, because there’s no humidity during the day and it’s cool at night, ample peace and quiet for my studious daughter, no need to drive our car, because there were shuttle buses—and, though we dined out every night, I didn’t have to dress for dinner! How about that?”
“Great,” I said. “You also apparently enjoyed your prevacation brainstorming session!”
“You bet,” said Gary. “It brought all of us closer together. When are you coming to Ames again?”
“The very next time I get the itch for action,” I said, grinning.
“You’re okay, Herb—you certainly know the mechanics of fixing things,” he said.
“Not really, Gary. As you know, I’m mechanically inept. Even when I try hard to put my foot in my mouth I sometimes miss. However, the way you solved your problem was okay.”
That phone call made my day, because I like to see people who are in continuing relationships collaborate to resolve conflict creatively.
In the Gary, Janet, and family situation, everyone emerged victorious. The “Where shall we go?” negotiation wasn’t approached as an adversary encounter. Concern was exhibited for each person’s feelings and needs. Individual needs were harmonized and reconciled. All acted in a collaborative mode, rather than a competitive mode. The five gladiators were transformed into problem solvers. Because the brainstorming session emphasized ends, not means, a fair and equitable solution was arrived at—a solution that delighted everyone.
I wasn’t at the brainstorming session, but I’ll bet my bottom dollar that the formal event was kicked off with a positive approach that got immediate agreement on all sides.
Ordinarily, where continuing relationships exist, there’s adequate lead time available before a negotiating event—lead time in which you can build trust.
However, life being what it is, there are instances in which you cannot or do not anticipate a negotiating event that suddenly looms before you. Instead of anticipating the event and and preparing for it, the way you’d like to, you’re dumped into it, head over heels. In such a circumstance, can you establish the confidence and faith required to produce a Win-Win outcome? The answer is yes, if you size up the situation correctly. Even without a process stage, you can use the event itself to probe for information and establish a relationship that will yield a favorable outcome for both sides. Let me share with you what happened to me not too long ago.
After some discussion during my absence, my family decided that our lifestyle was inadequate unless graced with the presence of a videotape recorder—to be exact, an RCA VHS Selecta-Vision, plus a twenty-one-inch Sony TV set with a remote control. When I arrived home late one Friday night, I was summarily informed that I’d been selected, based upon qualifications, to buy these items the following morning. Mine is a democratic family, so no matter how I protested, the scales were tipped four to one against me.
Actually, I was protesting not the request itself, but only the timing. I planned to use a videotape recorder in a new business venture and had been thinking for some time of gauging its effectiveness. Nevertheless, after spending an entire week in an exasperating negotiation overseas, I didn’t relish the thought of facing off with a department store clerk or a local shop owner.
But I did. After all, one must maintain one’s status in one’s family. The biggest problem I had was time. All the local stores open at 9:00 A.M. Since I was taking my youngest to a college football game at 11:00 A.M., I didn’t have much of an interval in which to gather information, use time effectively, and exercise power.
Fortunately, I knew my needs. They were to acquire the product at a reasonable price and to have it delivered and installed in good working order. The latter need is especially important for me, since I am the person who once spent 3½ hours putting together a three-piece bird feeder.
While driving into town, I said to myself, “Herb, you don’t want to get a great deal; just don’t end up in the Guinness Book of Records for buying the most expensive standard videotape recorder. So play it cool.”
Acting as though I had all the time in the world—so cool as to be virtually catatonic—I casually entered the establishment at 9:20 A.M. “Hi,” I said to the proprietor.
“Hello there,” he replied. “Can I help you?”
“Well, I don’t know,” I responded. “I’m just looking around.”
Since I was the only customer in the store and seemed to have a lot of time I started up a friendly conversation. I asked, in an offhand manner, how the new shopping center in the neighborhood was affecting his business.
“Well,” he vouched, “there’s been a slump due to it, because it just opened. But I think business will come back—you know how things are. People want to see what the center’s all about, you know? But they’ll soon get tired of it, don’t you think?”
I nodded in agreement.
He continued, “Eventually, I believe, old customers will return.”
While looking at clock radios and TV sets, and expressing some interest in videotape recorders, I continued to ask questions and build a relationship. I told him where I lived and how important I thought the local merchants were to the community.
Wiping his mouth with the back of one hand, he murmured, “I wish more residents of this town felt that way.”
As I listened with empathy, he started to talk about his problems. “I don’t know why people in this town always have to use those plastic charge cards. You’d think the government doesn’t print enough money. It costs me whenever they charge.”
While continuing our amicable discourse I ran my fingers over a videotape recorder. “Hmm …” I interjected. “How does this thing work? I’m all thumbs, you know. I don’t even know the difference between AC and DC.”
He showed me how it worked. “Here’s an example,” he said. “Before that shopping center opened, some executives would buy two or three of these at one time for their business. But lately nothing!”
Following this I asked, “Oh, if they buy more than one, you give a discount like the big stores?”
“Oh yes,” he said, his eyes visibly sparkling. “I do sell items cheaper in quantity.”
After showing specific interest in the videotape recorders and receiving a fifteen-minute demonstration, I inquired, “Which would you personally recommend?”
Without hesitation he stated, “Why, this RCA is your best bet. I have one myself.”
It was now almost 9:45 A.M., and we were on a first-name basis, Herb and John. We had a relationship going, and I knew a great deal about his needs and problems.
Now, with the foundation in place, I said, with the humility of Oliver Twist hesitantly asking for a bowl of gruel, “Look … I don’t know what these things cost. In fact, I haven’t the faintest idea. But John, I want to encourage you to stay in business. You know your costs. Tell you what I’m going to do, John—I’m going to rely on you. Just as I trust your recommendation as to the best model, so I’ll trust you when it comes to a fair price. I’m not going to quibble with you in any way. Whatever number you come up with—whatever you write down as a fair price—I’ll pay you right now!”
“Thank you, Herb,” John said, genuinely pleased.
I continued, still casual, still fairly offhand, “I rely on your honesty, John. I feel I know you. I won’t question any figure you come up with, even though I realize I can probably better it by shopping around at various department stores.”
John wrote down a figure, though he shielded it from me with his right hand.
“I want you to make a reasonable profit, John … but, of course, I want to get a reasonable deal myself.”
At this point, I introduced more information. (Remember, I’d entered his shop with instructions to also purchase a twenty-one-inch Sony color TV set, complete with remote control.) I said, “Wait a second … what if I also got this Sony with remote control? Would that have a bearing on the total price?”
“You mean as a package deal?”
“Yes, I thought about it based upon what you said earlier,” I said softly.
“Of course,” he murmured. “Just one second while I add up all these numbers.”
When he was finally ready to give me the total price, I said, “There’s just one more thing I should mention to you. I expect that what I am paying you is fair—a transaction where we both profit. Should that be the case, when my business makes a smiliar purchase in three months, you have already made that sale.”
As I continued to talk, I noticed that he crossed out the price he had written. “But John, if I should find out that my trust was misplaced, this disappointment will prevent me from giving you any additional business.”
“Of course,” he murmured. “Let me go into the back room for a minute. I’ll be right back.”
After consulting a book, he returned in a minute and a half and scrawled another figure.
Following on what he had said earlier, I now ventured, “I was thinking about what you said a few minutes ago. You know—about your cash-flow problem. That gave me an idea I hadn’t thought of before. I was going to charge all this, but … would it be more convenient for you if I paid you in cash?”
“Oh, yes,” he replied. “That would help a great deal. Especially now.” Saying this, he jotted another number on his pad.
I tugged my lower lip. “You’ll install this for me, right? I won’t be in town, you know.”
“Oh, yes,” he said. “I’ll install it for you.”
“Okay,” I said. “Give me your price.”
He gave me the package price for the RCA and the Sony. It totaled $1,528.30—which I later learned represented an equitable collaborative transaction.
I strode to a bank three doors away, made out a check for that amount, cashed it, and returned to John with the money in my hand. It was now 10:05 A.M—mission accomplished!
All right: What happened here? How did I come out the way I did, though I was unprepared? How did I escape being victimized, in what might have been a competitive situation?
The Specific “Game Plan”:
John not only installed the equipment beautifully, but he also gave me a free stand for the videotape recorder—a stand I hadn’t thought of asking for. Oh yes, two months later I fulfilled my commitment, when a second purchase was made for my business. Since this episode, we have become friends and have a close, trusting relationship.
In substance, once trust exists it tends to endure. You may have observed that many people fall out of love; yet rarely does anyone fall out of like. Where trust is lacking you are attempting to build the foundation of an agreement on quicksand. To cite an example, you may see political contenders try to come together in the euphoric last stage of a national political convention. Without an underpinning of trust, the framework of these negotiations collapses. Therefore, if you want a successful outcome that results in mutual commitment, the first order of business is building trust. The sooner the better!