by Roger Fisher
It’s true that I did not complete that memo on time. I don’t want to neglect the needs of our clients. I’ve been trying to juggle work and home life. Could we take a few minutes to brainstorm ways that I might be able to spend time with my family and get things done more effectively? One idea I had was that I could make a routine of checking my office voice mail when I get home from work. If anything urgent comes up, I’ll be able to take care of it promptly. I can talk to my spouse about how to make sure that we have coverage for the kids when something here takes precedence. Do you have other ideas?
If Ryan did a little homework, he could discover whether or not his boss has children. If his boss is a widower with three children, he might try to establish a personal connection around shared roles as parents and organizational employees. He might ask, “How were you able to raise three kids and climb up the organizational ladder at the same time?” But he should ask the question only if he is honestly interested in learning the answer. Otherwise, he is not building authentic affiliation. Most people are very good at sensing the difference between affiliation and manipulation.
Autonomy
Ryan unduly limited his own autonomy in the meeting. Ryan regarded his boss’s feedback as descriptions of “the truth.” Any time that Ryan disagreed with the feedback, he experienced a gush of emotions screaming out, “That’s not who I am!”
It might be better for Ryan to exercise increased autonomy in his own mind. He could see whatever the boss says as a hypothesis to reflect upon alone, with his spouse and colleagues, and perhaps at a later time with his boss. Rather than becoming defensive in the meeting, he then will be more able to listen without judgment. He can decide later, in the comfort of his office or home, whether or not he thinks he is forgetful, bad about follow through, or irresponsible in terms of the amount of time he dedicates to his organization.
What if Ryan disagrees with aspects of his boss’s evaluation? He has the autonomy to choose his battles. There is no need to assert his autonomy around unimportant issues that do not have much of an impact on his future in the organization. (Is the memo issue that important?) If the boss says things that do have a significant impact, Ryan can ask questions to learn more. Then he can explain his perspective to the boss.
Because the boss submits his evaluation to the organization, Ryan apparently thinks he does not have any autonomy in the meeting. Not true. He has the autonomy to recommend ideas and information about his performance. In advance of the meeting, Ryan might prepare a memo describing what he believes to be the areas of his effective performance and areas in need of improvement. He could give this memo to his boss before their meeting. This memo might relieve the boss of some of the stress associated with having a great deal of autonomy in how to evaluate him. Ryan also has the freedom to prepare some questions about how he might improve his job performance or the strategic directions of the organization.
Status
Ryan seems to have fallen into the trap of assuming that status is a zero-sum concept: the more status the boss has, the less Ryan has. The meeting turns into a power game, with each trying to “one-up” the other as to whose evaluation of Ryan is “right.” This is an emotionally dangerous path to go down.
Rather, Ryan can use status to stimulate positive emotions in himself and the boss. Each holds areas of particular status worthy of the other’s deference. The boss outranks Ryan in terms of decision-making authority and managerial experience. Ryan outranks the boss in terms of ground-level understandings of what goes on in their organization. Therefore, Ryan wants to respect the boss in his areas of high status; and he wants to inform the boss of his own areas of high status that could help the organization.
Ryan might say, “I have had a lot of experience this year at the ground level of this organization. You have a tremendous amount of management experience. Is there any way I might brainstorm with you some possible ways to improve office morale and get junior colleagues more motivated?”
SUMMARY
In a negotiation, you always have a job to do. In most cases, however, how you do that job is up to you. You are free to expand the activities within your conventional role. In almost any role, you can focus your attention on aspects that are boring, dull, frustrating, and time consuming. You can define your role narrowly, limiting it to those things that you are obliged to do or that someone else expects you to do. Yet you have the freedom to shape activities in your role. Time and again, you also are free to choose temporary roles that empower you and foster joint work.
Reshaping your role can take effort. But don’t give up. Give it a try. And try again. Over time, you can modify your role to your liking.
III
Some Additional
Advice
CHAPTER 8
On Strong Negative
Emotions
They Happen. Be Ready.
When angry, count to ten before you speak; if very angry, a hundred.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
When angry, count to ten before you speak; if very angry, swear.
MARK TWAIN
To deal with emotions, our general advice is to take constructive action. Rather than worry about labeling emotions, diagnosing their causes, and figuring out what to do, you can often overwhelm whatever negative emotions a person might have with positive ones. This is done if you express appreciation, build affiliation, respect autonomy, acknowledge status, and choose fulfilling roles.
Sometimes, however, strong negative emotions—anger, fear, or frustration—may drive the behavior of others. They may stop listening to you, stop talking, or storm out of the room. Equally true, strong emotions may affect your behavior. You may find yourself angry and mulling over something that the other person said or did. If these emotions are unaddressed, there is a strong likelihood that they will escalate and prevent a wise agreement.
For better or worse, strong emotions are not hard to find. You do have to pay attention to them before they overwhelm your ability to negotiate.
A CASE IN POINT
“Burger Brothers,” a nationwide food chain, was negotiating with the owners of the “Super Sox,” a popular sports team. Almost two years before, “Sandra,” a lawyer and co-owner of the sports team, and “Bill,” a lawyer for the food chain, had negotiated a commercial agreement between the two corporations that included the following provision:
Burger Brothers agreed to pay the Super Sox $20 million dollars for the right to use the team’s logo on their cups and paper bags for two years and to have the exclusive right to sell Burger Brothers fast-food products during all baseball games at the park. Further, the Super Sox agreed to market Burger Brothers and their products throughout their network—in their game books, on arena walls, in announcements at games, and the like.
Nearly two years after the initial agreement was signed, senior executives of Burger Brothers became increasingly disappointed by the limited marketing effort by Super Sox on their behalf. Problems culminated when the CEO of Burger Brothers attended a ball game and saw no advertisements for Burger Brothers anywhere save for a one-inch advertisement on the back of the game book.
Two weeks before the agreement was to expire, executives for the Super Sox initiated a meeting with Burger Brothers to renew and renegotiate their contract. Sandra arranged to meet with Bill. These two had built a good working relationship while negotiating the prior agreement, but had not communicated in person since its completion two years back.
“Hi, Bill. Great to see you,” says Sandra.
“It’s been a while,” says Bill.
“Let’s get right down to business,” Sandra says with a smile. “We’ve enjoyed working with you and with Burger Brothers. And we would love to keep doing what we are doing. We’d even be willing to add some services—for the right price, of course.”
“Forget that,” Bill says, crossing his arms. “You didn’t fulfill what you pr
omised to do last time.”
“What?” asks Sandra, shocked.
“You said we were going to be your base client. But I felt like we were one of thirty customers. We didn’t get the services we paid for. If we decide to go forward, it’s only going to be if you drop your price by at least $4 million. That’s an order from Burger Brothers’ CEO.”
“That’s not going to happen! This is the first I’ve heard that anything’s been wrong. I worked my team hard to get things done for you.”
“That’s not what I hear!”
“Says who? And you can’t blame me. Not now! Why didn’t you raise this issue last year? Or two years ago?”
“But I didn’t know the extent of things then.”
“And you couldn’t call me? To raise this issue now—this is absurd!”
“Absurd? Two years ago, I went to bat for you with our CEO. I got Burger Brothers to agree to the deal. If I hadn’t vouched for you, none of this would have happened. And then you didn’t live up to your end of the bargain. So don’t tell me this is absurd!”
As the argument between Bill and Sandra escalates, their strong emotions begin to overwhelm their ability to think clearly. Despite the potential benefits of working together, they may say or do things that insult one another and jeopardize the likelihood of a renewed agreement.
This type of situation—where one person or company does not live up to the expectations of another—happens all the time and provokes strong emotions. It may be that your longtime housekeeper cleans less thoroughly than she used to but requests a raise and a two-week paid vacation. Or it may be that, two months ago, your supervisor promised to be your mentor as you move into your new role—but she has yet to find time to meet with you.
Countless other situations also provoke strong negative emotions. A person may betray your friendship, suggest that you are incompetent, or go behind your back to get a decision approved. He or she may disregard the importance of an issue to you, treat you unfairly, or ignore your ideas. The possible ways to offend someone are endless, but one point is certain: Strong negative emotions happen, so you had better be ready.
In this chapter, we offer prescriptive advice on how to deal with strong negative emotions—yours and those of others. We describe why strong negative emotions tend to make it difficult to reach agreement, and we offer a strategy to help you deal constructively with them.
STRONG NEGATIVE EMOTIONS CAN SIDETRACK A NEGOTIATION
Strong negative emotions pose two main problems for negotiators. First, they can cause you to experience tunnel vision, in which the focus of your attention narrows and all you are aware of are your strong emotions. As a result, your ability to think clearly and creatively gets sidetracked.
Imagine two teams negotiating. Out of all of the negotiators, only one is a woman. Every time she speaks, the other team’s lead negotiator speaks over her or looks the other way, as though she is not important enough for him to listen to. She gets angrier and angrier and becomes preoccupied with a single behavior—the other leader’s lack of acknowledgment. Tunnel vision hinders her ability both to think clearly about the substantive issues and to contribute ideas—losses both for her and for the other negotiators.
Second, strong emotions make you vulnerable to the point that your emotions take control of your behavior. As your emotions escalate, you risk acting in ways that you will regret. You are likely to fail to think about the consequences of your behavior, especially the long-term consequences. In a fit of rage, for example, you may insult your spouse (and end up sleeping on the couch) or storm out of a meeting (and end up disappointing both your boss and your hopes for a promotion).
To make matters worse, emotions feed off one another. Your anger can stimulate the other person’s anger, just as their anger can easily be “caught” by you. Strong negative emotions are like a snowball rolling down a hill. They get bigger as they roll along. The sooner you deal with strong negative emotions—yours and theirs—the easier it will be to stop them from running you over.
CHECK THE CURRENT EMOTIONAL TEMPERATURE
Whatever the source of strong emotions, you need first to become aware of them to avoid their escalation. One way to become aware is to check your “emotional temperature” often enough during a negotiation to catch your emotions before they overwhelm your ability to act wisely.
Take Your Own Emotional Temperature
Unlike taking your body temperature, there is no need to decide definitively whether your emotional temperature is 98.6 degrees or 100.2 degrees Fahrenheit. You do not even need to know which specific emotions you are experiencing—or even why. All you need to know is the general extent to which your emotions are starting to affect you. To take your emotional temperature, simply ask yourself, are my emotions:
Out of control? Past the boiling point. (I am already saying things better left unsaid.)
Risky? Simmering. Too hot to be safe for long.
Manageable? Under control. I am both aware of them and able to keep them in check.
To answer the question, quickly assess how manageable your emotions feel at the moment. Do you feel in control, or are you biting your tongue to stop yourself from berating the other negotiator? If you are finding it hard to concentrate on anything other than your emotions, your emotional temperature is at least “risky.”
Assess Their Emotional Temperature
The people you are dealing with may also experience strong emotions, some of which are negative. If you do not notice that they are simmering with anger, their emotions may boil over and lead to unpleasant—even disastrous—results.
Herein lies a problem. When negotiating, people engage in thousands of different behaviors—whether avoiding eye contact, talking loudly, or banging a fist against the table. How do you determine their emotional temperature from such a wide variety of behaviors?
Like a good detective, look for behavior that is out of the ordinary. Although you cannot be certain what emotions another may be feeling, unusual behavior can alert you to a rising emotional temperature. Has their voice gotten louder, changed pitch, or gotten quiet—too quiet? Has their face become immobile, flushed, or red? Did they show up for a meeting unexpectedly late and without a good excuse?
With a little bit of observation, you can get some sense of another’s ordinary way of acting. Are they consistently friendly? Quiet? Loud? Before you negotiate substantive issues with someone for the first time, consider having an informal meeting over a meal or coffee. Such an occasion offers an opportunity not only to build a sense of rapport and affiliation, but also to get a sense of their “ordinary” ways of acting. You will have more information from which to tell when they may be getting upset.
To get a sense of another’s emotional temperature, you can also step into their shoes for a moment and consider whether they have core concerns that may currently be unsatisfied. From their perspective, how do things feel? Because you arrived late at a meeting, might they feel that their autonomy was impinged? Upon discovering that you met with their competitor, might they feel disaffiliated from you and perhaps even betrayed? Ask yourself if those concerns might be significant enough to stimulate negative emotions.
HAVE AN EMERGENCY PLAN READY BEFORE NEGATIVE EMOTIONS ARISE
The worst time to craft a strategy to deal with strong negative emotions is while experiencing them. Imagine what would happen if hospital staff waited until each new patient arrived in the emergency room before considering from scratch what they should do. There would be chaos. Instead, emergency rooms have developed standard operating procedures followed by everyone from nurses to surgeons and used with every patient who comes through the door. Negotiators need their own standard operating procedure to avoid facing strong negative emotions unprepared. Such a procedure can help you avoid letting emotions take charge.
The goal of your emergency plan is not to get rid of str
ong emotions. Whether positive or negative, strong emotions give you information about core concerns, underlying interests, and hidden barriers to agreement. Strong emotions can also energize negotiators to work toward reaching agreement. The passion of an enthusiastic negotiator can be contagious and encourage long-term joint work, just as the impatience of a mediator who has worked for hours and hours with two disputants may pressure them to come to agreement. Either way, strong emotions serve a useful function. You do not want to ignore emotions and lose their energy and information.
Rather, you want to be able to make a conscious choice—a smart choice—about what to do with strong emotions and how to deal with the event that caused them. A wise course of action will take into account your emotions and your reasoning. Before you can reasonably reflect on your emotions, however, you first need to calm them.
Soothe Yourself: Cool Down Your Emotional Temperature
By soothing your escalating emotions, you enhance your ability to reflect on what your emotions might be telling you and what you should do about them. Although soothing can take many different forms, the basic idea is to engage in a behavior that brings your emotional temperature back to a manageable, calmer state. You want to be in control of your emotions, not have them in control of you.
What can you do to address your risky or out-of-control emotions? In the heat of anger or in a fit of frustration, it is hard to figure out how to soothe your strong emotions. Therefore, we suggest that you choose a self-soothing behavior now—while you are able to reflect clearly. Try it out the next time you find your emotions escalating in a risky direction. Here are some suggestions of things you can do in the moment: