Negotiating Well

WIP.

Black Swan Method

• Questions, not to get answers, but to invoke thoughts in the other party. For example, during a job interview:
  • What happens if you guys don’t fulfill this role?
  • How can I be most successful for you?
  • How can I begin to be involved in project that are critical to the strategic future of this organisation.
  • (How am I supposed to accept a salary of half of what I’m worth.)
• Why?
  • Your other options don’t change your value to the company AND don’t change their ability to pay you.
  • You should be working WITH your boss and vise versa.
• If you ask a question you should mean it.
  • This means you both want to know the answer, and are willing to listen carefully to the person who asks the question.

Loving what you do/Having an aim

• Most meaning comes from adopting voluntary responsibility.
  • If you don’t adopt voluntary responsibility, some involuntary responsibility will be forced upon you.
    • You have to adopt responsibility. If you don’t, some involuntary responsibility will inevitably be thrust upon you.
• Ask yourself: why do you want a job when you go for a job interview?
  • Beside paying next month’s rent. Which is still perfectly valid, but it will not make you a compelling enough interviewee. It is too shallow.
    • It shows you haven’t thought it through enough.
• You can have what you want, but you have to specify what it is.
  • People generally do not do this, because they might feel like they are betraying themselves.
  • If you have a job interview that goes well and it turn into a discussion. If you have a vision for your own life, then you can see if this job will work for you.
    • This will turn the job interview into a negotiation. Because you want the job, and ideally, they also want you.
      • This is ultimately the goal of the job interview: establishing the preconditions for collaboration.
  • When in a job interview: Make sure you know what job your applying for.
    • If you don’t, then you might as well not be there in the first place. Because if you don’t know, what will you add to the company?

Importance of listening

• Listening is not only about what is said, but also how it is said.
• A ‘change of heart’ is much more effective if you decide to have that change of heart, instead of someone forcing it down your throat.
  • Voluntary acceptance vs involuntary compliance, if you will.
  • You want an agreement to last, without either party having to check daily.
    • Micromanage if you will.
  • People become micromanagers for one of two reasons:
    • Their personality happens to be like that.
    • They negotiated a deal that the other party is not thrilled about and they have to micromanage to ensure the other party actually does what they want.
  • Neither case is desirable.
• You should be able to summarize what the other person has said.
• Voluntary agreement is the best basis for an optimal relationship.
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The basis of software development

• When you build a product for a customer, you don’t just build it.
  • You build a bit of it, and discuss if it solves the problem the customer is facing.
    • If it does, keep going.
    • If it doesn’t, change it to better fit the requirements.
  • This, in principle, is what agile is.
    • Iterable development is not much different than having a relationship.
      • You talk and listen. You act upon it. You talk and listen some more.