Negotiations

Types, Qualities and Emotions

M. Humayun Kabir
Former Ambassador/Secretary
BIAM
20 October 2022

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Outline
• Types of negotiations
• Qualities of a good negotiator
• Management of emotion
• Summary

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Types of negotiations: Distributive
• The term distributive means there is a giving out or a scattering of
things. By the nature of the business, there is a limited or finite
amount of what’s being distributed or divided.
• Hence, this type of negotiation is often referred to as “The Fixed
Pie.” There is only so much to go around, and the proportion to be
distributed is limited but also variable.

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Distributive negotiations
• Distributive negotiations generally revolve around a single issue.
• A distributive negotiation usually involves negotiators starting talks
with no pre-existing relationship.
• This type of negotiation also involves being unlikely to develop a long-
term relationship. Simple, everyday examples include buying or selling
a car or a house.
• Purchasing products or services are simple business examples where
distributive negotiation bargaining is often employed. Remember,
even friends or business colleagues can drive a hard bargain just as
well as any stranger.
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Distributive Bargaining Basics
• Play your cards close to your chest – Give little or no information to the other side. The less
the other negotiator knows about our interests, the better our position. This can
include why we want to make the purchase, our preferences, or the point at which we’d
decline to deal. Expressing eagerness or need reveals a weakness which could be exploited.
• The opposite is equally true – Try to obtain as much information from the other side as you
can. Any further information uncovered is potential leverage to negotiate a better deal.
• Readiness to walk away from the negotiations, if our bottom line is not met.
• Make the first offer – Whatever the first offer is, will generally act as a negotiation anchor.
This then becomes the point on which the rest of the negotiation will revolve. Try to make
the first offer to ensure discussions set off in your favor.
• Be realistic – Being too greedy or too stingy will likely result in no agreement. So, keep
expectations realistic.

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Tactics
• Coercion-Threat of force or its use to wrestle concessions.
• Opening strong- Stating positions higher than normal expectations.
Set preconditions.
• Salami tactics-Prolong negotiations, create hindrances to progress,
offer small concessions, so the other side will reject it.
• Blame game: Put the responsibility on the other side and put the
blame for failure on the other side.

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Integrative negotiations
• The word integrative means to join several parts into a whole.
Integration implies cooperation, or a joining of forces, to achieve
something together.
• It usually involves a higher degree of trust and a forming of a
relationship.
• Both teams want to walk away feeling they’ve achieved something
that has value. Ideally, this means each team getting what they want.
• Win-Win situation is generally the outcome of such a process.

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Integrative negotiations-II
• There are many advantages when both teams take a cooperative
approach. Skillful mutual problem-solving generally involves some
form of making value-for-value concessions. This is usually in
conjunction with creative problem-solving.
• Generally, integrative negotiations involve looking to the future. They
also tend to involve forging long-term relationships to create mutual
gains. Reaching a mutually beneficial outcome is often described as
the win-win scenario.

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Integrative Negotiation Basics
• Multiple Issues – Integrative negotiations usually entail a multitude of issues up for
negotiation. In integrative negotiations, each side wants to get something of value
while trading something which has a lesser value.
• Sharing – To fully understand each other’s situation, both sides must realistically share
as much information as possible. This helps each side understand the other’s interests.
One can’t solve a problem without knowing the parameters. Cooperation is essential.
• Problem Solving – Find solutions to each other’s problems. For example, offer
something valuable to the other side, which is of lesser value to you. If you can make
this trade while realizing your objective, you have integrated your problems into a
positive solution.
• Bridge Building – More and more States are engaging in long-term relationships.
Relationships offer greater security and the promise of future success.

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Qualities of a good negotiator
• Honesty and integrity
• Empathy
• Responsible behaviour
• Larger perspective
• Good understanding of environment and issues
• Linguistic skills
• Listening capacity
• Solution orientation

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Emotions
• Emotions are a natural part of interpersonal relations, and certainly play a role in
negotiations. We cannot eliminate emotions, rather the object in negotiations is
to maximize positive, helpful emotions and minimize negative emotions.
• Key to managing emotions – yours and theirs – is to not focus on the emotions
themselves. Focus on the cause of the emotional outburst and on creating
positive emotions. If you understand what happens in your body when you have
severe emotional reactions, like excitement, anger and disappointment, you will
better be able to recognize the signs of severe emotional reaction and be poised
to diffuse it.
• When you are right you can afford to keep your temper. When you are wrong,
you can't afford to lose it.

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Areas of Emotion Management
• Three frames could be looked at:
Overall negotiating environment
Managing emotions of self
Manage emotions of the other side

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Nurture a Positive Environment
• Throughout the negotiating process, the following elements may
contribute to creating a positive environment for negotiations:
Relationship
Communication
Offers
Exchanges
Joint exploration
Outcome

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Managing Emotions – Self and counterpart
• Where do emotions come from? The heart or the brain?
• It may feel like your heart is beating faster and your blood is pumping
stronger, but the culprit here is the brain.
• Emotional situations are common in interpersonal relationships, and
certainly in negotiating process.
• As you might guess, heated emotions are most common in the
Bargaining Stage, although of course they can occur at other times as
well.

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Managing Your Emotions
• None of us is immune to feelings of anger, disappointment, surprise, anxiety -- pile on work stress,
sleepless nights, and worries about the future. Let's face it; we don't always react the way we wish
we had.
• We're responsible for our own behavior. You can blame the other side for causing your reaction, but
ultimately you have to take responsibility for it. Try these measures to manage your emotions in a
negotiating situation of escalating intensity:
• Breathe deeply. Change your internal physiology by filling your abdomen with air. Breathing deeply
changes your muscle memory, and enables the neo-cortex of your brain to take over, allowing you
to think positively and creatively.
• Positive self-talk. Aim for perspective. Tell yourself quickly that this will all work out. Say things to
you like, "I've been in a worse spot and turned things around." This positive self-talk will stimulate
your neo-cortex and allow for rational and creative thought to return.
• Get to details: Don't get yourself in an overly positive mood when you need to focus on detail. In
that situation you want to feel neutral so you can process and assess data objectively.

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Managing Your Emotions-II
• Walk around. Change your external physiology. Directing your muscles to do
something different can help you to direct your thoughts in a new direction as
well.
• Not everyone can pull off walking around in a heated moment. Try getting up
and look out the window, check the room thermometer, or go to the rest
room. It will seem unnatural to you and others in the room for you to do this at
a heated emotional point, but it will still help.
• Divert your focus. Take a moment to force thoughts of a pleasant distraction.
Imagine a beautiful place, an enjoyable evening you had, or your favorite song.
• Ask yourself helpful questions. When you ask yourself productive and positive
questions, your neo-cortex is stimulated to think rationally and creatively.

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Managing emotion on the other side
• You cannot calm another person down. Their thoughts got them angry. Only their thoughts can
calm them down. Your role is to try to influence their thoughts. Try these strategies:
• Recognize the signs. Be on the lookout for a flight/fight syndrome – and the adrenaline rush
that occurs when someone feels under attack. If you don't do something to correct the
situation, the person is likely to
• Fight – engage in win/lose negotiating
Flight – avoid negotiating
• This is not as easy as it sounds. The signs of flight or fight can be subtle. Look for changes in
voice and skin color, unusual silence, uncooperativeness, louder breathing, etc.
• Listen and Ask . Let them vent. Don't suggest solutions at this point. Ask questions. Invite more
venting: "Tell me more about that" Move from listening to asking when you ask a question and
they calmly respond. If you ask a question and they get very emotional, return to your listening
mode and try asking questions again after they have had more time to vent.

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Summary
• Be open minded
• Empathize
• Listen
• Reframe ideas
• Offer new ideas and solutions
• Explore joint solution
• Give the counterpart something to satisfy
• Get commitment on effective follow up and review
• Buy in external actors early on and involve them in implementation.
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Conclusion
• Negotiations involve multiple kinds of activities with possibility of
multiple outcomes.
• Reason, emotion, sentiments, pressure, persuasion play their roles in
a calibrated way.
• For a successful negotiator, the best option is to understand and
appreciate these dynamics and try to create his/her space to secure a
win- win outcome.

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• Any question, comment?

Thank you!

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