October 17, 2023 • 43 mins
Is there at all the U.S. negotiation culture? Or is it a number of many cultures within this huge country?
With the guest of this episode we propose you to use the Harvard interest-based negotiation approach to deal with all of them.
This episode is the 2nd part of the conversation with Linda Netsch, the founder of Align Consulting, a general manager at the law firm Flex by Fenwick, a Lecturer on Law at Harvard and Stanford Law Schools and a visiting lecturer at UCU Business School.
Linda has more than 20 years of experience of helping clients to become better negotiators and leaders in US, Europe, Asia, and Middle East. Before private law practice Linda served as an officer in the US Air Force.
While in the first part we talked more about international negotiations, in this part we will five a bit deeper into the negotiation culture of the U.S.
You can find the first part of Linda's insights in the Episode on September 20th, 2023 "Negotiating internationally with Linda Netsch. Part 1."
In the second part we have discussed:
- different cultures in different states
- U.S. stereotypes
- why long term approach is important in negotiations
- how to understand the interests of your counterpart
- are there any taboos or hot buttons in the U.S. business culture
- how to deal with the conflicts and emotions in negotiations
Listen to the Start Global Insights podcast on all major platforms and YouTube. And don't forget to subscribe not to miss the second part of the conversation.
Speakers LinkedIn Profiles:
Guest, Linda Netsch https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindanetsch/
Host, Dmytro Shvets https://www.linkedin.com/in/dshvets/
Please, give us your feedback on Apple podcasts or write to the email: podcast@start-global.biz
Create your international expansion strategy with Start Global, your guide to foreign markets. https://www.start-global.biz/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hi, I'm Dmytro Shvets, your host at The Start Global Insights, where I interview experts
(00:11):
from different countries about local business secrets and international expansion experience.
You are listening to the second part of the conversation with Linda Netsch, the expert with
extensive experience in practicing and teaching interest-based negotiations around the world.
Linda is a lecturer at Harvard, Stanford and UCU Business School in Ukraine.
(00:32):
She is also the general manager at the law firm FLEX by Fandvik and the founder of Align
Consulting, where she provides executive education and consulting services for clients in the
US and internationally, including Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
In the first part, we have discussed with Linda how to negotiate internationally, and
(00:53):
in this part, we will dive deeper into the negotiation culture of the United States of
America.
I cannot not to use this situation because you are from the US and we are making the
podcast for exporters.
I would definitely like to understand if there are some cultural aspects in the US that you
(01:15):
should consider while negotiating.
Yeah, and again, the US is such a big place that you can – I think I've lived in at
least three different cultures within this country, if not more.
I think I've lived in seven different states and each one being a little bit different.
For example, right now, I live in Silicon Valley.
(01:38):
I'm very much in the tech ecosystem.
I'm very much influenced by the legal aspects of tech and the nature of the economy here.
I'm very familiar with the kinds of deals that are done when tech companies are trying
to sell their products internationally.
(01:59):
I know in the tech contracts that the law firm I work for deals with every day, there
are certain issues that are constantly negotiated.
If you were trying to sell into a market here, I think I could describe some of the things
that I've seen in both investing in companies here and being part of a law firm that represents
(02:22):
companies here and running a business that's part of that law firm.
I think some of the stereotypes of Americans would be direct communication.
That also depends very much on the people you're negotiating with, but the stereotypes
would be a little less of the relationship building.
The old stereotype of more of the Asian culture would be more, let's build a relationship
(02:46):
first and then we'll get down to that.
That too is a stereotype with truth and false in it.
There's plenty of, let's take you to the giant space ball game client.
Let's have drinks and dinner client.
There's certainly an awareness of the importance of the relationship, but the assumption is
(03:07):
when you're negotiating, that's when you're down to, okay, now let's focus on the facts
and figures, the law, the price, the warranty, et cetera.
I think that the listeners will be very disappointed after listening to us that everything is so
simple.
From other sources, they're expecting that you need to really learn how they negotiate.
(03:30):
Some tricks, how to approach who is in charge in the room.
In Japan, it might be the oldest person or in the Arab Emirates, the last one is the
chief who is coming into the room or this type of things.
If you are in US, then you need to have this small talk about the weather or if the US
(03:53):
person is asking you, how are you?
It doesn't mean he needs to or really wants to hear the whole story of your life.
I think that stereotype is probably one of the more accurate ones.
It's funny how often I hear that.
The Harvard course that I teach is very international.
(04:13):
Often there are students from all over the world, students getting their masters in law
that are part of that program.
It's one of the most common complaints, if you will, about US culture that, hi, how are
you?
Doesn't mean how are you, it means hi.
Now, we get on to the next point.
Whereas most other cultures, if you're going to take the time to ask how someone is, you
(04:38):
might actually be curious about how they are and what their response to that might be.
It's like you care about somebody, yes, about the others.
Yeah.
One of the students talked about going to Starbucks and the barista asked her how she
was and she said, I just started to tell the person how I was and was astounded by how
off-putting that was to the person making my coffee.
(05:00):
Yeah, sure.
Those kinds of things are helpful.
I think it's actually helpful to study up, if you will, in a culture, try to learn as
much as you can about what the stereotypes are.
Then there is no playbook for how it works everywhere.
I opened a playbook for how to negotiate in Silicon Valley or in Dallas.
(05:23):
I think the importance is know that there are differences, try to see what the typical
ones might be, and then go in with the same kinds of mindset you would have no matter
where you are, which is what's motivating this person.
If there is a power thing going on in your multi-party negotiation, yeah, pay attention
(05:44):
to that.
You're a decision maker if there is such a thing.
Notice who talks, who doesn't.
Notice who's paid attention to and who is not.
Those can just help you understand how to influence a group of negotiators.
At the end of the day, the important thing is learn as much as you can about what's motivating
the other side.
(06:05):
Learn what you think their perception of appropriate standards, criteria are.
Then even the process of putting up your own proposals and options as they go along, each
time you get negative feedback on what you've proposed, you're learning something.
You might not like that you were just told they didn't like your proposal, but that gives
(06:26):
you an opportunity to learn more about what they're thinking.
The more you learn about that, whether you're in Shanghai or in Seoul or you're in Prague,
the better off you are in terms of your own ability to do deals in negotiation that satisfy
your own interest.
Yeah, this is the biggest problem of salespeople.
(06:51):
Without this experience of negotiations, they do not know why there was the reason of rejection.
Why they lost a deal.
Even if it is not a common case in culture to ask for the feedback, but you still can
do it.
You still can request what's the point of this proposal and why you have not accepted
(07:15):
that or just give me a hint.
So this proposal would satisfy your needs in the future.
So I would not waste your time, my time and pin you with the same case again.
Yeah, absolutely.
I think the instinct to ask for feedback to understand why, look, the truth of the matter
(07:38):
is sometimes you just won't get that answer.
People often don't want to say what their motivation was or why the alternative beat
you on price.
But regardless of whether you get the response or not, at least asking for that feedback
is an important part of learning more about what worked and what didn't.
(08:01):
It's like try not die.
Yeah, try.
Exactly.
And at the end of the day, sometimes the other party has a better alternative.
They have a better than whatever you could offer.
And so winning doesn't mean getting every deal or beating the other side's bottom line.
(08:24):
Winning means you got a deal that either you walked your alternative and you live to negotiate
another day or you got a deal that met your own interests, that tried to create value
and get as many interests built into that deal as possible.
It's legal, right?
It's built on some sort of standards that are enforceable or at least justifiable.
(08:48):
And it's better than your better than your better than what you could have done had you
walked away from that deal.
Yeah.
And I think that the main point of the interest-based negotiation is that you perceive this negotiation
in the long term.
So the zero sum is like you are winning now or never.
(09:08):
But if you are in the interest-based and in the long term thinking, if you lost now, it
doesn't mean that you lost the deal or you lost in life.
Because the time flies by.
The people may change.
The roles may change.
And you learn a lot from every loss in every deal.
You learn a lot.
(09:28):
And if you analyze that and you plan ahead, then every loss might be the gain in the future.
Absolutely.
I think that's an important point of the viewpoint of short-term versus long-term.
I might be able to trick you and get a great deal today, but generally that means you're
not going to either not want to negotiate with me next time or you're going to be looking
(09:53):
to even the score the next time around.
So the problem with that short-term win is it can have long-term negative consequences.
You know, we do in courses, I'm sure you've done this as well, we do exercises where that
plays out.
You can see how a choice in round one where you trick the other side often comes back
(10:16):
to haunt you in round 10 when the other side has the opportunity to pay you back.
So shifting your mindset around that long-term versus short-term relationship and reputation
versus short-term wins is a helpful framework to having your own mind in negotiations.
I think this is like a heritage of the past because in the past when you were living in
(10:41):
one country and your counterpart in another and you would like sell him or something and
you won't see him or her forever.
And now everything is so connected.
And everything is so transparent and this digital footprint that you have.
So you can write something about some person on the other point of the earth or you might
(11:05):
have an employee and then this employee becomes very easily and very quickly a partner of
the other organizations and you would need to have business with them.
So it changes so quickly and it is so transparent that it is not already the time to cheat somebody
because you will be cheated in the future.
(11:27):
It's a small world after all.
Coming back to US.
I understand, it depends.
It's also the best answer of the lawyers.
It depends.
But are there some taboos or some things that you would be careful about?
I just remember the case when I was in the United States in North Dakota and we went
(11:51):
to a bar and of course drinking beer and talking a lot.
And I am so curious.
I'm very curious about cultures and nations.
So I was really frank and curious about two questions that actually turned the evening
into a disaster.
The first one was about the indigenous people and the second about Vietnam.
(12:19):
And the person I was talking to was a military guy.
And I was curious why the hell you have gone to Vietnam to fight for the war at the other
side of the planet and what have you done with the indigenous people in America?
And that totally destroyed the evening.
(12:40):
So of course no fight appeared but the relationship was a bit not so good after that.
Yeah, well, I mean, I guess those are the tricky hot button topics are no matter where
you are in the world, are things to be cautious about.
(13:02):
And I think you can often ask a question in a very broad way like what's your point of
view on US and Afghanistan or how have you experienced US policy toward Russia?
Whatever it might be, a very open-ended question is probably safer if you're going to tread
(13:22):
on that potentially dangerous ground.
It reminds me a bit of the first time I went, this is many years ago now, but the first
time I went to the Middle East and I had my own kind of stereotypes of what that experience
would be like.
First of all, I was surprised that they were asking a woman to come and teach business
(13:44):
people negotiation in the Middle East.
Again, it was a stereotype that was wrong.
And I remember speaking to the people who brought me over in advance asking, what should
I not do?
Very cautious about doing the wrong thing if I was there.
And I think they were kind of surprised at how fearful I was of stepping on verbal landmines
(14:07):
in some way or just behavioral ones.
And really the only after talking to them for a period of time, I realized, just be
humble, realize you're in someone else's set of norms.
I think the only piece of advice they gave me was don't use a lot of alcohol examples.
This is a dry country.
(14:27):
Don't drink while educating.
Don't drink while educating.
I'm not going to use examples about buying cases of wine, right?
Because you just should know that's your culture where if it's not a part of the culture, if
it's not appreciated in the culture, don't talk about that.
But to your examples, if you're going to talk about hot button things, American politics,
(14:47):
right?
Just know you're in dangerous territory and therefore the more kind of open you are to
just being curious about their point of view, the less you're putting judgment in your questions.
I think it's natural.
If we have a strong point of view, it's natural to have our questions turn into assertions.
(15:08):
That is, what the heck were you doing in Iraq, Americans?
And that is going to have a different impact probably on a military guy than a San Francisco
peacenik.
But it is being very cautious when you're in territory that you know, even if you're
(15:29):
curious, that you know might be something the other side doesn't have a strong interest
in talking about or hearing another point of view about.
Yeah.
One more point that I remembered, the old Ukrainians were growing up in Soviet times,
so Soviet culture.
And we had a lot of kind of a political friendship with Africa.
(15:50):
So the question of racism or interracial relationship was a bit different in our country.
And for example, the word Negro was quite okay, not like offensive word, we didn't mean
something about the race of the other party.
And you could see that in Ukraine, we don't have these issues of racism because we don't
(16:15):
have too much of a relationship with that.
But I heard from my friends in the US and Canada, they had a lot of problems within
this situation.
Like actually even in some cases, looking at black people, if they were white, was causing
some bad reaction.
(16:35):
Because there was this expectation of racism from their side, although they were not in
this situation, meaning something with them.
Yeah.
It's interesting that this assumptions we make about people's intentions versus what
their impact was.
(16:57):
I might say something that I intend to be a compliment or a curiosity that is offensive
to another party and just not even be aware of it.
Much more likely that's going to happen if you're a different culture or if there are
different norms.
Or I think to your point, if a culture is much more homogeneous, if you will, as opposed
(17:20):
to extremely diverse around different races within a culture, there are just different
assumptions are made about people's comments just based on the culture that you're in.
Again, I think we all make mistakes or accidentally insult all too regularly.
The question is whether or not you accept that when it happens, you realize that if
(17:45):
my behavior had a negative impact on you, I don't tell you why you shouldn't feel that
way.
I'm going to learn from it and then not do it again, depending on obviously the situation.
But the notion is, look, if what you did hurt somebody and it isn't a matter of principle
that you have to do or say what you did, then adapt that change.
(18:07):
I think noting that we can dial our own behavior to be okay with the people we're working with
can help us be more persuasive in our negotiation and be less likely to provoke others.
At the end of the day, we all make mistakes and the more we're willing to own them when
(18:29):
we make them, forgive them when they happen to us and be curious about why that happened.
I think that helps with broad issues that we're talking about around cultural difference,
racial difference, gender difference.
Again, humility is a good trait in negotiation.
Not always valued, as we can certainly see among some very prominent people in the world.
(18:54):
But at least I'm going to stand on the principle that humility is a good quality, listening
is a good quality, curiosity is a great quality.
That's just my own perspective on what helps you be more successful in negotiation.
At least it is always helpful.
It might be that you won't be able to use it to some extent in some cases when you cannot
(19:18):
influence the situation, but it will be helpful for your conclusion for the future when you
meet such people again.
Just one last around this notion of curiosity, listening.
I think one of the areas we explore often in negotiation courses is the distinction
between empathy and assertiveness.
(19:40):
And that those two things can be intention.
Empathy being if we define that as the ability to understand the point of view of the other
side of another person.
Not necessarily agree with it, but at least understand it.
And try to communicate it to the other side that they actually believe you understand
them.
(20:00):
So I not only do understand you, I communicate back to you what I understand your thinking
to your satisfaction.
Yeah, you believe I got it.
That's the empathy piece.
So the empathy is focused on the point of view of the other.
The assertiveness is standing up for your own interests, your own point of view, making
sure that your standards are also discussed in a negotiation.
(20:24):
And both of those are important.
Some people are very good on the empathy, but not very strong at standing up for themselves
or saying what they really think or making sure that their interests are also met.
So if you're good at empathy, you probably have to work on your assertiveness muscle.
On the other hand, there are plenty of people who are very good on the assertiveness side,
saying what they want, demanding what they want, but not good at understanding the perspective
(20:46):
of the other side or what the other side wants or what the other side feels.
And so if your strong suit is assertiveness, probably what you should do is work on your
empathy muscle because you need both of them.
It's not an either or, it is a both.
And then it's in any given situation, even back to your conversation about like talking
(21:07):
about difficult topics.
That's one maybe you want to lean on the empathy skills a bit more, right?
And just understand the other person's point of view.
Whereas if I'm with a negotiator, it's very dominant, very zero sum, I've got to lean
on my assertiveness skills and work harder on making sure that I also am having my needs
(21:27):
met in the negotiation.
And just that awareness and that simple, you know, yeah, we talked a lot today about gray
areas and it depends.
Interest, favorite phrase, it depends.
But there are some fundamental things that are very helpful.
Interest versus position and empathy versus assertiveness.
Just those concepts can help guide you when you're in this kind of messy world of human
(21:50):
communication, human relationships.
I've recently saw like in social media, some shorts and in YouTube, the guy was saying
that I learned a very useful word that sounds like interesting.
If you meet somebody and he says to you something that you are not to agree with, take a moment
and say, interesting.
(22:11):
If you will use this word, it will help you to get the answers, what is going on and time
to think.
And I actually think there's something to that.
It's good to have when something hits you wrong, it's good to have a more neutral thing
to say besides what the heck is wrong with you, right?
(22:32):
And interesting might be a good thing to rely on when you are thinking that's crazy.
But when you tell somebody they're crazy or you think they're just flat out wrong, often
that's not going to make them open up more, it's going to make them fight more maybe.
But maybe having some of those kind of crutches on how to deal with the behavior that we don't
(22:55):
like, like interesting is a good tool.
Let's come back to the Harvard methodology and the key elements that you said.
We were talking a lot about interests.
And I think that this point that you said about assertiveness and empathy is about these
two sides of interests.
(23:16):
So you need to understand your interests.
So you need to understand what do you want.
And this is actually also quite tough tasks.
And it seems obvious, but when you are sitting and writing them down, it is quite hard to
figure out what is your interest actually in this negotiation.
And then the empathy is for the interests of the other party.
(23:37):
And here is the main question I hear is how can I understand when I'm preparing for negotiations?
So I'm not talking to the person.
Yeah, so I'm guessing.
How can I imagine or how can I understand the interests of the other party?
(24:01):
What is the approaches or how can I predict that?
Are there any advices how people can do that?
One thing I think in your question, in the lead up to the question that's very helpful
is to do that preparation.
I think too often we don't have a systematic way to prepare.
(24:22):
And even if you take a few minutes of being disciplined around what you said, which is
take a piece of paper, write my interests, write their interests, and try to brainstorm,
if you will, think about as many as you can possibly come up with.
Challenge yourself to do that, your own first.
(24:44):
And then what you think the other sides are.
And to your point, before you have a chance to speak with them, how do you know?
Well, in this day and age, there are ways of researching people's past.
It could be what their jobs have been in the past.
It could be what they've said on social media.
It could be what their likes are on social media.
(25:06):
You can at least try to build some assumptions about the other side.
If they're a complete stranger, that's a good place to start.
If there are other people who know this person that you're able to communicate with, that
can be helpful as well.
And so to work on any ways of learning more about them, but also even if you don't have
that, you can make some educated guesses, some logical guesses perhaps around what you
(25:32):
think motivates them.
Money is always, depending on obviously the negotiation, you can assume some things about
what people want, but also try to challenge yourself to be broader than just they want
money and they want credit.
Right?
Well, what else do they want?
How much does creative control mean to them?
(25:52):
How much does selling this to their boss or their constituents mean?
Right?
Really try to put yourself, you know, saying and put yourself in their shoes to the best
extent you can.
And then realize as you look at your list of what you want and what they want, my interests
and their interests, notice that your list of their interests is something you should
(26:13):
be asking questions about.
Are you right?
And so, like their responses to discussions about what appropriate salary are or appropriate
price for the object being sold, that helps you learn whether or not you're right about
their priorities and what their interests might be as well.
So the main point though is that preparation piece in advance.
(26:35):
If you can learn more about them, great.
Do however that might be.
Do your research.
But if nothing, you know, people often say, oh, it's just so much work to do these long
preparation sheets and come up with all these.
It's common sense.
So why should I write it down?
Yeah, exactly.
Everything is obvious.
Yes, Odi.
(26:55):
Right.
I mean, why do you write down a grocery list?
Because you might not remember that thing in the moment.
Good point.
So the power of actually typing out or writing out, those can, it's helpful for the creative
process, if you will.
Right?
If I see my list of my interests next to yours, that might prompt some ideas on ways we could
(27:18):
do this deal or things we might agree on that weren't so obvious when I was just doing it
all in my head.
And so if I said, what's the fastest preparation process you can use?
Write out your interests and their interests and then be careful about whether you're accurate
on their interests, learn during the negotiation, write out your alternatives and theirs.
(27:41):
Right?
What are you going to do if this falls apart?
And what do you think they're going to do if this falls apart?
Again, you might ask some questions aimed at understanding whether or not your perception
of their alternatives are accurate.
What are relevant standards?
Do I have a legal case that applies?
Do I have market research that shows what the option I'm proposing will work?
(28:07):
And that process alone, my interests, their interests, my alternative, their alternative,
what are relevant standards?
Looking at that often shows you a variety of options that you might be able to agree
on in the course of the negotiation.
That doesn't take all day.
Yeah.
And actually on this list, you can see already what interests are common and what you can
(28:29):
promote as a common interest and get the common outcome of the negotiations.
Yeah.
In one thing that isn't part of the seven elements, but I have found is really helpful
is particularly when you're doing the interest lists of mine and theirs is what resources
and capabilities do you have that might be of value to them or that you just have, whether
(28:54):
you thought about whether they care or not?
And same for them, right?
What do they have?
What are their connections, other products, relationships, know-how?
What do they have that's of value to me?
That combination of the things you want and what you can offer and the things they want
and what they can offer can be a really rich list for possible options that are better
(29:18):
for both sides and that capture as much value as possible.
Yeah.
I think that this is a very good thing exactly in our question of intercultural or intercultural
or inter-country international negotiations because in most cases, the exporters, at
least what I hear when they are selling something abroad, they are thinking about only price.
(29:38):
It's like, I will sell cheaper.
Right.
Then if you are thinking broadly, if you brainstorm, then you can find out much more values that
you can propose to your counterpart in other country that they do not have now because
the cheap price and everybody is complaining about the China, yes, or the cheapest prices
coming from China, so you cannot compete.
(30:00):
But in fact, you can compete.
We had the case with Canadians that said that they are tired of China.
They are tired of the misconceptions or different understandings, so they are very lucky to
have Ukrainian furniture because it takes the same amount of time to deliver that to
Canada and the same quality or even better.
(30:24):
And price is not that much important in this case because you are getting much more value
in communicating or predictability of the delivery.
So you order the chair, you got the chair and that's what the value for them might
be.
Yeah.
One thing that I think about particularly now with Ukraine and thinking about exporting
(30:46):
or dealing with countries beyond Ukraine.
Obviously, Western Europe is a closer market for Ukrainian goods and services and obviously
huge challenges, even just getting things in and out of the country right now.
But at least from my experience in interacting with Americans, if you will, and knowing that
(31:08):
that's a way too broad a topic.
But for a country as divided as we can be, there is by and large an interest in Ukraine
and Ukraine being successful and Ukrainian people, more of an understanding and awareness
and appreciation for Ukraine now than probably ever in the history of America.
(31:33):
And maybe that's a good thing for both after the victory and now in realizing that an interest
that many Americans have is supporting the cause and being helpful.
And I know several people that I've talked to have said, yeah, but what can I do?
(31:54):
I give my dollars to the Red Cross or...
I paid taxes that were paid to the missiles and hopefully F-16s soon.
I paid for the Patriot missile now.
But I do think that there is an interest and for some people a frustration that there isn't
more that one can do.
(32:18):
When I went to Ukraine earlier this year, there were people who thought I was crazy,
but then there were other people who were really, for lack of a better word, jealous
and inspired by the opportunity to even interact with people who are dealing with this but
dealing with it with so much class and grace.
(32:40):
And so I guess I'm just offering that in this current context.
There's maybe more interest in trying to be supportive, whether it's helping a business
grow or promoting a product or even promoting awareness.
I guess my advice to Ukrainian business folks is don't underestimate that there's a large
(33:00):
segment of American population that would like to do business to support both recovery
and development during and after the war.
Yeah.
Good points to add this value, this emotional value.
And coming back to the methodology and the question about emotions exactly.
(33:21):
So a lot of questions about that, how to deal with conflict negotiations.
So if you are in the conflict, if the other party is emotionally unstable or you are emotionally
unstable, you heard something not very pleasant for you.
Do you have any tools or approaches how to do that in these conflict situations and behave
(33:44):
like a human?
Or use these emotions to drive the negotiations in the direction that will be successful?
Yeah.
I mean, it's obviously an important topic with a lot of different angles to explore.
But I would say, kind of at the foundation, it is around emotions.
(34:05):
Awareness is the first step.
And so becoming more self-aware around the things that provoke you.
What are the kinds of things that are likely to throw me off?
In negotiation courses, we often have people think through what are behaviors of your negotiating
counterparts that are hot buttons for you, that are one where you might have your negative
(34:28):
emotions get triggered such that your logical brain gets suppressed.
And the more you...
It's kind of immunizing yourself, if you will.
The more you start to think about those things and be able to manage them in advance, like
oh, this person's going to insult me.
This person is going to interrupt me, talk over me, not listen to me.
(34:50):
The more you get prepared for that, the more you can hopefully avoid to some degree the
trigger that again makes you less...
Generally we're less successful when we're just being reactionary, fight or flight-like.
And so if we can resist the urge, the first step is get to know yourself better, right?
(35:14):
Predict what's going to set you off and think through ways you can avoid having that derail
you.
Then other things that can help.
If you really think like this, I'm not going to be as effective as I wish I could be because
of the nature of my history with this person or the things that I think the topics that
are going to be erased too much for me.
(35:35):
That's when you might want to get someone to stand in for you, right?
Have a mediator.
Have a mediator there.
Be willing to call timeouts when you feel your blood pressure rising, if at all possible,
to even just call a timeout and take a deep breath.
I know again, it sounds kind of trivial, but it's surprisingly important to give yourself
a little bit of space if you don't have control, to whatever extent we ever have control over
(36:00):
our emotional reactions to really hot button things.
Things like we've talked about a little bit before is if you can train yourself to think
about impact versus intent.
When someone does something, the impact on me is very negative.
I often assume the worst about what their intentions are and that makes it even worse,
(36:21):
right?
If I think you intended to insult me and you want me to be hurt, then I'm even madder at
you and then I want to fight back more.
Just kind of getting a little better at thinking through, okay, well, maybe that was his or
her intention, but maybe not.
Maybe he's oblivious.
Maybe she just didn't know that that was offensive.
(36:43):
Maybe she just talks like that all the time and it landed particularly badly on me.
That intent impact shift can help you at least not be as provoked when the impact on you
is bad to not assume the worst about the intentions of the other side.
Again, I'm not Pollyanna.
(37:05):
I'm not naive about how sometimes people do want to hurt you, but recognize it's in your
own self-interest to not get provoked by that behavior.
I think preparing yourself in advance, what's likely to provoke me and what am I going to
do?
Being willing to call timeouts.
I think it's okay to practice also how you respond to something that is a matter of principle
(37:29):
not okay with you.
If you're going to make that assertion about my ethics, I'm sorry, we're not going to be
able to go forward.
I'd like to request that we not have that be part of this negotiation because I think
that will only be destructive.
Even just having some practice around how you might respond to where you want to be
(37:52):
assertive about behavior that you think needs to be called out as opposed to just ignored.
That can help you be a little bit more calm.
Again, the more we're just driven by pure emotional reaction, our instinct emotional
reaction is fight or flight.
Usually that's not the best response.
(38:13):
If you're trying to escape the animal that's going to eat you, maybe fight or flight makes
sense, but if you're dealing with another human being who's trying to have their own
interests met, usually fight or flight is not the best approach.
The preparation and practice, these are the main things to avoid emotional statements
(38:34):
that will not be manageable and ignitiated.
The preparation is often about yourself too.
Being self-aware, thinking through really what it is that provokes me.
And be true to yourself.
Yes, and not to lie to yourself that you won't react on that or this situation.
So we're describing the ideal psychic healthy person, which is almost impossible, especially
(39:01):
in current situation.
Yeah.
I don't know that person and I'm not that person, but I do.
I think the more we're striving for that, at least we have the goal.
At least we know we're going to fall short sometimes, but it's much better to at least
know what the constructive responses are and have those guide us.
(39:25):
I know from years of working with this material, I'm much better at dealing with it.
Not perfect.
And I certainly still fall prey to some of the things that happen to humans in negotiation.
But I think just lots of practice and awareness means I'm a lot better at not getting provoked.
And I'm a lot more logical, if you will, around what can I do that will actually help me get
(39:51):
what I want here as opposed to just that short-term interest has all been fight or flight.
I want to get my job in now.
But I think the more you're able to resist those short-term impulses for long-term gain,
that helps you not make some of those bad choices.
Yeah, true.
I totally agree.
One idea came to my mind recently when I was thinking about this emotional reactions in
(40:16):
my negotiations is that you should be careful here as well, but to turn your reaction into
question.
It's like if you would like to react negatively to somebody's words about you and then you
want to say the same words to him or her, but then turn this into questions like paraphrase.
(40:43):
Yeah, so do I understand correct that you just sent me to do concrete direction?
Even if it would be funny, it will be still better than to react with fight response.
Yeah.
And you know, absolutely.
(41:05):
It could almost turn into something funny if I'm paraphrasing an allegation that I just
lied.
So if I understand you correctly, you think I'm a liar.
I obviously don't think that.
I think there's a power in humor.
It's another cultural and individualistic thing you have to be careful with, but it
(41:28):
can be disarming, especially when the heat is turned up.
The smile to say something, especially self-deprecating humor as opposed to humor directed at the
other person.
There are cultural differences around this and again, but I do think that humor tends
to cool the temperature down.
(41:49):
It's not again, provocative humor and that can be something that if you're good at it,
can be a really powerful negotiation tool as well.
One more thing is that while you are asking the question and hearing the other answer,
it takes time.
So it takes time for the signal to go to your normal brain and not the lizard brain.
(42:10):
Yes.
And to think over in that situation.
So you give yourself time to calm down or to breathe.
Yeah.
Even if you say something like, well, it's very hard for me to hear that you think I'm
dishonest.
Just giving voice to your own feelings in a way that the other side is not likely to
react to can both slow things down to your point, but also signal to the other side how
(42:37):
you're feeling because they may not be aware of how you're reacting to the particular situation.
Good.
Lena, this was amazing conversation.
Thank you.
I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this topic with you and certainly welcome the opportunity
to interact with you and your audience.
Thank you.
Hi, I'm Dmytro Shvets, your host at The Start Global Insights, where I interview experts
(00:11):
from different countries about local business secrets and international expansion experience.
You are listening to the second part of the conversation with Linda Netsch, the expert with
extensive experience in practicing and teaching interest-based negotiations around the world.
Linda is a lecturer at Harvard, Stanford and UCU Business School in Ukraine.
(00:32):
She is also the general manager at the law firm FLEX by Fandvik and the founder of Align
Consulting, where she provides executive education and consulting services for clients in the
US and internationally, including Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
In the first part, we have discussed with Linda how to negotiate internationally, and
(00:53):
in this part, we will dive deeper into the negotiation culture of the United States of
America.
I cannot not to use this situation because you are from the US and we are making the
podcast for exporters.
I would definitely like to understand if there are some cultural aspects in the US that you
(01:15):
should consider while negotiating.
Yeah, and again, the US is such a big place that you can – I think I've lived in at
least three different cultures within this country, if not more.
I think I've lived in seven different states and each one being a little bit different.
For example, right now, I live in Silicon Valley.
(01:38):
I'm very much in the tech ecosystem.
I'm very much influenced by the legal aspects of tech and the nature of the economy here.
I'm very familiar with the kinds of deals that are done when tech companies are trying
to sell their products internationally.
(01:59):
I know in the tech contracts that the law firm I work for deals with every day, there
are certain issues that are constantly negotiated.
If you were trying to sell into a market here, I think I could describe some of the things
that I've seen in both investing in companies here and being part of a law firm that represents
(02:22):
companies here and running a business that's part of that law firm.
I think some of the stereotypes of Americans would be direct communication.
That also depends very much on the people you're negotiating with, but the stereotypes
would be a little less of the relationship building.
The old stereotype of more of the Asian culture would be more, let's build a relationship
(02:46):
first and then we'll get down to that.
That too is a stereotype with truth and false in it.
There's plenty of, let's take you to the giant space ball game client.
Let's have drinks and dinner client.
There's certainly an awareness of the importance of the relationship, but the assumption is
(03:07):
when you're negotiating, that's when you're down to, okay, now let's focus on the facts
and figures, the law, the price, the warranty, et cetera.
I think that the listeners will be very disappointed after listening to us that everything is so
simple.
From other sources, they're expecting that you need to really learn how they negotiate.
(03:30):
Some tricks, how to approach who is in charge in the room.
In Japan, it might be the oldest person or in the Arab Emirates, the last one is the
chief who is coming into the room or this type of things.
If you are in US, then you need to have this small talk about the weather or if the US
(03:53):
person is asking you, how are you?
It doesn't mean he needs to or really wants to hear the whole story of your life.
I think that stereotype is probably one of the more accurate ones.
It's funny how often I hear that.
The Harvard course that I teach is very international.
(04:13):
Often there are students from all over the world, students getting their masters in law
that are part of that program.
It's one of the most common complaints, if you will, about US culture that, hi, how are
you?
Doesn't mean how are you, it means hi.
Now, we get on to the next point.
Whereas most other cultures, if you're going to take the time to ask how someone is, you
(04:38):
might actually be curious about how they are and what their response to that might be.
It's like you care about somebody, yes, about the others.
Yeah.
One of the students talked about going to Starbucks and the barista asked her how she
was and she said, I just started to tell the person how I was and was astounded by how
off-putting that was to the person making my coffee.
(05:00):
Yeah, sure.
Those kinds of things are helpful.
I think it's actually helpful to study up, if you will, in a culture, try to learn as
much as you can about what the stereotypes are.
Then there is no playbook for how it works everywhere.
I opened a playbook for how to negotiate in Silicon Valley or in Dallas.
(05:23):
I think the importance is know that there are differences, try to see what the typical
ones might be, and then go in with the same kinds of mindset you would have no matter
where you are, which is what's motivating this person.
If there is a power thing going on in your multi-party negotiation, yeah, pay attention
(05:44):
to that.
You're a decision maker if there is such a thing.
Notice who talks, who doesn't.
Notice who's paid attention to and who is not.
Those can just help you understand how to influence a group of negotiators.
At the end of the day, the important thing is learn as much as you can about what's motivating
the other side.
(06:05):
Learn what you think their perception of appropriate standards, criteria are.
Then even the process of putting up your own proposals and options as they go along, each
time you get negative feedback on what you've proposed, you're learning something.
You might not like that you were just told they didn't like your proposal, but that gives
(06:26):
you an opportunity to learn more about what they're thinking.
The more you learn about that, whether you're in Shanghai or in Seoul or you're in Prague,
the better off you are in terms of your own ability to do deals in negotiation that satisfy
your own interest.
Yeah, this is the biggest problem of salespeople.
(06:51):
Without this experience of negotiations, they do not know why there was the reason of rejection.
Why they lost a deal.
Even if it is not a common case in culture to ask for the feedback, but you still can
do it.
You still can request what's the point of this proposal and why you have not accepted
(07:15):
that or just give me a hint.
So this proposal would satisfy your needs in the future.
So I would not waste your time, my time and pin you with the same case again.
Yeah, absolutely.
I think the instinct to ask for feedback to understand why, look, the truth of the matter
(07:38):
is sometimes you just won't get that answer.
People often don't want to say what their motivation was or why the alternative beat
you on price.
But regardless of whether you get the response or not, at least asking for that feedback
is an important part of learning more about what worked and what didn't.
(08:01):
It's like try not die.
Yeah, try.
Exactly.
And at the end of the day, sometimes the other party has a better alternative.
They have a better than whatever you could offer.
And so winning doesn't mean getting every deal or beating the other side's bottom line.
(08:24):
Winning means you got a deal that either you walked your alternative and you live to negotiate
another day or you got a deal that met your own interests, that tried to create value
and get as many interests built into that deal as possible.
It's legal, right?
It's built on some sort of standards that are enforceable or at least justifiable.
(08:48):
And it's better than your better than your better than what you could have done had you
walked away from that deal.
Yeah.
And I think that the main point of the interest-based negotiation is that you perceive this negotiation
in the long term.
So the zero sum is like you are winning now or never.
(09:08):
But if you are in the interest-based and in the long term thinking, if you lost now, it
doesn't mean that you lost the deal or you lost in life.
Because the time flies by.
The people may change.
The roles may change.
And you learn a lot from every loss in every deal.
You learn a lot.
(09:28):
And if you analyze that and you plan ahead, then every loss might be the gain in the future.
Absolutely.
I think that's an important point of the viewpoint of short-term versus long-term.
I might be able to trick you and get a great deal today, but generally that means you're
not going to either not want to negotiate with me next time or you're going to be looking
(09:53):
to even the score the next time around.
So the problem with that short-term win is it can have long-term negative consequences.
You know, we do in courses, I'm sure you've done this as well, we do exercises where that
plays out.
You can see how a choice in round one where you trick the other side often comes back
(10:16):
to haunt you in round 10 when the other side has the opportunity to pay you back.
So shifting your mindset around that long-term versus short-term relationship and reputation
versus short-term wins is a helpful framework to having your own mind in negotiations.
I think this is like a heritage of the past because in the past when you were living in
(10:41):
one country and your counterpart in another and you would like sell him or something and
you won't see him or her forever.
And now everything is so connected.
And everything is so transparent and this digital footprint that you have.
So you can write something about some person on the other point of the earth or you might
(11:05):
have an employee and then this employee becomes very easily and very quickly a partner of
the other organizations and you would need to have business with them.
So it changes so quickly and it is so transparent that it is not already the time to cheat somebody
because you will be cheated in the future.
(11:27):
It's a small world after all.
Coming back to US.
I understand, it depends.
It's also the best answer of the lawyers.
It depends.
But are there some taboos or some things that you would be careful about?
I just remember the case when I was in the United States in North Dakota and we went
(11:51):
to a bar and of course drinking beer and talking a lot.
And I am so curious.
I'm very curious about cultures and nations.
So I was really frank and curious about two questions that actually turned the evening
into a disaster.
The first one was about the indigenous people and the second about Vietnam.
(12:19):
And the person I was talking to was a military guy.
And I was curious why the hell you have gone to Vietnam to fight for the war at the other
side of the planet and what have you done with the indigenous people in America?
And that totally destroyed the evening.
(12:40):
So of course no fight appeared but the relationship was a bit not so good after that.
Yeah, well, I mean, I guess those are the tricky hot button topics are no matter where
you are in the world, are things to be cautious about.
(13:02):
And I think you can often ask a question in a very broad way like what's your point of
view on US and Afghanistan or how have you experienced US policy toward Russia?
Whatever it might be, a very open-ended question is probably safer if you're going to tread
(13:22):
on that potentially dangerous ground.
It reminds me a bit of the first time I went, this is many years ago now, but the first
time I went to the Middle East and I had my own kind of stereotypes of what that experience
would be like.
First of all, I was surprised that they were asking a woman to come and teach business
(13:44):
people negotiation in the Middle East.
Again, it was a stereotype that was wrong.
And I remember speaking to the people who brought me over in advance asking, what should
I not do?
Very cautious about doing the wrong thing if I was there.
And I think they were kind of surprised at how fearful I was of stepping on verbal landmines
(14:07):
in some way or just behavioral ones.
And really the only after talking to them for a period of time, I realized, just be
humble, realize you're in someone else's set of norms.
I think the only piece of advice they gave me was don't use a lot of alcohol examples.
This is a dry country.
(14:27):
Don't drink while educating.
Don't drink while educating.
I'm not going to use examples about buying cases of wine, right?
Because you just should know that's your culture where if it's not a part of the culture, if
it's not appreciated in the culture, don't talk about that.
But to your examples, if you're going to talk about hot button things, American politics,
(14:47):
right?
Just know you're in dangerous territory and therefore the more kind of open you are to
just being curious about their point of view, the less you're putting judgment in your questions.
I think it's natural.
If we have a strong point of view, it's natural to have our questions turn into assertions.
(15:08):
That is, what the heck were you doing in Iraq, Americans?
And that is going to have a different impact probably on a military guy than a San Francisco
peacenik.
But it is being very cautious when you're in territory that you know, even if you're
(15:29):
curious, that you know might be something the other side doesn't have a strong interest
in talking about or hearing another point of view about.
Yeah.
One more point that I remembered, the old Ukrainians were growing up in Soviet times,
so Soviet culture.
And we had a lot of kind of a political friendship with Africa.
(15:50):
So the question of racism or interracial relationship was a bit different in our country.
And for example, the word Negro was quite okay, not like offensive word, we didn't mean
something about the race of the other party.
And you could see that in Ukraine, we don't have these issues of racism because we don't
(16:15):
have too much of a relationship with that.
But I heard from my friends in the US and Canada, they had a lot of problems within
this situation.
Like actually even in some cases, looking at black people, if they were white, was causing
some bad reaction.
(16:35):
Because there was this expectation of racism from their side, although they were not in
this situation, meaning something with them.
Yeah.
It's interesting that this assumptions we make about people's intentions versus what
their impact was.
(16:57):
I might say something that I intend to be a compliment or a curiosity that is offensive
to another party and just not even be aware of it.
Much more likely that's going to happen if you're a different culture or if there are
different norms.
Or I think to your point, if a culture is much more homogeneous, if you will, as opposed
(17:20):
to extremely diverse around different races within a culture, there are just different
assumptions are made about people's comments just based on the culture that you're in.
Again, I think we all make mistakes or accidentally insult all too regularly.
The question is whether or not you accept that when it happens, you realize that if
(17:45):
my behavior had a negative impact on you, I don't tell you why you shouldn't feel that
way.
I'm going to learn from it and then not do it again, depending on obviously the situation.
But the notion is, look, if what you did hurt somebody and it isn't a matter of principle
that you have to do or say what you did, then adapt that change.
(18:07):
I think noting that we can dial our own behavior to be okay with the people we're working with
can help us be more persuasive in our negotiation and be less likely to provoke others.
At the end of the day, we all make mistakes and the more we're willing to own them when
(18:29):
we make them, forgive them when they happen to us and be curious about why that happened.
I think that helps with broad issues that we're talking about around cultural difference,
racial difference, gender difference.
Again, humility is a good trait in negotiation.
Not always valued, as we can certainly see among some very prominent people in the world.
(18:54):
But at least I'm going to stand on the principle that humility is a good quality, listening
is a good quality, curiosity is a great quality.
That's just my own perspective on what helps you be more successful in negotiation.
At least it is always helpful.
It might be that you won't be able to use it to some extent in some cases when you cannot
(19:18):
influence the situation, but it will be helpful for your conclusion for the future when you
meet such people again.
Just one last around this notion of curiosity, listening.
I think one of the areas we explore often in negotiation courses is the distinction
between empathy and assertiveness.
(19:40):
And that those two things can be intention.
Empathy being if we define that as the ability to understand the point of view of the other
side of another person.
Not necessarily agree with it, but at least understand it.
And try to communicate it to the other side that they actually believe you understand
them.
(20:00):
So I not only do understand you, I communicate back to you what I understand your thinking
to your satisfaction.
Yeah, you believe I got it.
That's the empathy piece.
So the empathy is focused on the point of view of the other.
The assertiveness is standing up for your own interests, your own point of view, making
sure that your standards are also discussed in a negotiation.
(20:24):
And both of those are important.
Some people are very good on the empathy, but not very strong at standing up for themselves
or saying what they really think or making sure that their interests are also met.
So if you're good at empathy, you probably have to work on your assertiveness muscle.
On the other hand, there are plenty of people who are very good on the assertiveness side,
saying what they want, demanding what they want, but not good at understanding the perspective
(20:46):
of the other side or what the other side wants or what the other side feels.
And so if your strong suit is assertiveness, probably what you should do is work on your
empathy muscle because you need both of them.
It's not an either or, it is a both.
And then it's in any given situation, even back to your conversation about like talking
(21:07):
about difficult topics.
That's one maybe you want to lean on the empathy skills a bit more, right?
And just understand the other person's point of view.
Whereas if I'm with a negotiator, it's very dominant, very zero sum, I've got to lean
on my assertiveness skills and work harder on making sure that I also am having my needs
(21:27):
met in the negotiation.
And just that awareness and that simple, you know, yeah, we talked a lot today about gray
areas and it depends.
Interest, favorite phrase, it depends.
But there are some fundamental things that are very helpful.
Interest versus position and empathy versus assertiveness.
Just those concepts can help guide you when you're in this kind of messy world of human
(21:50):
communication, human relationships.
I've recently saw like in social media, some shorts and in YouTube, the guy was saying
that I learned a very useful word that sounds like interesting.
If you meet somebody and he says to you something that you are not to agree with, take a moment
and say, interesting.
(22:11):
If you will use this word, it will help you to get the answers, what is going on and time
to think.
And I actually think there's something to that.
It's good to have when something hits you wrong, it's good to have a more neutral thing
to say besides what the heck is wrong with you, right?
(22:32):
And interesting might be a good thing to rely on when you are thinking that's crazy.
But when you tell somebody they're crazy or you think they're just flat out wrong, often
that's not going to make them open up more, it's going to make them fight more maybe.
But maybe having some of those kind of crutches on how to deal with the behavior that we don't
(22:55):
like, like interesting is a good tool.
Let's come back to the Harvard methodology and the key elements that you said.
We were talking a lot about interests.
And I think that this point that you said about assertiveness and empathy is about these
two sides of interests.
(23:16):
So you need to understand your interests.
So you need to understand what do you want.
And this is actually also quite tough tasks.
And it seems obvious, but when you are sitting and writing them down, it is quite hard to
figure out what is your interest actually in this negotiation.
And then the empathy is for the interests of the other party.
(23:37):
And here is the main question I hear is how can I understand when I'm preparing for negotiations?
So I'm not talking to the person.
Yeah, so I'm guessing.
How can I imagine or how can I understand the interests of the other party?
(24:01):
What is the approaches or how can I predict that?
Are there any advices how people can do that?
One thing I think in your question, in the lead up to the question that's very helpful
is to do that preparation.
I think too often we don't have a systematic way to prepare.
(24:22):
And even if you take a few minutes of being disciplined around what you said, which is
take a piece of paper, write my interests, write their interests, and try to brainstorm,
if you will, think about as many as you can possibly come up with.
Challenge yourself to do that, your own first.
(24:44):
And then what you think the other sides are.
And to your point, before you have a chance to speak with them, how do you know?
Well, in this day and age, there are ways of researching people's past.
It could be what their jobs have been in the past.
It could be what they've said on social media.
It could be what their likes are on social media.
(25:06):
You can at least try to build some assumptions about the other side.
If they're a complete stranger, that's a good place to start.
If there are other people who know this person that you're able to communicate with, that
can be helpful as well.
And so to work on any ways of learning more about them, but also even if you don't have
that, you can make some educated guesses, some logical guesses perhaps around what you
(25:32):
think motivates them.
Money is always, depending on obviously the negotiation, you can assume some things about
what people want, but also try to challenge yourself to be broader than just they want
money and they want credit.
Right?
Well, what else do they want?
How much does creative control mean to them?
(25:52):
How much does selling this to their boss or their constituents mean?
Right?
Really try to put yourself, you know, saying and put yourself in their shoes to the best
extent you can.
And then realize as you look at your list of what you want and what they want, my interests
and their interests, notice that your list of their interests is something you should
(26:13):
be asking questions about.
Are you right?
And so, like their responses to discussions about what appropriate salary are or appropriate
price for the object being sold, that helps you learn whether or not you're right about
their priorities and what their interests might be as well.
So the main point though is that preparation piece in advance.
(26:35):
If you can learn more about them, great.
Do however that might be.
Do your research.
But if nothing, you know, people often say, oh, it's just so much work to do these long
preparation sheets and come up with all these.
It's common sense.
So why should I write it down?
Yeah, exactly.
Everything is obvious.
Yes, Odi.
(26:55):
Right.
I mean, why do you write down a grocery list?
Because you might not remember that thing in the moment.
Good point.
So the power of actually typing out or writing out, those can, it's helpful for the creative
process, if you will.
Right?
If I see my list of my interests next to yours, that might prompt some ideas on ways we could
(27:18):
do this deal or things we might agree on that weren't so obvious when I was just doing it
all in my head.
And so if I said, what's the fastest preparation process you can use?
Write out your interests and their interests and then be careful about whether you're accurate
on their interests, learn during the negotiation, write out your alternatives and theirs.
(27:41):
Right?
What are you going to do if this falls apart?
And what do you think they're going to do if this falls apart?
Again, you might ask some questions aimed at understanding whether or not your perception
of their alternatives are accurate.
What are relevant standards?
Do I have a legal case that applies?
Do I have market research that shows what the option I'm proposing will work?
(28:07):
And that process alone, my interests, their interests, my alternative, their alternative,
what are relevant standards?
Looking at that often shows you a variety of options that you might be able to agree
on in the course of the negotiation.
That doesn't take all day.
Yeah.
And actually on this list, you can see already what interests are common and what you can
(28:29):
promote as a common interest and get the common outcome of the negotiations.
Yeah.
In one thing that isn't part of the seven elements, but I have found is really helpful
is particularly when you're doing the interest lists of mine and theirs is what resources
and capabilities do you have that might be of value to them or that you just have, whether
(28:54):
you thought about whether they care or not?
And same for them, right?
What do they have?
What are their connections, other products, relationships, know-how?
What do they have that's of value to me?
That combination of the things you want and what you can offer and the things they want
and what they can offer can be a really rich list for possible options that are better
(29:18):
for both sides and that capture as much value as possible.
Yeah.
I think that this is a very good thing exactly in our question of intercultural or intercultural
or inter-country international negotiations because in most cases, the exporters, at
least what I hear when they are selling something abroad, they are thinking about only price.
(29:38):
It's like, I will sell cheaper.
Right.
Then if you are thinking broadly, if you brainstorm, then you can find out much more values that
you can propose to your counterpart in other country that they do not have now because
the cheap price and everybody is complaining about the China, yes, or the cheapest prices
coming from China, so you cannot compete.
(30:00):
But in fact, you can compete.
We had the case with Canadians that said that they are tired of China.
They are tired of the misconceptions or different understandings, so they are very lucky to
have Ukrainian furniture because it takes the same amount of time to deliver that to
Canada and the same quality or even better.
(30:24):
And price is not that much important in this case because you are getting much more value
in communicating or predictability of the delivery.
So you order the chair, you got the chair and that's what the value for them might
be.
Yeah.
One thing that I think about particularly now with Ukraine and thinking about exporting
(30:46):
or dealing with countries beyond Ukraine.
Obviously, Western Europe is a closer market for Ukrainian goods and services and obviously
huge challenges, even just getting things in and out of the country right now.
But at least from my experience in interacting with Americans, if you will, and knowing that
(31:08):
that's a way too broad a topic.
But for a country as divided as we can be, there is by and large an interest in Ukraine
and Ukraine being successful and Ukrainian people, more of an understanding and awareness
and appreciation for Ukraine now than probably ever in the history of America.
(31:33):
And maybe that's a good thing for both after the victory and now in realizing that an interest
that many Americans have is supporting the cause and being helpful.
And I know several people that I've talked to have said, yeah, but what can I do?
(31:54):
I give my dollars to the Red Cross or...
I paid taxes that were paid to the missiles and hopefully F-16s soon.
I paid for the Patriot missile now.
But I do think that there is an interest and for some people a frustration that there isn't
more that one can do.
(32:18):
When I went to Ukraine earlier this year, there were people who thought I was crazy,
but then there were other people who were really, for lack of a better word, jealous
and inspired by the opportunity to even interact with people who are dealing with this but
dealing with it with so much class and grace.
(32:40):
And so I guess I'm just offering that in this current context.
There's maybe more interest in trying to be supportive, whether it's helping a business
grow or promoting a product or even promoting awareness.
I guess my advice to Ukrainian business folks is don't underestimate that there's a large
(33:00):
segment of American population that would like to do business to support both recovery
and development during and after the war.
Yeah.
Good points to add this value, this emotional value.
And coming back to the methodology and the question about emotions exactly.
(33:21):
So a lot of questions about that, how to deal with conflict negotiations.
So if you are in the conflict, if the other party is emotionally unstable or you are emotionally
unstable, you heard something not very pleasant for you.
Do you have any tools or approaches how to do that in these conflict situations and behave
(33:44):
like a human?
Or use these emotions to drive the negotiations in the direction that will be successful?
Yeah.
I mean, it's obviously an important topic with a lot of different angles to explore.
But I would say, kind of at the foundation, it is around emotions.
(34:05):
Awareness is the first step.
And so becoming more self-aware around the things that provoke you.
What are the kinds of things that are likely to throw me off?
In negotiation courses, we often have people think through what are behaviors of your negotiating
counterparts that are hot buttons for you, that are one where you might have your negative
(34:28):
emotions get triggered such that your logical brain gets suppressed.
And the more you...
It's kind of immunizing yourself, if you will.
The more you start to think about those things and be able to manage them in advance, like
oh, this person's going to insult me.
This person is going to interrupt me, talk over me, not listen to me.
(34:50):
The more you get prepared for that, the more you can hopefully avoid to some degree the
trigger that again makes you less...
Generally we're less successful when we're just being reactionary, fight or flight-like.
And so if we can resist the urge, the first step is get to know yourself better, right?
(35:14):
Predict what's going to set you off and think through ways you can avoid having that derail
you.
Then other things that can help.
If you really think like this, I'm not going to be as effective as I wish I could be because
of the nature of my history with this person or the things that I think the topics that
are going to be erased too much for me.
(35:35):
That's when you might want to get someone to stand in for you, right?
Have a mediator.
Have a mediator there.
Be willing to call timeouts when you feel your blood pressure rising, if at all possible,
to even just call a timeout and take a deep breath.
I know again, it sounds kind of trivial, but it's surprisingly important to give yourself
a little bit of space if you don't have control, to whatever extent we ever have control over
(36:00):
our emotional reactions to really hot button things.
Things like we've talked about a little bit before is if you can train yourself to think
about impact versus intent.
When someone does something, the impact on me is very negative.
I often assume the worst about what their intentions are and that makes it even worse,
(36:21):
right?
If I think you intended to insult me and you want me to be hurt, then I'm even madder at
you and then I want to fight back more.
Just kind of getting a little better at thinking through, okay, well, maybe that was his or
her intention, but maybe not.
Maybe he's oblivious.
Maybe she just didn't know that that was offensive.
(36:43):
Maybe she just talks like that all the time and it landed particularly badly on me.
That intent impact shift can help you at least not be as provoked when the impact on you
is bad to not assume the worst about the intentions of the other side.
Again, I'm not Pollyanna.
(37:05):
I'm not naive about how sometimes people do want to hurt you, but recognize it's in your
own self-interest to not get provoked by that behavior.
I think preparing yourself in advance, what's likely to provoke me and what am I going to
do?
Being willing to call timeouts.
I think it's okay to practice also how you respond to something that is a matter of principle
(37:29):
not okay with you.
If you're going to make that assertion about my ethics, I'm sorry, we're not going to be
able to go forward.
I'd like to request that we not have that be part of this negotiation because I think
that will only be destructive.
Even just having some practice around how you might respond to where you want to be
(37:52):
assertive about behavior that you think needs to be called out as opposed to just ignored.
That can help you be a little bit more calm.
Again, the more we're just driven by pure emotional reaction, our instinct emotional
reaction is fight or flight.
Usually that's not the best response.
(38:13):
If you're trying to escape the animal that's going to eat you, maybe fight or flight makes
sense, but if you're dealing with another human being who's trying to have their own
interests met, usually fight or flight is not the best approach.
The preparation and practice, these are the main things to avoid emotional statements
(38:34):
that will not be manageable and ignitiated.
The preparation is often about yourself too.
Being self-aware, thinking through really what it is that provokes me.
And be true to yourself.
Yes, and not to lie to yourself that you won't react on that or this situation.
So we're describing the ideal psychic healthy person, which is almost impossible, especially
(39:01):
in current situation.
Yeah.
I don't know that person and I'm not that person, but I do.
I think the more we're striving for that, at least we have the goal.
At least we know we're going to fall short sometimes, but it's much better to at least
know what the constructive responses are and have those guide us.
(39:25):
I know from years of working with this material, I'm much better at dealing with it.
Not perfect.
And I certainly still fall prey to some of the things that happen to humans in negotiation.
But I think just lots of practice and awareness means I'm a lot better at not getting provoked.
And I'm a lot more logical, if you will, around what can I do that will actually help me get
(39:51):
what I want here as opposed to just that short-term interest has all been fight or flight.
I want to get my job in now.
But I think the more you're able to resist those short-term impulses for long-term gain,
that helps you not make some of those bad choices.
Yeah, true.
I totally agree.
One idea came to my mind recently when I was thinking about this emotional reactions in
(40:16):
my negotiations is that you should be careful here as well, but to turn your reaction into
question.
It's like if you would like to react negatively to somebody's words about you and then you
want to say the same words to him or her, but then turn this into questions like paraphrase.
(40:43):
Yeah, so do I understand correct that you just sent me to do concrete direction?
Even if it would be funny, it will be still better than to react with fight response.
Yeah.
And you know, absolutely.
(41:05):
It could almost turn into something funny if I'm paraphrasing an allegation that I just
lied.
So if I understand you correctly, you think I'm a liar.
I obviously don't think that.
I think there's a power in humor.
It's another cultural and individualistic thing you have to be careful with, but it
(41:28):
can be disarming, especially when the heat is turned up.
The smile to say something, especially self-deprecating humor as opposed to humor directed at the
other person.
There are cultural differences around this and again, but I do think that humor tends
to cool the temperature down.
(41:49):
It's not again, provocative humor and that can be something that if you're good at it,
can be a really powerful negotiation tool as well.
One more thing is that while you are asking the question and hearing the other answer,
it takes time.
So it takes time for the signal to go to your normal brain and not the lizard brain.
(42:10):
Yes.
And to think over in that situation.
So you give yourself time to calm down or to breathe.
Yeah.
Even if you say something like, well, it's very hard for me to hear that you think I'm
dishonest.
Just giving voice to your own feelings in a way that the other side is not likely to
react to can both slow things down to your point, but also signal to the other side how
(42:37):
you're feeling because they may not be aware of how you're reacting to the particular situation.
Good.
Lena, this was amazing conversation.
Thank you.
I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this topic with you and certainly welcome the opportunity
to interact with you and your audience.
Thank you.
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