How to Prep for a Negotiation with Susan Borke, Esq.

Hello, my fellow negotiators. I have a quick question for you and some exciting news to share. But first the question. Have you ever used a piece of advice from Negotiate Anything in any part of your life? What impact did that have and what would it mean if you could amplify that impact? Now, while you're thinking about that, let me share the exciting news that is what your life and career will look like when when you join Negotiate Anything Premium. Negotiate Anything Premium is a comprehensive resource for mastering negotiation, providing exclusive content and community support to enhance your growth. It's everything you love about Negotiate Anything and so much more. Are you ready to negotiate more of the best things in life? Click the link in the show notes to learn more. I'll catch you later.

My name is Susan Bork and my company name is bourkeworks. My focus is on training negotiation skills. I really feel it's empowering when people understand how to negotiate effectively and it makes them. It puts them in a position of being able to do a better job for themselves and for their organizations.

And so how did you get into this?

A lot of my background is from when I was working in house for the National Geographic Society. I worked as in house counsel, creating the business affairs department for the television group initially and then working as part of the general counsel's office as deputy General counsel for about 18 years. My total tenure with National Geographic was about 28 years. And after I left, I realized that one of the things I most enjoyed from when I worked at National Geographic was creating a negotiation skills course for staff. People who took my course really enjoyed it, and it did two things at least. One was giving them confidence that the lawyers they were working with were really interested in negotiating constructively, helping them do their deals well. And the second thing was it gave us a common language for talking about negotiations. And that made our whole communication process much more efficient.

That's really smart. I think that's a really great example to show how negotiation as a skill can improve the communication skills of, of everybody in the organization and bring people closer together when they're working collaboratively.

That's very true. And I really feel that that's the key to effective negotiating. If you look at negotiation, that whole process as a problem solving process, and then that's going to orient you towards working together collaborators, whether you're doing an internal negotiation within an organization or even within a family, or whether you're negotiating with outside vendors or, or outside collaborators, we want to who you're going to work with as independent contractors. Or entities from what you're buying, products or services, all those things take on a whole different orientation. When you see negotiation as a problem solving process.

Right. That makes a lot of sense. And that's one of the things I was really excited to talk to you about, is focusing in on the process of negotiation from preparation to engagement. And I think it would be good for the audience to see your approach to negotiation and the process you use. So in your opinion, with the thinking about negotiation as a process, what is the first step?

I think the first step is to think about negotiation as a process. And what that means is that generally almost most negotiations are continue. They consist of several stages of a cycle. And the cycle is one of preparation, which is what I see you doing mostly on your own, and then engagement. And that's what I see when you're actually directly interacting with your counterpart. And for most negotiations, this preparation and engagement is a continuously going cycle. And some of it occurs almost instantaneously because sometimes what happens is that you'll hear something from your counterpart and you'll need to digest it and prepare in your own mind, you know what your next appropriate response is. Other times it's going to be a more formal staging. You'll do preparation. And I see this preparation, real effective preparation, as having three components. And then you'll go in to some form of more formal engagement with your counterpart, whether that's a meeting or a telephone conference. And then that will conclude and you'll need to go back into the preparation part of the cycle so that you can prepare for the next engagement.

I like the bifurcated approach to the negotiation process because it's nice and simple. Preparation, engagement, and it's clear as to where those steps are. I've read books in the past where they might have broken it down into six or seven steps. And I'm confused and overwhelmed. So I appreciate the simplicity of this approach and the fact that it doesn't really include a clear conclusion because as you know, with a lot of negotiations, there is no clear conclusion. Even if it culminates in a deal, it leads to further negotiations and the continuation of the relationship. So it puts people in a mindset of constantly being ready and constantly engaged. If you're not engaging directly with the person, then you fall back into the preparation stage and you're getting ready for the next engagement.

I agree with you. That's a very good way of looking at it. And I try to advise people. When I was working in house counsel and then when I have clients who I'm coaching. What I try to explain to them is that the contract is the beginning of the relationship. That agreement you sign is the beginning of the relationship. And you set the tone for that relationship during the negotiation that leads up to it.

Exactly. And one of the things that you mentioned earlier was there being three parts of the preparation process. Can you tell the audience a bit about that?

Yes, I like to characterize them as research, rehearse, and review. So I talk about the three Rs of preparation.

Okay. And so research, I feel like that one is pretty straightforward in that we are gathering information. But can you go a little bit deeper into actually how you do that as kind of like a systematic approach to the research you do?

Well, you need to do research on two parties. One is yourself. You really have to understand what you're trying to do through this negotiation. What are you trying to achieve and why. Because as you look at the whys, it may give you insight that will allow you to add value and take advantage of opportunities that arise when you're talking to your counterpart. So you really want to have a good sense of what you need out of this relationship or out of this negotiation and get very clear on that. A second component of that is understanding what standards apply to the situation. So you want to make sure that what you want to get out of this is realistic. You can be ambitious in terms of what you want, but you still need to be bounded by what market realities may be at play. And then the second strong part of the research that you want to focus on is to get into your counterpart's head as much as possible. So to really learn about that person, that individual, if there's a cultural, you know, any cultural issues that you need to be sensitive to understand what they are. And also during that period of time, you're not talking to the person, so you aren't necessarily getting direct feedback. But you can start creating what I call our hypotheses about the person. And I think it's really important when you look at your counterpart, both the person and if the larger organization, the organization as well as that, you are focused on making hypotheses rather than assumptions. And Kwame, I think you understand the difference that that is in terms of your approach then, to the situation.

I do. And that is a brilliant. A brilliant nuance. And so for the audience, when you say the difference between hypotheses versus assumptions, what exactly do you mean there?

Well, with assumption, we're wedded to them. They're true. We know it in our heart. And in our mind, all of our assumptions are completely true. That's how we deal with them. That's what we think of them. Whereas when you're dealing and talking in terms of hypotheses, that's what scientists do. And scientists have a thought, a hypothesis about something, and then they actively look for information to either support or, you know, cause them to change their hypothesis or adjust it. The point about hypotheses is that there's no ego involved. The point is that what you want to do is find out what reality is going to tell you about the accuracy of this hypothesis and then you make adjustments to it based on what you what actually happened.

I've got a quick story for you. So I was at this keynote and I talked to a listener and he said, kwame, I love the podcast, but my favorite part, man, I love those commercials. And I said, I don't think this is a true story. And now let me tell you about Negotiate Anything Premium, where you can listen to your favorite Negotiate Anything episodes ad free. With a subscription to Premium, you can get access to more insights from your favorite experts and ad free listening and extended episodes. Bonus, you'll also get access to exclusive episodes and personalized advice from yours truly. If you've been looking for an easy and affordable way to level up your skills and negotiate more of the best things in life, join our Premium community now for that gentleman in that fictional story. This ad's for you. And for the rest of you, I'll see you in Premium.

What I like about that is with approaching it as the hypotheses, it helps to guide your curiosity. You're going in there with ideas, possibilities, but you want to confirm or deny those through the process of negotiation, through either the first part of negotiation, like you said, which is the preparation, where you're actually doing research and you can to a certain extent, test those hypotheses there. But then you, you go into the next step, which would be active engagement, and you can test those hypotheses by asking questions and being curious and trying to learn in the midst of the negotiation. I think that distinction is brilliant and it does a great job when it comes to putting ourselves in the right mindset for these negotiations.

I agree with you. And it feeds. Then if you're dealing with hypotheses, I think it also feeds into the second part of preparation, which is rehearsal. So when I talk about rehearsing, what I mean is a variety of things, but part of it is even doing what good athletes do. All right, what athletes do Is they visualize whatever they're doing, their swing or the game, or how they're going to get ball from one end of the court to the other. And as they do that, as they think in their own head, all the ways, what it's going to take to get the ball from where they are to where they the basket, or then they're thinking about all the different things that can happen along the way, all the things that can go wrong. So they've got a defender on them, you know, who might be interested in fouling them, how they defend against that. They also can think about if this weight of the basket, if going down the left hand part of the court isn't available, how do they get to the right hand court, or how do they get the ball to a player that's on that out of the court. So that whole process of visualization and as detailed a process as possible is going to help you be much more actively prepared for the negotiation. And once you visualize and thought about all the things that can happen, what your reaction and response is going to be and how you're going to, you know, respond in a constructive and effective manner, that frees up bandwidth in your mind when you're actually engaging with your counterpart. So that if something happens that you didn't plan for, it doesn't panic you because you have bandwidth for it. It's not, you know, it's a surprise, but you've already figured out all these other things, and it probably is going to be like one of the things you've already figured out.

Absolutely. And I think that's an underutilized technique when it comes to negotiations in particular. But our professional lives in general, I always find it fascinating that professional athletes almost seem to take their craft a little bit more seriously, when in reality, what professional athletes do is they're entertainers, they're in the entertainment industry. You and I were both attorneys. You have doctors, nurses, and other professionals who have jobs that carry a lot of consequence. But it seems as though we aren't as serious, maybe not serious. We aren't as intentional about the preparation for our daily activities. And I think visualization is one of the most powerful techniques we can utilize. And when it comes to resistance, it's critically important. Because a lot of times you see people have negotiation strategies that are essentially based on hope. I want to say these things, and I hope it works. Then if it doesn't work, then we really don't have much of a strategy. Or if we don't rehearse a Appropriately, like you say, we're not prepared. And it just reminds me of the saying, the words of one of America's greatest philosophers, everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face. And that is of course, Mike Tyson. So if you visualize that punch, it makes it a lot easier for you to take it and roll with it in the midst of the conflict or negotiation.

I agree with you completely. I think that another place where you can prepare effectively is, is to have an agenda, to have a written agenda. So part of this rehearsing that I'm talking about is having a written agenda. And the reason for that, you don't have to share it with your counterpart. Depending on the negotiation, it may be appropriate to do so. But by having what the points you want to cover written down, you're again freeing up mental bandwidth. You don't have to remember, you just don't have to remember all those extra things. And that leaves you with more, more of your mind that you can apply to listening, to really listening when you're engaged with your counterpart and really hearing both what they're saying and what not saying, and to understand where the opportunities in the negotiation are to make a deal that's going to work for them as well as for you. What we forget is that, you know, we're so busy trying to get whatever it is we feel we have to have in out of this negotiation is that if this negotiation doesn't result or bear results that are going to be satisfactory and ideally attractive to our counterpart, there's not going to be any agreement.

Exactly. I think that's brilliant. And the benefit of lessening your cognitive load during these difficult conversations is enormous because when you think about it, oftentimes in these conversations it's incredibly stressful. And when you're stressed, oftentimes your body produces cortisol, which is a stress hormone, which often results in the clouding of cognition. And so what you want to do is take as much of the weight, the cognitive weight off your shoulders during the conversations as possible. And you can do that through preparation. And so it's almost like an actor, when you see an actor up on stage or even somebody who's in improv, improv actors prepare as well. They practice. It seems natural, doesn't seem like they're acting. And great actors can do that, but they do that because of their preparation. They're able to do that because of their preparation. And I know me, when I'm in my negotiations, I'm not brilliant enough to come up with high level questions. On the fly and these arguments on the fly. So I pre think as much of the negotiation as possible to make it easier for me to be natural and listen during the conversations.

I agree. And a written agenda I have found invaluable to contributing to that. The last part of preparation is really what you do after engagement. So the review, the last r review is what you do, I would say immediately after you hang up the phone or you walk out of the meeting. When you're down in the lobby of the building. If you're walking out of a meeting with someone, you know, when you're, when you're out of their presence, you really want to take a few minutes, five, ten minutes and, and write down notes about the negotiation you just left. You've got your written agenda so you can quickly go through it and identify what did you agree on, what slope, what follow up questions do you want to pursue your own preparation the next time you engage all those things and what worked? What did you notice? Did you realize that when you talked in terms of the vast of the organizations working together, the person was leaning forward and engaged? When you were talking about, you know, market competition, they seemed less engaged. So what are the things that really got your counterpart's attention? How can you use those to prepare for the next time you're engaging with them?

I love it. I think that's brilliant and I think we've, for me personally, that's something that I need to do a better job of reviewing afterwards because when it comes to memory, your memory starts to decay instantly. And so you can't leave it up to chance and hope that you remember. And for you as an attorney and with what you do with review, I'm assuming that includes sending a follow up email or message to the person with whom you were speaking, is that right?

It can be, yes, in a way. That's another form of engagement. The review is something you're doing yourself about the negotiation. I agree with you though that many times it's very helpful to do that kind of recap summary that reflects your understanding of, you know, where there were agreements or possible agreements, what issues still remain open that can provide an opportunity to ask a simple perhaps follow up question that'll clarify a point that might not be completely clear in your mind because it sounded really good in the room and then you're like, oh, but what about this kind of thing? So I think I always feel that sending a follow up is a good idea. And ideally, before you leave the room, it can be helpful if you try and Do a recap of what happened after that engagement, even before you leave the room so that you get immediate feedback from your counterpart as to whether you're summarizing things effectively and accurately.

That makes sense. Before we get to the engagement part, is there anything else you want to touch on with the preparation?

No. As you, as you can tell, I'm actually really. That's an area I focus on a lot because I think that when you've prepared effectively, the engagement goes a lot more smoothly.

Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think it's hard for people to kind of appreciate that because it's, it's frankly not as cool to spend all that time preparing, doing that introspection and then doing the research and all of that stuff. It's hard work and it's not as glamorous. But you're absolutely right. It does make the engagement significantly easier. Let's move on to engagement. What points would you like to cover here?

Well, I think you've had very good people on to talk about that part of the negotiation process. And I would reiterate what I know you said and other of your, you know, guests have said, which is that it is so, so important to listen and hear what your counterpart is saying. When they understand that you're really listening and they feel that you're really listening, you'll improve your relationship, which is really important, and you'll also yourself be focused on what they're saying. And when you're listening, really listening to what the other person is saying, that's when you're going to catch the nuances that allow you to create. You know, it's that moment of insight that's going to allow you to craft an opportunity or an option or an offer that the other party, your counterpart, is going to say, oh, yeah, that that's a great idea, or that would really work. And then you move the whole negotiation forward, like one great leap, right?

Oh, man, this is great. And I see we are coming up on time. But before, before you go, let me ask you this question, because this is a question I get all the time when I'm doing these workshops, and I want to see how you handle it. What if you are listening intently, but the other party is so clouded by emotions that they don't give you credit for the listening that you're doing, meaning they don't believe that you're listening? How do you address that?

Well, I really like Chris Voss's strategy, which is that you paraphrase, you have to, you know, you have to be able to repeat back to them, what you understand them, you know what you're hearing. And you want to do that because you can get one of two answers. You'll either get that's right, which as he said, gold standard of knowing. Then they captured what they're saying. Or they'll be like, no, that's not right. And then they can clarify, they can tell you what, what they do really mean. It gives you that chance. And certainly you say, this is what I'm hearing, but you need to tell me if I've got it right. That's how you move that conversation forward.

I agree 100%. Well, perfect. Before you go, can you tell the listeners how they can get in touch with you?

I have a website and I know you're very good at posting it. It's borkworks.com, which is my last name, B O R K E followed by the word works. And that's probably the best way to get in touch with and I'd love to hear from anyone who's interested in talking more about negotiation.

Fantastic. Well, thank you, Susan for joining us. This has been phenomenal.

Thank you for having me. It's always great talking with you. Kwame.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Now, before you sign off, I have something to tell you that I've never told you before. Just kidding. I've told you before, but you should listen to it again. I want you to know about Negotiate Anything Premium. Imagine all of the things that you love about our traditional feed, plus so much more. I know you like our traditional feed because you're at the end of the episode. And with Negotiate Anything Premium, you'll get more bonus content you've been asking for, more of the expert insights that you can't get anywhere else and more exclusive behind the scenes access into every conversation. Are you ready to get more of what you want out of your life, career and every conversation? With Negotiate Anything Premium, you'll have access to more high level, custom designed content and insights, giving you the tools you need to negotiate higher salaries, better deals and better relationships in your life and career. Once I had a listener share that Negotiate Anything helped her to negotiate a $53,000 raise. Could this be you? What would that mean for your life? I've seen firsthand the impact this model has had on my life and the lives of my corporate clients and I am confident that it can do the same for you. Are you ready to negotiate more of the best things in life? Click the link in the show notes to learn more. I'll catch you later.