In 2013 I took my then 14 year old son and a friend to see the Rolling Stones in Hyde Park in London. It was a lovely summer’s evening, we were close to the stage and The Stones were sensational. My son still says that it was one of the best days of his life.
Fast forward a year: my son calls me at work. “Dad – great news, The Stones are playing in Sydney in a few months. The tickets are going on sale on Thursday.” Me: “OK but what has that got to do with us?” Him: “If you get online just before 9, we might be lucky and get tickets.” Me: “Haha, are you serious? That sounds like a £5,000 weekend.” A 10-minute sales pitch ensues. Hearing the longing in his voice and his promise to get a holiday job to pay for some of it, I nearly crack. But I manage to hold firm. Then, after a few seconds of silence, comes the killer line: “Well OK, I suppose it is a long way…. but never mind, they are playing Dubai on their way back. That’s much closer so we can go there instead.”
Having never taught him about negotiation, I learned then that my son is a natural. (Very proud.) He talked for long enough about a weekend in Australia that I almost got used to the idea. And then Dubai seemed like it was just around the corner, and the airfares trifling.
There has been much research on this issue which has produced some quite startling results. The psychological power of positional bargaining is strong, and it’s often under-appreciated by many, even seasoned negotiators.
In my experience, all negotiations involve positional bargaining to some extent; even those where the parties have agreed to collaborate. And so, successful negotiators need to be skilled at deploying the psychology of positional bargaining and at defending themselves against it. How do we do this? I’m not going to try to present the full learning experience in this article but I will outline a couple of the issues that we need to consider.
The first question you have to ask yourself is: Do I make the first proposal, or do I encourage them to go first? There’s no right or wrong answer here: it depends, particularly on your confidence in the information you have about their situation. Secondly, when I make my proposal, where do I pitch it? Too bold and I risk insulting them and making myself look foolish, too modest and I risk a sub-optimal deal. Again, getting the answer to this question right, relies on the quality of the information you have about their situation: just one of the reasons why good preparation is so important.
And how do we defend ourselves against the powerful psychological pressure that is positional bargaining? I’d love to see you at one of my workshops so that we can explore the answer to this important question! All I’ll write here is that a vital starting point is being aware of what they are trying to do to you.
(By the way, we didn’t go to Dubai – but it was a close-run thing.)