How to Negotiate From a Place of Calm Part 1
Have you ever negotiated when you were agitated or off your game? How did that work out for you? If you’re like most people, it didn’t end well. How you show up for a negotiation will profoundly impact on the outcomes you’re able to get. The more intentional you can get about creating a sense of calm as you enter a negotiation, the more you’ll get best results.
Recently, I interviewed Dr. Annie White, author of The Calm Code: Transform Your Mind, Change Your Life. I am a big believer that negotiating our mindset is our first and most important negotiation, so Dr. White’s message resonated with me, and I wanted to share it with you.
This is the first in a 3-part series about some simple techniques you can use to approach your negotiations from a place of calm.
Most people think negotiation is simply about the give and take between the people in the conversation. In fact, it starts well before that ever takes place.
Visualization
Dr. White advocates starting with a visualization technique. However, she distinguishes between visualizing the outcome you want versus visualizing the emotions you want to feel as a result of it. Target the emotions first. How do you want to feel after that negotiation? Do you want to feel successful and proud? Ground yourself in those emotions.
Be sure to visualize feeling good about what the other person is getting, too. It’s not just about what we’re getting out of a negotiation. We’re helping to negotiate something for them that’s going to improve their business or their life. Be excited about the prospects for them.
Take these emotions and imagine a situation where this negotiation is going to take place. Is it going to be over the phone, zoom or in person? Toss in as many sensory details as you can to get your subconscious into the moment of the conversation.
Then imagine the conversation in as much detail as possible. As you’re thinking about the conversation, make sure it ignites the excitement, pride, and other feelings you wanted to feel. Emphasize those benefits.
At the end, do a triple thanks and affirmation. i.e. “Thank you, thank you, thank you that they loved the deal and I’m excited about how it turned out.”
Visualization is one of the techniques you can use to physically train your mind to be calmer and happier. Yes, I said train your brain. Many people believe that we’re stuck with our old conditioning and patterns. Science has established that we can actually reroute the neural pathways in our brains.
Think of it like an air traffic controller. If you’re in charge of routing all the planes with a major airline carrier, you need to make sure all the passengers get where they need to go on the planes that are taking them there. You design the flight paths and their connections.
Now think of the passengers as your thoughts, and the flight paths and connections as the neural pathways and the synapses, which are the connections between them. Instead of booking them all to Stressville, why not book them to Calm Town? Simply make more paths and connections to Calm Town and disintegrate the pathways and connections to Stressville. Every single thought, action, and emotion strengthens or wires your mind along these corresponding pathways in your brain.
Be prepared for some pushback reflex as you create these new connections. But as you train your mind to be more calm and happy than stressed and negative, your thoughts will more easily go to the positives instead of the negatives.
Join us next week as we explore two further simple methods to help you hold the calm when you negotiate so you can get better outcomes.