What can be Negotiated

Well, about anything can be a negotiable.

A negotiable is anything which might be exchanged during a negotiation.

In addition, there are two basic types of negotiables – the tangible and the emotional.

Tangible Negotiable

These are easily identified. For example, when negotiating the sale of a house, the tangibles include the house itself, a diary date for moving, a price, the contents which are to be included in the sale, etc.

Tangibles will typically be documented and quantified in some way. So, when selling a house, the following will be agreed to in writing:

• The address and defined boundary of the specific property under negotiation.
• A specific date on which the price will be paid, and the house will be made available to the buyer.
• A specific purchase price.
• A list of specific contents included/excluded from the agreement. For example: when selling a house, the garden plants are generally regarded as included – unless the vendor specifies otherwise. Therefore, when I last sold, I had to list all the plants I wanted to take with me and exclude them from the sale.

When negotiating, we typically remember most of the tangible negotiables. But note, failing to document tangible specifics can cause significant problems.

For instance, imagine the response if it was never documented when a negotiated pay increase was to be implemented.

Tangible Needs and Wants

Tangible negotiable can be subdivided into ‘wants’ and ‘needs’.

Two examples:

• When selling my home, I might want to get twice (or three times) what it is worth. A would-be buyer might want it at half the market value.
• In business, when employers and employees are engaged in pay negotiations – the former (generally) doesn’t want to pay as much as the latter wants to receive.
• In the above examples, the wants are in conflict and there is no way forward for the parties: Sticking to tangible wants leaves no room for negotiating.

However, there is an alternative. Let’s re-consider the two examples:

• When I sell my house, I might need enough money from the sale to buy another. A buyer needs to be able to afford it.
• When seeking to agree a pay increase from an employer, the employees might need to be given their market worth and the employer needs to keep them on the payroll and motivated.
• Both examples provide room for manoeuvre in a negotiation, not least because ‘needs’ are (typically) more reasonable than ‘wants’ and there are different ways to achieve success.

To illustrate:

• If I want twice the market value of my house, the chances of a sale are negligible. However, if the buyer can enable me to buy another home, there will be many homes from which my needs can be met.
• If I want a 20% pay increase, the employer could refuse, and we are at an impasse. However, if I state my need is to reflect my market worth, there could be a mix of options negotiated – enhance my pension, reduce my hours and/or give me a pay increase.

Stating tangible needs is a basis for negotiating

Emotional Negotiable

Every negotiation involves emotions and they can have a profound impact on the progress towards an agreement by causing us to act subjectively and often irrationally. However, they are not necessarily that easy to identify. Let’s illustrate this with our house selling example:

The buyer may fall in love with the house. They may be (emotionally) pressurised by their family or friends to make the move and/or buy this specific house. Yet, they are unlikely to let the seller know of such pressure for fear that the seller might take advantage and increase their asking price.

The seller might be selling because they need the proceeds to buy urgent medical treatment for a loved one. Again, the seller’s reluctance to reveal this might be caused by fear that it will give the upper hand to the buyer.

Rarely will all the emotions be revealed in a negotiation

Emotional negotiables are also present in business negotiations. Consider:

• The senior manager who is driven by an emotional need ‘to be seen’ as successful.
• The person who gets upset when they think their needs are disregarded or disrespected.
• When a negotiation falters because one party insults another.

Emotional Needs and Wants

Does the principle of stating tangible needs rather than wants work with emotional negotiables? Alas, no!

Let us look at a business example. I negotiate the best possible deal for my organisation but believe that it is not quite good enough to avoid me ‘losing face’ amongst my peers. If I emotionally want to look good in front of my peers, I might choose to scupper the deal rather than proceed with it. Rationally, we would say that such action would be wrong. However, who said emotions were rational?