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We've all been taught never go into a negotiation without your BATNA, your best alternative to a negotiated agreement.
But what if your Batman is actually the very thing stopping you from reaching your best deal?
In this episode, Derek Chevalier doesn't just challenge the rule, he explains why it's a trap, and what to do instead if you want to unlock real creativity at the table.
My contention is that if an outcome is what you expected it to be before you went into negotiation, it's generally a sign that you left a lot on the table and that you did not evolve or create what we call the highest and best outcome.
How could you possibly have known what was possible in that negotiation before you walked into the room?
And that's one of the dangers we talk about when you look at something like a BATNA.
Yeah, having a best alternative to a negotiated agreement is a great idea, but it's also a prison, because if you go, you came up with that BATNA.
So at the end of the day, the BATNA teaches you to negotiate with yourself.
The outcome you started with, you came up with it, they had a BATNA, you had a BATNA.
And then when you don't get there, you go, oh, okay, we'll drop back to my BATNA.
No, no, no, no, no. An evolved negotiator understands that Abatnez is a place, we're here, but we're walking into the room to find out what we don't know, not to negotiate ourselves back into a place we decided to go to before we walked into the room.
So if the outcome is equal to what our expectation, it means that the outcome is not comprised of a significant amount of elements that we didn't know before we walked into the room.
That means we left a lot on the table.
This is a major paradigm shift, because I think like the BATNA has been a sacred cow in negotiation for what, 30, 40 years at this point?
And we never ever stopped to think about how it could possibly be hurting us, because especially when you think about using the negotiation technique of anchoring, which is nothing more than psychological priming.
What we're doing is that we're anchoring ourselves going into the negotiation, and we're not going in with as much fluidity and openness.
We have to reprogram our minds.
It's good to have an idea of the BATNA, but not just worship it as if it is the be -all and end -all of our negotiation, strategy, power, and leverage.
Then we also, too, if we're negotiating on behalf of somebody else, we also have to educate them as well because we have to let them know, hey, listen, you have this idea but great negotiators embrace surprises and there's going to have to be an element of discovery here and we need to be open to that.
We have to negotiate with our stakeholders so they can understand this evolve negotiation approach. We have to negotiate with ourselves to go through a little bit of unlearning before we go into the negotiation and then we have to negotiate with more fluidity and move to that highest and best outcome.
That's that's brilliant.
That's brilliant. Absolutely.
Because think about it in evolved negotiation.
We measure the outcome By how much of the outcome was based upon data insight or information?
Or knowledge we did not have when we walked into the room Therefore if you knew all the things at the beginning that you needed at the end There was no point in the negotiation just negotiating yourself So I think the bat and it is an important idea, but in an Evolver Be Slaughtered, I actually say, hey, it just needs to be updated so that we understand that it's a starting point.
It's not an end. Ultimately, what we're looking for is that creativity.
And we're looking as as we get new insight and new discovery, or as we find out that our counterpart is not willing to provide us with that, rather than running to the BATNA, we're running to the creative aspects of our negotiation and communication capabilities to find creative ways of unlocking what the counterpart is unwilling to provide for us.
That's strategy, that's when we look at our tactics, and yes we've got to be creative in a moment to be able to decipher which tool and how to shape and use that tool to unlock that access.
Because we're not going to the BATNA until we're 1000 % sure that we've used every tool in our toolbox to gain access to whatever that person is unwilling to share with us.
This is great. Yeah.
So, it is we're using our negotiation skills to gather information to amplify our creativity.
Now, let's go through this.
Let's go deeper, because sometimes you might be an evolved negotiator, but the other person may not be so evolved in this situation.
They might be playing their cards close to their chest, not sharing information, not even being willing to be creative.
How do you approach this in a way that helps them to feel a level of psychological safety and vulnerability where they're willing to open themselves up to even explore these creative options?
So obviously the answer is going to depend on the specific situations on times and also a lot on who we're actually negotiating with, because keep in mind very frequently, the person we're negotiating with may not be the actual person that's making a decision.
Also, a person's title doesn't necessarily reflect their role in a decision -making process, so there are a lot of variables where that we could talk about, but specifically, from a skill standpoint, this is where things like neurolinguistic programming and effective communication and neurophysiology come in.
so if you're being resistant i might start with a persuasive argument to find out whether or not that convinces you and i'm going to use data and i may use a lot of different uh tools to persuade you to move or to open up now if that doesn't work i'm going to shift to a strategy based upon influence and the vast majority of people do not know the difference between those two, right, so persuasion cannot happen by accident and it doesn't happen without the other person being aware that they're being persuaded by definition, right, you can't persuade someone without their being aware of it by definition.
But if you look at the etymology of influence, influence is the ability to have an impact on a person, place or thing without their being aware of it.
So now I'm going to shift and begin to use tools and approaches that give me insight into my counterparts resistance because that resistance may not have anything to do with the issue we're talking about it may have to do with some interpersonal cultural may have to do with their upbringing or their background having an impact I may have used a tone or a word that triggered that person shut them down and their resistance is not to provide any information their resistance is the fact that they're stuck in the fact that I just sounded like their father or that my voice raised, or I was direct in a way
that shut them down.
Well, that's not negotiating.
That has nothing to do with the negotiation issues that has to do with an interpersonal issue, during which I need to use interpersonal tools to a recognize be approach, and then C, resolve that issue before going back to the negotiation.
Oh, man, this was so good, we crushed this.
Okay, Simone, you take it, because I will just keep on flowing because I know Simone has some questions for you too.
I've seen Kwame saying something similar about negotiation, it's the art of deal -discovering instead of deal -making, right?
I'm not an expert, but when I go to a negotiation, my strategy is to have a goal in mind.
I don't know how to prepare a negotiation without having this goal in mind.
So how can I go to a negotiation without having a goal in mind in order to be open, to get more, more than what I was looking for?
I just don't understand how to harmonize these two concepts.
Man. It's actually a very good question, because what I'm, what I'm thinking too is that when When you just think about goal -setting in general, let's step aside from negotiation, but let's go to goal -setting in general, that, again, it serves as an anchor.
The more aggressive we are with our goals, a lot of times, the more likely we are to push harder, right?
It's kind of like aim for the stars.
If you don't make it, you'll shoot, you'll hit the moon, that type of mentality too.
The thing is now what we're realizing is that we might aim for the stars and recognize that the stars were a lot closer than we thought, and there's something far beyond that too.
people. And I think we have to hold that high aspiration in our mind because we recognize that especially in transactional negotiations, the people are going to be trying to pull in the opposite direction, they might start off very positional.
So we have to make sure that we are still ambitious enough to not be inappropriately persuaded and anchored in the wrong direction.
But at the same time, I think we have to loosely hold that goal in our mind.
So we still orient in the right direction, focused on our interests, but at same time be open.
And so that's where the flow comes in because this is something that is very difficult to reconcile because the reality is that a lot of times when you start to get to higher levels, in order for us to perform at a high level, we have to hold two dichotomous beliefs in our mind at the same time and reconcile them in real time.
And so it's hard to articulate what it is.
But it has to be an intentional focus on getting better, getting more improving, whatever improving might be.
And as I'm in the conversation, I might recognize that improving or moving toward better might look very, very different from what I initially planned.
I would add to that specifically to your question, Simon, this one, that yes, you have an idea about what you want but it is a decision to allow that idea to become the anchor of the negotiation so the idea is what you would like in a perfect world based upon what you know if you enter a negotiation not focused on what you know but rather focused on finding out what you do not No, as you're going through that process you're going to get new insight and information that will simultaneously change what you thought was possible when you walked in there and I had an experience just this morning that was I look
in the I'm looking at Jupiter, it's fixed.
I look at it, right?
And then suddenly it takes off and I'm watching it going across the side.
So the question would be, is it a star or is it a satellite?
Because what I thought was the star was actually a satellite moving across the universe.
So guess what? Must have found out something he didn't know and moved to another neighborhood.
And so don't allow your assumptions about what it is you want and what it is the outcome ought to be, to be the driving force, but rather to seek to get access to what you don't understand.
And that will change the entire equation.
Hey, Derek, hold up one second.
I want to talk to the listener for a moment.
Yes, you. I'm talking to you.
If this conversation is making your brain buzz, that's a good thing.
That means you're evolving, because a great negotiator doesn't just memorize strategies, they question them.
So here's my ask for you.
Just take 20 seconds and leave a 5 -star review for the show.
That's what fuels this work.
And the more of those reviews we get, the more people we can reach and help to grow this movement.
And if it helps more people to discover the power of negotiation as a tool for change, then that's a real win -win.
Yeah, this is good.
Yeah, this kind of flips the old paradigm on its head.
And I think a lot of times for the sake of ease of understanding, we have oversimplified some concepts that deserve to be a little bit more fluid too.
Goal setting has been described in a very rigid type of way, but that again assumes perfect knowledge as if I'm going to go into this conversation and not learn anything.
And that rigidity kind of trickles down throughout the conversation.
Because it biases the way that we even ask questions because we ask questions not to expand our understanding, but subconsciously we asked questions just to confirm our previous assumptions.
Right? So that's huge.
Yeah. Just think about that.
You're you're actually in that's, that's brilliant, because you go in with this idea about what you want.
And then you're fighting to protect and defend what you want.
In other words, going in with a closed fist. And I think what Kwame and I are talking about certainly an evolved negotiator is going in with an open hand.
Like, I you know, I'm going in to find out what's possible not to defend and protect what I want.
Because very often what I want is a fraction of what was possible.
If the other person knew some what I was if they had more insight about what I'd be willing to do they might very well be able to share something so that's why we focus on what are my learning that I didn't know or I'm testing my assumptions and presumptions I go in I'm not reinforcing and defending them that's going to change everything so I think it is a paradigm shift that's that's cool testing what we already know and then not not seeking to reinforce, man that's good.
Man, Derek, maybe you should write a book on this or something, bro.
I don't know. I'm thinking about that.
You know what next time, if we get a chance to talk, I'd love to talk about some.
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of the key elements in negotiation, contemporarily that we also challenge and evolve.
For instance, the idea of never split the difference, for instance.
So that figures into, if you're talking about a rigid never split the difference, right?
So here's one of the things that we talk about.
Listen, that rule came from Chet Karas, and his third rule of his program is don't split the difference.
But what we talk about in Evolve is this, if you teach someone never to do something, you simultaneously teach them to fail in any a situation where what you told them never to do is the only thing that would that would result in an outcome or avoid deadlock.
So we don't teach Evolv Negotiators to never do something.
We teach them when to do it, how to do it, and what to do to protect themselves as they're learning more about Options.
Wow. So Evolve is not erasing things or saying they're not great.
I did. We're just saying, Hey, they've got to be elevated for the 21st century because.
B because never doing something like, let's apply that to politics right now.
Never split the difference.
Really? Are you sure you want you really?
Is that where you think about Ukraine and Russia?
Never, never at all.
That make any sense?
And yet it's a popular idea that will create more harm than good without understanding that I am never doing it because somebody told me never to do it, as opposed to saying to saying, when should I do it?
Who should I do it with?
How should I frame it?
What are other options and possibilities that I can build in.
So that's really what the snuff or evolved framework brings to the marketplace.
It looks at all of these ideas and says, Hey, they're not bad ideas, but they need to be updated and integrated into the body of knowledge and negotiation.
Oh, that's so good.
Yeah. Cause as I was, as you were saying that I was thinking about like, what are some of those, those like commandments of negotiation?
Never split the is one of those, and things like that.
Don't interrupt ever, right?
And it's like, okay, because I used to have those beliefs, and then I was making reads and negotiations, and I was saying, wait, no, this is actually the time to interrupt.
And I don't do it often.
I don't do it often.
But sometimes it's required.
And I think we need more work like that in the world to validate what a lot of people are feeling in the moment because they're saying, But I'm here in this moment, and it seems like that thing that I was told never to do is the only thing that would work under these circumstances, but we see the read, and then we don't do it to our own detriment.
But it's almost like we hold on to it, almost like a religious belief, where we say, well, according to the religion of what I should not do in negotiation, I did not do that.
And following that rule actually hurt me, but I'll get some kind of payoff sometime after the negotiation in some unspecified future?
Well, I'm feeling bad right now.
Well think about it.
Here's the other, here's the other reason why don't split the difference, never split the difference or any of the don'ts are kind of dumb.
I said it. And here's why they, they actually contradict other concepts in almost every negotiation framework.
And you know that is don't create patterns.
so so if you're if you're following a rule that says don't that becomes a pattern if you're following a pattern then you become vulnerable and a slave to that pattern and if you're negotiating with an evolved negotiator they will eat you alive because they're not they're they have a pallet of colors and the more sophisticated they are they're able to create ate a new color based upon the environment of that moment.
So that I use in a role that, and you know from yesterday they're bringing something new which brings up the concept because Kwame is an attorney.
One of the things we talk about in involved negotiation is this, Justice Gorsuch said, ""Great lawyers create or follow precedent." They follow precedent, but evolved negotiators are seeking to create precedent.
Those are very different roads, very different roads.
I need to know what the precedent is, but if it fits, you must acquit.
That wasn't a precedent.
It created a precedent.
And a great negotiator is looking to create an outcome that didn't exist based upon the information, the ingredients, and the challenges ahead of them.
And that's what an evolved negotiator does.
That's what makes the approach different than the approach of other people, right?
We're trying to figure out how to create something in a moment, right?
And sometimes we're chefs and sometimes we're bakers, meaning, you know, a chef can add and replace ingredients with this or that.
A baker needs to stay pretty close to a recipe.
However, an evolve negotiator has the ability to do both at any given time, knowing when to be a baker and when to be a cook and then when to be an innovator.
Therefore, we're continually evolving and if we're not, that's the sign that we need to go back and retune, refresh and reconsider what we're doing.
Oh my gosh, because this is so liberating because it's like you've allowed me to give voice to things that I have been saying, but I've been thinking, but haven't really just shot the shot.
Because I think when it comes to the ...
Let's go with Evolve Negotiator because I love that.
This is your branding, it's strong.
Because when we're thinking about it it's like, yeah, we're giving you the license to do what is required to be effective in moment.
And what we never do is lose sight of our skills.
So you never have the license to be an unskilled negotiator, but you can have the license to make reads in the moment.
And a lot of times people who are having these difficult conversations or let's talk about people who are actually like in sales and negotiation who are having these high level conversations, you might become just so beholden to the tactics and strategies of yesteryear, the precedent that has been set before us.
And so we're saying that we are incapable of creating something that other humans have like just overlooked.
Is that the thing? So like the entirety of negotiation knowledge has been locked in since like the 1980s or 1990s.
That's just in what world is that the case?
And so when you think about what a tactic is, it's just the pairing of skills utilized at the right moment.
And that there's no possible way that in the incredible diversity of the world, and as the world continues to evolve, that we have exhausted all possible tactics.
Of course. Thank you.
Yes. This is why you, you just touched on the way you know, that my moniker is Derek Chevalier the van Gogh of negotiation.
So sometimes people will ask me, what do I mean by that?
Because here's what I mean by Imagine and I go to Amsterdam every chance I got going back from and I'll just spend time with Van Gogh and go to the museum.
But people say, well, why is that?
And I say this the evolved negotiation in terms of bringing it to where it is now and where we're going has been like Starry Night.
So imagine this. Van Gogh is in France, he's got all these paintings including Starry Night, nobody will hang it up.
He can't get a bowl of soup because Starry Night is a reflective of every word that Kwame just said about new innovation.
He was making paints, making the colors, making his brushes.
He was painting subjects that were unusual for the time against Monet and others.
So people were looking at what is now a priceless painting and looking at the same painting and saying that it had no value whatsoever.
And that's the difference between taking the body of knowledge and negotiation, as if it is iron clad and evolved negotiation, in which we're saying, hey, we got new paints, new brushes, new opportunities to create new paintings.
And when you first see them, They're not going to look like what it used to look like, but at the end of the day, it will end up priceless in a museum, just as Starry Night did.
So, right? It's the idea of no one, so Van Coel couldn't do it.
His brother, who was an art dealer couldn't do it.
It took a woman, not surprising, his brother's wife, who went to Garenger, and with a group of students, young minds, she went at a time when women were not involved in art at all, and broadband go to the world.
I got something. The universe is speaking, because here to check out this synchronicity here.
This is a great place to land the plane.
So I have a Stevie Wonder story blended with an Amsterdam story.
So for my 35th birthday, like a year and a half ago, I went to Amsterdam to celebrate it with my friends.
And so we went into this restaurant.
And it was an old school Amsterdam restaurant.
And so it was somebody else's birthday and they brought out these flares and they pumped birthday music over the loudspeakers and everything.
But it was like the traditional Dutch birthday song.
And it was, I can't sing it, it was very unique tune.
And I said to myself, oh my gosh, I want that.
And then I brought, as soon as it was done, the staff did their whole song and dance, literally.
And I brought the server over, I was like, hey, it's my birthday.
She's like, no, it's not.
I was like, yes, it is, here's my driver's license.
She's like, okay, we'll be back.
And so I was like, this is great.
I'm going to get a traditional Dutch birthday song.
And so what happens?
What happens? They bring out the flares, bring out the cake and everything.
And what song do they play?
The Stevie Wonder birthday song for me.
I was like, wait, wait, you profiling me.
You're profiling me.
It was great, man. So...
So great. That's great, when she's like, wait a second.
That's, I love it. Oh man.
This was great. I was excited, but this was, thank you, man.
I mean, I'm blessed and I feel, so thank you, both of you.
It's, it's really a privilege.
Yes. to meet you and we'll talk more, man.
I definitely wanna get your insights on the book.
And I think that there are a lot of things that you'll see in there mixed with what you're already doing that will then you're going to evolve and take to an even other level and that's what we're here for.
I mean, that's what we're gonna, you're creating something that does not exist in a world that is ever -changing and evolving and that's where we are.
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