Negotiation plays a key role in your career life. There are many careers where you need to have good negotiation skills to survive.
You must thus understand what your negotiation skills are. This will help you progress in your career and achieve success.
There are many different types of negotiators in this world and each type has its own advantages and disadvantages.
What kind of Negotiator Are You?
Here we have discussed the two main types of negotiators and their characteristics.
Powerful Negotiator:
Competitive negotiators are the most successful ones in fields like sales and marketing. These are individuals who are often referred to as distributive, positional or assertive types of negotiators.
They are completely result oriented. Their prime goal during any negotiation is to achieve the goal and to please their client.
They will have the final say in any negotiation. They are the kind of negotiators who will willingly suppress a submissive client.
Here is a list of characteristics that will be present in you if you are a competitive negotiator:
- You will use an assertive and strong language
- You will be suspicious about any deal and make a deal only when you are perfectly sure
- You will not value the opposite person but just the deal
- You may conceal some facts if they benefit your deal.
- You would not like to compromise and would want the deal your way
Cooperative Negotiator:
Cooperative negotiators are usually different from competitive ones in the fact that they try to achieve a common goal in a mutual manner so that both the negotiators go home pleased.
If you are a cooperative negotiator, you most important value relation and do not look at the negotiation as a competition but as a problem to which you have a clear view and wish to attain a solution that is best suitable to both the parties.
You assess the situation in the best possible way and understand it properly from your perspective.
Here is a list of traits that a cooperative negotiator possesses which helps you distinguish him from competitive negotiator.
- You are usually friendly and cooperative with your competitor
- Relation usually matters a lot for you
- Your main focus is to achieve a solution for the problem in hand
- If you can see the problems associated with the issue in hand, you will communicate it honestly to your client
- You would communicate in a polite and friendly manner
- You would try and avoid conflicts
- Long term relations with your clients are usually good
The major merit of being a competitive negotiator is that you will have a strong and impressive persona.
You will be able to communicate your perspective with clarity. It will be easy for you to make an impression on the client. You must be careful while you speak to your client and you must make sure that you maintain your cool while interacting.
There are some tips and suggestions that will help you improve as a negotiator. Here is a list of tips and suggestions to help you be a great negotiator.
Don’t let Emotions Come in the Way:
Many competitive negotiators have the desire to win the argument. They generally do not wait to understand and analyze the problem as an issue and simply get carried away by the emotion. These negotiators should learn to control their emotions and try to find the best solution for a given problem. If you are a cooperative negotiator and like to remain honest in all situations, you must make sure that you present the facts in the most amiable manner. It is better not to be too curt or blunt while presenting facts as not everyone can digest facts easily.
Try To Maintain Relations with your Clients:
Clients are people who remember you, for your work. Make sure that you maintain a cordial relationship with your client. Try to deal with them in a friendly manner. While you place your viewpoint, consider the views expressed by the client as well. Consider all the pros and cons and evaluate the situation with complete honesty. Being dishonest for temporary gains may lead to loss of a client for the entire lifetime. Value your client and take the right decision.
Honesty has its limit:
Cooperative negotiators usually do not like to take a risk and prefer to be upfront honest. It is a great approach provided you handle honesty with care. Not all individuals can digest honesty. Make sure you present the facts in a manner that can be acceptable to the client. Usually it is great to explain the pros and cons and then let the client or the opposite person make a decision. This also supports the life of the relation.
Improve Communication Skills:
There are individuals who have all the knowledge and the experience that a person may require in a negotiation. Yet they lack the confidence to communicate. You can get over this hurdle by working on your communication skills. Try and practice speaking in front of the mirror. Improve your language skills by reading and interacting in the language. Boost your confidence by interacting with more people and trying to deal with similar situations. Nervousness and lack of confidence often prevents people from communicating properly.
These simple tricks and tactics will help you enhance yourself as a negotiator. If you need to be a good team player, you need to have great negotiating skills. As you ascend the success ladder, you need to interact with more and more people and negotiation skills are of prime importance. If you improve as a negotiator, you will be able to easily cross this great hurdle to success.
