The key to get what he wanted and avoiding compromises, and making the other side feel like they were treated fairly was tactical empathy.
tactical empathy is the act of sincerely empathizing with her counterparts situation and then getting them to empathize with your situation, let me tell you why demonstrating sincere empathy is critical to negotiation and how giving and receiving empathy is the key to walking away from a negotiation with the best possible price, best possible salary, or the best possible contract while making the other party feel like they were treated fairly, during a psychotherapy session a psychiatrist will encourage a patient to talk while she listens intensely, occasionally the psychiatrist will jump in to help clarify what the patient is saying and feeling psychiatrists do this because they know that their patient will be less defensive and less opposed to change if they can make them feel heard the same principle applied to a negotiation during a negotiatino your counterpart will be uncomfortable dealing with you and resist your counteroffers until you demonstrate that you understand their world and can empathize with their cares and concerns.
A woman in chris voss negotiating workshop learn this the hard way, the woman who will call susan was a sales rep for a pharmaceutical company, she was attempting to influence a doctor to replace to replace one of the drugs that he was prescribing to his patients that she was selling, in the first meeing with the doctor, he was cold and skeptical, he told her that nothing would convince him to replace the drug he was already adminstratering his patients, although this initial sales pitch was going terrible. Susan started to see how deeply he cared for his patients, when he talked about any one of his patients his body language and tone of voice was noticeably warmer, Susan pointed it out you seemed very passionate about treating your patients, I can see hwo hard you work to tailor specific treatment to each and every patient, the doctor paused and looked at her as if he was seein gher for the first time and said, that’s right i feel like iam treating an epidemic that the other doctor are not picking out on which means that a lot of patients are not getting treated adequately, from that moment on, the doctor let down his guard, and was willing to listen what susan had to say when susan brought up the positive attribute of her product, he listenced closely， by the end of meeing, the doctor say he is open to try new medication, he placed the order on that day, the magical words that turned around susan’s conversation with the doctor where that’s if you couldn’t get your counterpart to say the words that’s right, then you know you made them feel hurt, and you know that they will be more receptive to any offers or counter offer that you made.
Chris Voss says, the negotiation does not truely start until you hear the words, ” that’s right”, the best way to get your counter part to say the words that’s right, is to listen to the emtion behind the counterpart’s word, your goal is to spot the care and concern that have regarding the negotiation and summary the care and concerns with concise stateement, starts with it seems like or sounds like, it seems like you really concern about, the beauty is if you are wrong, you don’t damage the conversation, if you conterpart confirm with your statement with that’s right, that is the time to get them to empathize with your situation.
Turn confrontation to Problem solving seesion.
So next time you go into negotiation empathize with their situation and try to get a that’s right, then get them to empathize with your situation, and ask them to help solve one of your problem, by asking a calibrated question like how am I supposed to do that if you do this, you’re on your way to mastering the art of negotiation which is simply the art of getting someone else to have your way, that was the core message from never split the difference.