The Negotiation Guru

Many people have emailed me after reading my previous post, “What do people lack most when they negotiate?”

Thank you for your emails. This shows that many people are aware of the importance of confidence during negotiation. And awareness is a giant step towards become better at negotiation.

Are you a confident negotiator?
Do you have bad thoughts before a negotiation?
Are you afraid of the results of your negotiation?
Do you know how to increase your confidence during negotiation?

Here are 3 tricks to help you with your confidence:

1) Fake it

We have control over our own emotional states. We can alter our emotional states at any time of the day. When you start faking it, you actually start feeling it.

When you are feeling sad, notice how a smile can change your mood?

What should you do when you are not feeling confident?

You can speak slower.
You can walk taller.
You can sit up straight.
You can smile more.

Plenty of things to do to “fake” your confidence. Your thoughts can affect your actions and vice versa.

Simply put, the more you act confident, the more confident you think. the more confident you are.

2) Detach yourself from the outcome

People are so negative.

Before a race: “What if I lose?”
Before an exam: “What if I fail?”
Before an interview: “What if I don’t get the job?”
Before asking a guy/girl out on a date: “What if I’m too ugly?”
Before a negotiation: “What if _____ (fill in the blank)?”

It is so easy to allow all these negative thoughts of the negotiation outcome to affect you. Detach yourself from the outcome.

When you start to detach yourself from the outcome, you take it less personal and this dramatically increase your confidence.

3) Focus on the situation

When you are stressed over your negotiation, you tend to lose focus of the situation. You will be thinking of what to do, what to say and so on.

Remind yourself of the exact purpose of this negotiation.

As you become more focused on the situation, you find yourself more in control. With this, you start to feel more confident.

Confidence is what you need to increase the success of your negotiation. Do not let such negativity deflate your own self-confidence.

REMEMBER: Confidence is a key component. Own it.

For more on improving self-confidence and self-esteem, visit David Rogers’ site.
Read my previous post related to this topic, “What do people lack most when they negotiate?”

—————–
Jens Thang
Negotiation Skills for Everyone

Email: jens@thenegotiationguru.com

This entry was posted on Friday, January 11th, 2008 at 1:17 pm and is filed under Others, Psychology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.