Much of old-school negotiating strategy is premised on the idea of getting to “yes” (the 1981 book Getting to Yes being the touchstone text of the genre).
It’s easy to understand why this makes intuitive sense. “Yes” would mean that you’ve reached some sort of agreement, that they’ve acceded to your conditions. But as we’ll explore, “yes” is just the very end of the process: and if you push too hard, you’ll only anger and provoke your counterpart or get a false “yes.”
Along the way to yes is a whole series of “nos.” And those nos are simply the signposts on the way to yes.
People often say “yes” just to get someone else off their back. They’re not truly agreeing or committing to something, they’re simply trying to end a conversation with someone who’s being too aggressive and domineering.
We’ve all encountered pushy salespeople. They ask a series of questions whose obvious answer is “yes,” in the hopes that they will cut off your escape route to a refusal, compelling you to eventually say yes to whatever they’re selling. Think of these leading yes questions like, “Wouldn’t you like to pay less for Internet service?” “Do you value drinking clean water?” The intention is always the same.
These may have been effective at one time. But because we’re all so conditioned to these sorts of leading questions, they don’t have nearly the same impact today. We’ve all become experts at feigning interest and pretending to agree.
There are three kinds of yes.
You want “yes” to actually mean something. A “yes” that’s just a throwaway line to get you off their back or that holds no promise of follow through on their part is useless. To make your “yes” stick, though, you first need to do something counterintuitive: you need to get them to say “no.”
“No” signals the beginning of a successful negotiation, not the end of one. We already know that we want our counterpart in a negotiation to feel comfortable. And as we’ve explored, everyone wants to feel safe and in control. Tactics like mirroring, labelling, and accusation audits are effective at making people feel comfortable and that they are emotionally safe and understood by someone else.
Getting to no takes you a step further: it makes your counterpart feel in control. When we say “no” to something, it is a powerful assertion of control. We are setting boundaries and demonstrating our autonomy in the most fundamental way: we are saying, “I am in control, and I will not let external forces dictate what I do.”
In negotiation, don’t balk at hearing “no.” It is not a signal to terminate the discussion: instead, it reflects your counterpart’s temporary desire to maintain the status quo. Or, it could represent a desire for an alternative, a declaration that they’re not ready, or a request for more information.
Once the other person feel more secure having said “no,” the real negotiation can begin. Indeed, by identifying what you don’t want, you can get down to hashing out what you do want.
Example: “Yes” vs. “No” Donation Scripts
No-based persuasion scripts have been shown to be far more effective than yes-based scripts.
For example, a political fundraiser in 2012 was struggling to get contributions from Republicans by asking the standard “yes” questions like, “Do you believe Democrats are ruining the country?” and “Do you think we need to vote Obama out of office?” But the “yes” questions always led to a “no” when the final question (“Can we count on a donation from you?”) was asked.
When the fundraiser rewrote the script to ask “no” questions like “Do you think the country is headed in the right direction?” and “Are you going to sit back and let Obama have another four years in the White House?” the contribution rates shot up dramatically: the no-oriented script got a 23 percent higher rate of return!
Why? Because the fundraiser got the donors to see on their own that their goals were aligned. The no-based script got the donors to commit themselves to not sitting idly by and letting Democrats control the presidency. That self-commitment and self-identification compelled the next step: contributing money to help Republicans defeat Obama. The fundraiser skillfully got the donors to commit to a position from which contributing money was the only logical move.
To get to “no,” ask your counterpart questions that are designed to prompt negative answers. Answering these questions gives them a sense of autonomy and control: they’re making the decisions and they can take the next step if they want to. They’re drawing their own boundaries and stating their own desires about what they do and don’t want.
A clever way to accomplish this is to mislabel your counterpart’s emotions. You don’t want to mis-read them entirely, but go more extreme than what they’re feeling so they draw it back. (Accusation audits are one example of this technique.)
Another tactic is to ask what they don’t want. For example, if you’re talking with someone who you know wants to stay in a job, you could say “It seems like you’re really eager to leave your job.” This forces them to correct you and state “No, I’m really committed to staying where I am.”
Alternatively, you could ask them, “What would you say ‘no’ to?” This gives them a free hand to draw their boundaries and establish their comfort zone. In doing so, they’ll also reveal their negotiating limits—crucial information that will enable you to target your offers and counteroffers.
Once you’ve given someone the freedom and autonomy to say “no,” how do you take the next step and transform that into a successful negotiation? Ask solution-based questions or label the effect of the “no.”
Solution-based questions can be fairly simple and straightforward, like “What about this doesn’t work for you?” or “What would you need to make this work?”
Shortform Example: Getting to No
To demonstrate how labeling would work in a scenario like this, take a look at the brief dialogue below. Notice how Person 2 vocalizes the effect of Person 1’s “no.”
Person 1: “No, I don’t like those terms.”
Person 2: “It seems like there’s some real resistance on your part to what we’re discussing.” (Label)
Person 1: “Well, I’m definitely not comfortable with where we stand.”
Person 2: “I hear what you’re saying. And it sounds like there’s a disconnect and that you think I’m trying to pull one over on you.” (Label)
Person 1: “No, I don’t think you’re doing that, I just want to get to a place where I’m feeling comfortable about going forward with this deal.”
What if you can’t get a “no” out of your counterpart? This means that they’re probably too indecisive, confused, or concealing some sort of hidden agenda. Negotiation is never going to be successful with people like this, because they either don’t know what they want or are being dishonest.
This is a clear signal to walk away. A good rule to keep in mind is, “No ‘no’ means ‘no go.’”