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Intimidated To Negotiate For Yourself? 5 Critical Strategies To Help You Nail It

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It’s all over the news today – that women are challenged in negotiating and advocating powerfully for themselves.  In recent research released this week by Citi and LinkedIn , the data reveals that while 30% of women say they regularly share news of their professional accomplishments, only 40% feel they are adequately promoting their work to senior members of their organizations, compared to 50% of men who feel they’re doing a good job of self-promotion.  And women believe they should be making 27% more than their current salary. Another recent study revealed that 57% of men negotiate their very first salary, versus 7% of women. In my work with over 10,000 professional women, I see this pattern daily of women feeling reluctant and intimidated to negotiate on their own behalf.

To understand how women can learn to negotiate more effectively, I connected with pioneer female sports agent-turned-entrepreneur Molly Fletcher, upon the release of her newest book, A Winner’s Guide to Negotiating.

One of the first women in the sports agent business (and dubbed by CNN as the “female Jerry Maguire”), and founder of her own consulting company, Molly knows all about the gender stereotypes of negotiating. When people weren’t sure of her skill set– she found new ways to relate to, embrace, and ultimately represent top male and female athletes we’ve all watched on television—and she did this through what she attributes as her five steps of negotiating.

I asked Molly to address the key questions I hear from women every day about how to negotiate, and win, and offer some critical strategies to enhance our negotiation power.

Molly shares this:

Research shows that women overwhelmingly tend to be more hesitant when negotiating on behalf of themselves– accepting lower pay, agreeing to take on more, and negotiating at much lower rates than their male counterparts.  Here are five key strategies that will help you communicate and negotiate with more authority and confidence:

1. Take intimidation out of the equation.

One of my motivations for writing A Winner’s Guide to Negotiating: How Conversation Gets Deals Done was to take the intimidation factor out of negotiation.  In a recent salary.com survey, 59% of respondents said they dread salary negotiations because it makes them feel nervous and/or apprehensive.  It is for most people, a very uncomfortable position.  A few tactics:

- Preparation is key. It seems obvious, but almost 90% of negotiators fail to ask basic diagnostic questions when entering a negotiation.  Preparation is a huge part of being able to ask with confidence.  That means not just arming yourself with hard data, but also having 360-degree awareness and understanding the values, goals, hopes and fears of the other side.  Being prepared will help you anticipate the inevitable ebbs and flows of a negotiation and help you drive a more compelling case.

- Practice in low stakes scenarios.  People tend to think negotiating is a skill you either have or don’t have, instead of a skill that can be developed with practice.  Don’t make that big negotiation you have coming up be the only time you practice.  Find low stakes situations where you can practice your negotiating skills and build confidence.

- Negotiation is just a conversation. If you can frame up negotiation as an ongoing conversation and not a one-time battle, you will diminish some of the fear.  Remember that not every negotiation has to happen all at once.  Take the time to set the stage and find common ground.

2. Embrace the power of the pause.

The key here is to embracing the silence in negotiations, and learn when to keep quiet.  I call this “Embracing the Pause” and it’s one of the most difficult parts of negotiation.  As a general rule, the most powerful time to embrace the pause is after you make your ask.  We have a tendency to be really uncomfortable with silence because it signals a level of ambiguity we aren’t accustomed to.  Very rarely does everything happen at once in a negotiation.  If you can learn to embrace the pause effectively, it’s a really powerful tactic in negotiation.  It can accomplish a number of important outcomes:

- Projects confidence in your position.

- Limits emotionality, which often destroys negotiations.

- Creates anticipation and possibilities.

- Allows you to capture data based on how the other side responds within the pause.

- Adds perspective by allowing you to come out of the negotiation to take a high-level viewpoint.

3. Negotiate for the top.

Women negotiate at a much lower rate than men, and when they do negotiate, often settle for less.  There are many factors that play into this gender discrepancy, including the very real “social cost” of negotiation for women.  I think the first part of negotiating stronger has to come from a real understanding of why it’s important.  When women don’t negotiate, they lose out on more than just money.  They also lose out on career opportunities, exposure within a company, promotions, additional training, and opportunities for growth.

When we look at the pay gap or the lack of women in leadership roles, we can recognize why negotiation is an important skill for women to possess.  So I think it starts there, with understanding that negotiation is going to have to be part of that conversation and creating change.

The social cost of negotiation does have an impact in how women negotiate.  I think as women, we have to be extremely over prepared.  We also have to be more intentional about framing up negotiation as for the benefit of “we” instead of “me.”  That’s good advice for anyone, but women in particular have to be more conscious of it.

4. Leverage your authentic assets.

I try to avoid over-generalizations about gender because I think most of my advice can go towards both men and women.  The biggest takeaway is to be authentic.  Women especially feel pressured to have to adapt a certain personality when negotiating, and you see it with men sometimes as well.  There is a stereotype that negotiators have to be tough and aggressive, which carries over into an adversarial, hardline approach to negotiation.  I think it’s much more important to be authentic and play to your strengths.

5. Be as fluid and flexible as possible.

As a sports agent, I never know exactly when or where a deal is going to get done.  There is a gross misperception that every deal gets done in a boardroom after a formal meeting and is closed with a handshake.  That’s not the way it works. Usually it is much more fluid than that so you always have to be ready when the opportunity arises.

As the mom of three daughters, I’ve been in some pretty interesting scenarios as my job has no “off” hours.  I can remember negotiating the final stages of PGA TOUR golfer Matt Kuchar’s deal with Bridgestone.  I knew we were close to a deal, but I wasn’t entirely sure when it would get done.  We had discussed logo placements, bonuses, the number of tournaments required for full fair pay—all the groundwork to get the deal done.

I escaped out of the office to spend some time with my daughters who were 5 and 6 at the time.  We set up a mean hopscotch course, and I was in “mommy mode.”  At about 7 pm, the phone rang and it was my primary contact Daryl from Bridgestone.  I instantly have to switch modes mentally to get the deal.  I took the phone call and we were able to finalize details and lock in a deal in only minutes.  And I only had to miss one round of hopscotch!

Negotiation is fluid like that.  You always have to be extremely prepared, open and ready to find a solution, whenever the exciting chance emerges.

One final question I was curious to ask Molly:

Kathy: Molly, we’ve heard from experts like Victoria Medvec, the executive director of the Center for Executive Women at the Kellogg School of Management say (in a panel discussion at the 2014 Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit), “You never ask for more money. You ask for more of a package.” Would you advise that women should always ask frame the “ask” in terms of a full compensation package, rather than just a raise?

Molly: I agree with that advice up to a certain point.  Yes, regardless of gender, it is always more productive to frame up negotiation from a holistic point of view.  You need to take the time to understand what the company values and determine how you contribute to that.  However, the viewpoint of compensation as the "caboose… along for the ride" is a slippery slope.  In many ways, it goes right back to reinforcing Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella's original comments that you can count on "karma" to get you that pay raise.  Too many women already think this way.  We should be teaching women how to have these conversations and negotiate more effectively.  Sometimes it is about a “package” but other times it’s truly about a pay raise, and that's perfectly OK.

For more about Molly Fletcher, visit www.mollyfletcher.com and her new book A Winner’s Guide to Negotiating.

To create more reward and satisfaction in your career, visit kathycaprino.com and Best Work/Best Life.