Fear of conflict, rejection, or low self-esteem. Any or all of these makes it difficult to feel comfortable when negotiating with prospective clients, employees, or partners.
A symptom of this fear is being motivated to provide exceptional value in your service or product. In other words, giving everything to your clients, often for free. We don’t value our own skills and expertise, and we feel bad or embarrassed about charging for them. If money grew on trees we wouldn’t need worry, but it doesn’t, so we do.
I struggle to understand how you have the guts to take the risk to start a business, work tirelessly to make it succeed, and then cower in the corner when it comes to asking for what’s rightfully yours. Your hard work deserves to be recognized. You earn your money. You might as well maximize your time spent talking to prospects, meeting with them, answering emails, crafting proposals, and closing deals. It isn’t a zero sum game — you’re providing value that they could not otherwise create on their own. Even NPOs, charities, churches and schools keep revenue and cash flow in mind. They are businesses, after all.
Why is what you do any different?
Recently with a new client of mine, I sat in on a call to listen to her pitch a prospect. After some pleasantries and casual conversation, the topic turned towards money. She hesitantly offered up her rate, and it was 15% below what we had previously discussed as being her target. When there was no response for about 4 seconds from the other party, she immediately dropped her rate by 20%. As the seconds ticked by and still no response from them. I was mortified! She was now 35% below what 10 minutes earlier we had been discussing as the number she felt she was worth. Without a single word from the other person on the phone, she then proceeded to drop her rate another 15-20%, she was now less than 50% of her perceived worth and had literally given away money. I was so shocked I was speechless.
Without ever asking for what you think you’re worth, how will you ever know if you are?
Behold the power of silent negotiation! Practice it as often as you can.
Ask for what you want, then shut your mouth and look them in the eye. You’ll be amazed at two things: 1) how hard this is actually to do, and 2) how quickly you get the other person to crack. Remember staring contests as a kid? This is the same, but you’re playing for keeps. A couple of ways to help cope with the silence is to count slowly in your head, or even disengage yourself completely from the task at hand, but be careful not to lose eye contact if you’re in person. After you start using this technique, you’ll become more comfortable with it, and you’ll learn the power of it. It works in almost every negotiation you might find yourself in.
If time is your only tangible asset, use it wisely. Maximize your efforts with the highest return possible.