In Scotwork, we teach a course where we tell participants that they will learn over 100 skill tips and tricks. In fact, they don’t learn all of them – no-one I know has such a retentive memory. They do, however, remember the bits that they think they can use as soon as they arrive back in their world and they also recall things when their own experiences or things happening around them jog their memory, thus adding to their kit of negotiating tools. This week gave my memory a bit of a jog. The news reports caused me to think of quite a few negotiating lessons – let me share some of them with you.
First, less than a year ago, I wrote a blog where I speculated about the potential for an agreement between the new government in the person of Wes Streeting, the Health Secretary, and the junior doctors. I hoped in that piece that the new Secretary would “sweat the assets” of the NHS – to use his own words – and get some changes and improvements in return for a settlement on pay. The outcome was a 22% pay rise for no change in work practices. I mentioned in a subsequent blog that this presented a loophole which other public sector workers would require little invitation to jump through. Fast forward to this week and the government have made offers to public sector workers in their latest pay round. All, except one of these accept the recommendations of the independent pay review bodies and all of which exceed the government’s stated position of 2.8% pay increases. Inflation has increased to 3.6% but was around 2.5% when the decisions were taken thus making the offers “inflation busting” to the media. Amongst these, doctors have been offered 5.6% to add to last year’s unconditional 22%, teachers are offered 4% and NHS workers 3.6% There are others in other parts of the sector, too. The doctors have described the offer as “derisory” and submitted a claim for a further 30% increase, the NHS workers have asked why they are “worth less than” doctors and the teachers have threatened strike action because the pay increases will, according to the government, have to be partially funded out of existing school budgets for the year. I am inclined to the belief that all of this was predictable (and I did predict it) when Streeting gave in to the demands of the junior doctors and conceded a massive unconditional pay rise. The deal was a precedent he may now regret as others adopt a “me, too” and “all for nothing in return” position. The lesson is: if you want greed and unrealistic proposals, conceding without return is a sure way to build future problems and place yourself in a position which is hard to defend. My prediction? More buying off is around the corner.
My memory was also tweaked this week when I recalled a Scotwork colleague, now retired, who on a Negotiating Skills programme complimented a participant in one of the negotiating cases for being “specific about what you want but vague about what you will give in return”. We were told this week of a trade deal the UK has made with the European Union that will allow the EU continued access to UK fishing waters for 12 more years after the expiry of the current treaty. Reneging on this at any time in those 12 years will trigger very substantial financial penalties even if the government of the day was not in charge when the deal was done. In return, I read on the Prime Minister’s Twitter feed that we will all be “able to get to the beach more quickly”. This is a reference to the fact that the EU has indicated to its members that if they wish to do so they can lift restrictions on the use of E Gates at airports. There is no guarantee that your next visit to the Coast del Sol will permit this, as the Spanish government under the agreement made this week merely has to consider it.
At the same meeting, an agreement was announced that there would be a young persons work exchange arrangement where young people from the EU (population 650 million) would be able to have access to work experience in the UK (population 68 million) who would have similar access to EU countries. The principle is conceded, the details of operation and safeguards are not established but are to be mutually agreed in the future.
These two examples of international negotiations brought to mind my colleague’s comment about being specific in what you say the other side must agree to, but vague about what you will concede by way of return.
So, in real life, the abiding rules apply: always get a commensurate return for your concessions, never be fooled by “we’ll see it is done fairly” comments or promises that “it will all be alright, trust me”. Be specific, be clear, ask for what you want and give up nothing until you are sure that you will get the return you think is right. Or live to regret it when your lack of rigour comes back to haunt you. And just don’t get me started on the negotiating lessons of the Chagos Islands!
