It's hard to realize that we are nearly half-way through this semester already. I found this week incredibly interesting, specifically regarding how we can learn to reflect upon various ways deception plays a part of negotiations. Up to this point, I have not been involved with negotiations as part of my current role, but I can recall a time where I have felt deceived after negotiations and when I felt that I perhaps overstated my line in the sand.
Approximately a year ago, when accepting a new position within my
current organization, our internal transfer policy states you are given a
flat-rate increase of 6% in base compensation. My particular contention with
that policy was based upon the fact that I was not being promoted within my
current department, but to an entirely new line of business within the
facility, where that policy is traditional. Based upon my past performance and
current knowledge, my case warranted additional consideration for higher
compensation, and I pushed for more than the standard 6%. Additionally, because
of working in the finance department, I was aware of what the previously paid
compensation was for my predecessor, and was attempting to use that knowledge
to base my bottom line upon when negotiating for more – a measuring stick, if
you will. Moreover, each position has a range, and I was certain that although
it was a huge leap, I needed to be somewhere beyond what their initial offering
was.
During the course of negotiations, I have asked several
questions, offered several alternative perspectives to counterbalance their
hesitations, all which were met with a great deal of resistance due to not
wanting to "buck corporate policy", which I refused to accept as
logical. I contended that over the past two years since my last promotion, I
had consistently produced exemplary work, taken on additional responsibilities
and projects outside of my scope, and more importantly, contributed to
identifying over $50,000 in overlooked net revenue. I asked my CFO to go back
to the table one last time and fight for me, and how much I believed I was
worth fighting for. I truly felt that I had never presented myself as the usual
and customary employee, and that was why I felt it was appropriate for me to
request a higher salary than the usual and customary 6% increase. I felt I had
to stand my ground; fight for it all upfront, knowing our company wasn't great
about compensation. He agreed and went back to the recruiter with their final
offer, and emphasized with her that the discussion was closed and would move on
with starting interviews with outside candidates.
Their final offer came in lower than anticipated; I was
disappointed. I shared that with the recruiter behind closed doors. We were
approximately $10,000 apart and now the ball was in my court, or so I thought.
When I shared my sadness with the recruiter and asked what the range actually
was for the position, she stated that it was now irrelevant; she felt that I
was more concerned with the monetary aspect than the opportunity presented. She
then proceeded to tell me that she was no longer comfortable having me sign the
paperwork accepting the new position and salary knowing how displeased I was.
She went into detail how disappointed she was with my responses to their
offers. She, and the entire C-Suite had done a great deal of due diligence in
selecting me for the position, to the point of not even interviewing other
potential candidates. All of the feedback they received from my peers about me
moving into the position was met with smiles, enthusiasm, and excitement.
Universally the message they received was everyone felt there wasn't another
person that could hold a candle to my abilities, skills, and relationships to
get the job done better than me. I began to get tears in my eyes; I felt
horrible and immediately folded like a cheap card table. Hearing that kind of
feedback was priceless and the money no longer mattered. I expressed that, and
accepted the position feeling somewhat vindicated!
Approximately two months later, my CFO came to my office with a
huge smile and congratulated me while showing me a piece of paper and basically
stated that the corporate office did their annual salary reviews to ensure that
everyone fell within the current ranges for their particular position. They
found that I was not within the lowest part of the range and had raised my base
pay several thousand dollars per year. This pleased me greatly; I actually
ended up getting the exact amount I was looking for when initially accepting
the position. I immediately called my husband and we were over the moon!
After getting the bump several months ago and being so pleased, I
have now started to overthink the entire course of events in reference to what I
discovered when reading our module assignments. I literally started to question
everything today; if I wasn't even in the low end range for the opportunity,
how could it be possible for them to offer less than the lowest acceptable rate…wouldn’t
that be against policy? Was it that they couldn't do more, or wouldn't do more,
or turned off by my negotiation tactics? Were they just trying to get me as
cheap as possible, or did everything they could without needing corporate approval,
knowing that corporate would perform their annual review and bump it up without
having to cause a stink ahead of time?
Although a myriad of ideas began to float through my mind, in the
end, I don't think they misrepresented information in order to gain any type of
advantage, but I do think that there are things I can evaluate going forward
for negotiating salary requirements. I tried to play hardball and it almost “back
fired” me right out of a promotion. On the same token, by threatening to walk
away after starting negotiations was not entirely professional on my part
either. As our reading this week noted, “People are generally more comfortable
telling lies of omission…” (Hoch, Kunreuther, & Gunther, 2001, p. 189) , and I think that
may be the case I encountered.
My C-Suite is very non-confrontational at all costs in just
dealing with our normal every day operations; they typically will not go above
and beyond in their actions, and similarly, they do not tend to disclose all of
the relevant information when giving reasons as to why something cannot be
done. Why would I assume they would respond or act differently in this case? In
hindsight, it would also make sense that although I have an outstanding record
in my previous position, I am now an unproven entity in the new one. Trying to
justify a significant salary increase that is going against corporate policy
for the facility, and at year-end to boot where all spending is highly scrutinized,
and for a CFO and CEO to ask for an override to break the policy may not have
been appropriate in their eyes.
Going forward, I can employ the use of preparing specific questions
prior to starting the negotiations. Instead of assuming that I would be
handsomely compensated based upon my past performance, I should do adequate
research with the recruiter to identify the salary range and then raise any
objections immediately. If I continued to get the impression that my question
was being avoided, I would have predetermined ways to ask the same question in
different ways until we reached an impasse. That is probably easier than
presenting an aggressive and ungrateful tone with my C-Suite.
Additionally, although I feel that I attempted to “shift the
frame” (Hoch et al, 2001, p. 196) and demonstrate all of the winning reasons
why I deserved more than their initial offer, I failed to reframe my own
perceptions. This was potentially damaging to my negotiations, as well as my
reputation with management.
Finally, I need to listen better to what is not being said; I failed
to reflect on what other reasons could be contributing towards their decision-making
process. By clouding my focus, I failed to ask direct questions that may, or
may not have, explained underlying reasons as to their hesitations to go
against company policy. As non-confrontational people, I essentially threatened
to walkout and leave them without any other viable candidates to replace our
outgoing director. Because my mentor had been grooming me over several months,
and our team being aware of this, I thought I could leverage them into getting
me what I wanted…which I thought was a higher salary.
In the end, if I had done a better job at “Monitoring decision
making in the loss domain” (Hoch et al, 2001, p. 199) I would have felt ecstatic
towards the fact that they did go above and beyond with their first offer,
which was already outside the normal 6% allowed by corporate offices and almost
$10,000 over my current salary. Instead, I viewed it as losing more and turned
it into fabricated appreciation, which clearly was not the case.
I think as far as my negotiating skills, or lack thereof, I need
to prepare carefully and truly know my audience and their tolerance levels. I
thought I would be willing to walk away, and that they would be willing to move
up where I wanted in salary. In light of the experience, and all that I placed
at risk, I know better that I don’t have the gumption to do it. Perhaps if I had
planned better on my end as well; knowing the limits of what I would and would
not settle for, I may have not risked my reputation as a negotiator, and as a
valued and committed employee.
My favorite
take-away this week was when I realized how right our book was when I read, “There
will always be missing information and differences in attitudes regarding what
should or should not be revealed” (Hoch et al, 2001, p. 200), and based upon my
reflection of my negotiation, it is more about how we handle in knowing, or not
knowing, the information that may, or may not be revealed, and knowing what our
absolute limits are!
Until we blog again!
Reference
Hoch, S. J., Kunreuther, H. C., & Gunther, R. E.
(2001). Wharton On Making Decisions. New York: John Wiley & Sons,
Inc.
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