Arbitration & Mediation

Never Get in a Bar Fight with a Thai, Negotiating with the Chinese and the Upcoming Course for Negotiating Women

By Victoria Pynchon

Xan Skinner, a lawyer, mediator and restorative justice practitioner, lived for four years in China and speaks Mandarin.  Yesterday, at the Orange County Mediation Conference, Lee Jay Berman of the American Institute of Mediation, gave the keynote on Cross-Cultural Negotiation.  Xan's joining Lisa Gates and my on-line community learning course You Can Negotiate Anything at Craving Balance.  In response to a few tweets from the Mediation Conference about Lee Jay's talk, Xan (@xanskinner) directed me to her post about negotiating in China, which begins with the ominous warning, "never get into a bar fight with a Thai" and ends with the following observation.

A  Hong Kong shopkeeper once told me why he likes Americans as customers.  He says, "Indians have money, but they are very sharp.  They're skilled negotiators, and they haggle a hard bargain.  Americans, on the other hand, are great customers.  They have a lot of money, and they're not too smart."  A fool and his money are, truly, soon parted!  I guess, after first accepting that I'll never be wealthy, I have to admit to myself that my true, main goal is not to end up dead on the bar room floor. 

If your true "main goal" is to insure that those with heart and soul also wield a little economic power, avail yourself of the opportunity to get in on the ground floor of Lisa's and my new joint venture, priced so low you might under-estimate its potential value to you.  What is that value?

You will learn:

• how to negotiate retail
• how to to let your bargaining partner have your way and strengthen your relationship at the same time (answering Xan's troubling question:  isn't getting the best deal for me selfish, unfair, wrong, even downright immoral)
• how one woman, using "female" interest-based negotiation tactics, survived a round of lay-offs by simply refusing to be laid off.
• how to know whether your bargaining partner is "taking" you
• how not to be "taken"
• how to be at choice in the great "money vs. quality of life" conundrum

At the end of the course, you will be able to:

• save at least $1300 on the purchase of your next car (this is the sum buyers are said to lose every time a woman negotiates the purchase of a vehicle)
• ask for and get the raise you deserve especially in this difficult economy
• ask for a get the "lifestyle" concessions you want without giving up salary in return
• get the better part of the bargain even when negotiating from a position of weakness
• negotiate better deals for your clients, friends and family

And you do not have to be aggressively competitive nor change a single thing about yourself other than to practice the skills we teach you -- how to negotiate in an interest-based collaborative, problem solving way.

The Comparables

One of the primary ways we learn to test the value of an offer is to check out what the competition is charging for the same services.  When the services are this unique (Lisa's life-altering coaching skills coupled with my dynamite negotiation training) it's difficult to find anything comparable, but here's my attempt to do so.

• How I first learned what I can now teach you
  • the Straus Institute course on Mediating the Litigated Case
    • $2,195 for 42 hours of training
  • the Straus Institute LL.M I earned after Mediating the Litigated Case changed my life
    • $40,000, give or take a few thousand on either side
• Other negotiation courses
  • the two day Karrass Negotiation course - $900-$1,000 (this is the one you read about in your in-flight magazine)
  • the American Mediation Institute's one day Strategic Negotiation Skills Course
    • I actually recommend you take this great course
    • it's a great bargain at $345
    • the next class will be on March 27 - if you're local, spend the coin to spend the day with master negotiator Lee Jay Berman
  • Negotiation Dynamics Core Training Program on CD
    • $297
    • this is probably a great bargain but I know nothing about the bona fides of this course so cannot recommend it
  • My own corporate "in-house" tailored one-day negotiation course for lawyers, executives or managers:  $5,000 for up to 50 people

Why us?

First of all, we're women.  In my market - the negotiated resolution of complex commercial litigation with hundreds of millions of dollars at stake, I can tell you frankly that my gender is not a selling point.  It should be because conflict resolution and negotiation are more about influence and people skills than they are about power and authority.  While we wait for the guys to get it, we can (men, don't read this) totally overtake them by learning what they know (distributive, competitive negotiation strategy and tactics) while at the same time using what we already know (interest-based, collaborative, problem-solving negotiation strategy and tactics).

Are you with us?  Come on the journey.  Change your life and the lives of those you care about by adding economic power to the powers you already possess in abundance.  It's the Century of the Woman.  We need you to step up to the line because this is not just about getting the best deal on your next flat screen TV purchase. It's literally about saving the planet!

Full post as published by Settle It Now Negotiation Blog on March 20, 2010 (boomark / email).