Improve Your Negotiation Skills (Lelia Gowland's Negotiation Strategies)

In this interview with negotiation expert Lelia Gowland, she shares tips for improving your negotiation skills. Lelia is the author of You Got This: The Ultimate Negotiation Guide for Professional Women. She teaches a strengths-based approach to negotiation for professional women who want to increase their impact and have a more profitable and fulfilling career.

In this video, we tackle the myth that women are bad at negotiating and Lelia shares everyday examples of negotiation. She also looks back on some of her own negotiation experiences, including negotiating her salary at her first job and negotiating the purchase of a used car, and shares what she would have done differently. We talk about when you should walk away from a negotiation and the importance of self compassion as a negotiation strategy.

MALLORY WHITFIELD:

Hi Lelia, welcome and thank you for joining us today. So you are an expert on negotiation. And I know that in your book and in your speaking you talk a lot about a strengths-based approach to negotiation. Can you explain what that means?

LELIA GOWLAND:

Absolutely! I think so often the attitudes around negotiation are, "I have to be this very formal business person who negotiates in this very specific way." And what I've found in working with clients, and from all of the sociological research about best practices when it comes to negotiations, is it comes back to how you can show up authentically and as your self and find your own authentic negotiating voice. When I think about what that looks like for each person, a lot of it is unlearning some of the messages that you may have gotten about what professional competence looks like, or what a negotiator looks like. Because the research says that good negotiators are good listeners, they're empathetic. And they're collaborative. And for so many of the women I work with those strengths are very much innate to them and things they may not have realized are valuable in negotiation.

Yeah, and you work primarily with women, right? There seems to be this narrative... even when I do a Google search, one of the most popular search queries that comes up is, "Are women bad at negotiating?" What do you think about that?

Yeah, the prevailing narrative for a long time was, "Women are bad at negotiating." And then the prevailing narrative became, "Women don't ask. They're not negotiating and not selling." We see so many negative things about the wage gap, we see so many negative consequences for professional women. And the reality is, I think we're told we're not good at negotiating, we're told that we're not supposed to ask. And when we shift how we think about negotiation, we actually recognize more opportunities to negotiate, and we enjoy it more.

Some of the most interesting research that I found on negotiation for women, and gender in negotiation... We'll pause here and take a step back and acknowledge gender as a spectrum. There's no right way to perform or exist within your gender or gender identity. And when we're talking about women, we're talking about people who identify as women in the social science research. So the difference that we see between men and women in negotiating is that women are more likely to say it's been months prior since their last negotiation or thinking of structural negotiations like buying a car or negotiating a promotion. Whereas men are more likely to say, "Oh, I negotiate all the time. I, you know, negotiated last week - I had a conversation with a colleague today about who was going to take what shift. And yes, that's part of my day to day." And so when women recognize more opportunities to negotiate, it both increases their confidence, and helps them recognize the skills that they're already putting into practice. One kind of dynamic, but I always like to share that exception, was women with kids who say they negotiate all the time: "Do you want to take a bath now? Do you want to take a bath and 15 minutes? Either way, you're taking a bath."

Well, you talked about these sort of everyday examples of negotiation like, if you have kids, you're negotiating all the time with them. But say you're younger in your career or don't have kids. Can you give us some other examples of what might be everyday negotiations that we might not think about but we actually are negotiating?

When you are deciding what to watch on Netflix, you know, whenever girlfriends comes over, that's a negotiation. When you're scheduling a meeting, and the initial time that someone suggested doesn't work for you, you're finding a new time, that's a negotiation. Whether you should buy the clicky pens or the pens with caps, in your office (back when everyone was going to offices) - that was a negotiation. And so those little bitty negotiations may seem like they don't matter, but it's about building your confidence and recognizing opportunities to negotiate.

I know that preparation is a big part of negotiation. Thinking back to one of your own earliest career negotiations, is there any advice that you would give yourself to have been better prepared or to have been a better negotiator?

When I received my first job offer, it was a great job for a boss who I really loved. It was an internship that turned into a job offer. I knew he was going to ask me what my salary expectations were, how much I thought I should make. So I went to my mentor, and I said, "How do I answer that question?" We Googled it because she didn't know either. 

We figured out the market value [of that role] through websites. I now recommend people use PayScale.com. It's one of my favorites, and this is not a branded partnership or anything. I don't make money off of it. But I'm a real enthusiast. I think their data sets  are very strong and their analytics are good. So we figured out, okay, people with my level of experience (which is to say not much), in Dallas, working in a nonprofit this size with this degree, can expect to make between $30,000 and $40,000 a year. So $35,000 was the median. So my mentor and I said, "Okay, $35,000 it is." And when my boss asked me, "How much do you think you should make?" And I said I was thinking $35,000 based on my research, and he said, "Yeah, that's great. I was thinking $35,000 to $40,000. That's right in line with what I was thinking." And I said nothing. 

So the advice that I would give myself is like, first congratulate myself on asking for support from a trusted colleague and mentor. Second, doing my research and investigating what market value and the going rate is for the work I was going to be doing. But I think that's where I would really challenge myself to reflect about where there might have been opportunities to say, "Okay, well, $35,000 is the median, I should go for the highest part of this range, because I'm coming in with a ton of institutional knowledge. My boss already knows I'm gonna do a great job because he has seen me work for the past several months as an intern, and I'm at the top of my class in college. So these are three very good reasons why I should be at the top of the range." I would have gone in with that as my ask.

Another piece that I would have shifted was when he said, "Yes, I was thinking $35,000 to $40,000." Instead of being like, "Well shoot, I wish I'd said $40,000." I could have said, "You know, actually, on further reflection, here are the reasons why I'd like you to consider $40,000. Thank you for your candor about the range you're considering. Based on my experience here, I'd like to request to be at the top of that range." And that statement is not totally crazy. I'm not asking for a magical pony. I'm not outlandish in my request. That's a very appropriate way to shift even if that's not what I asked for initially.

Yeah, that's such great insight looking back. But you've come so far since then. You've done so many negotiations, and you teach about negotiation. As a more experienced negotiator, can you share an example of a time when you feel like you really just crushed it and you came out feeling so confident?

Yeah, recently, I was working with a collaborator. I'd been asked to scope a project and I said, you know, this is really peripheral to my area of expertise, I can handle this piece of the content, but I want to bring somebody else in who has expertise in the rest of it. And as I was negotiating this project, she was texting me saying, "Damn, you're good at this." It was interesting, because I think the research demonstrates that when women are advocating for themselves, they have a much harder time. Even as an expert in negotiation, who's written a book on it, who teaches this stuff for a living, that's still true for me. And so recognizing that I would be advocating not just for myself, but also for my colleague, helped bolster my confidence. It helped bolster what I was asking for and how hard I was pushing them for a budget. 

So in this instance, they were saying, "Great, that all sounds wonderful, we love y'all. Please go scope this project." And I said, "I'm happy to go write a proposal. But I really need a budget, do you have a budget in mind?" They said, "Oh, we really don't." And I said, "You know, I so respect that. And here's what I've found. We work with clients at a range of levels. One of the things that's really challenging and a real inefficiency in the process is if we don't get clear up front about what level of engagement this is. If this is a one-off Lunch & Learn, that's going to be a really different scope of work, different expectations and budget, than if this is a multi-month process where we're auditing your organizational culture. I want to better understand where I am in that, where we are in that range to support you all better. The best client outcomes come when we get clear about that up front. What is your budget? A range is great." And then I stopped talking. That's the hardest part for me as a level 11 extrovert who's very conversational. I sometimes have to take my own advice and sing the ABCs or the Happy Birthday song in my head, so that I can actually get myself to stop talking and give them a chance to respond.

Yeah, because sometimes you really have to either shut up or even walk away, right? When is it necessary or okay to walk away? Or are there any things that should not be negotiated at all? Is everything negotiable or not?

I recently had an experience with a person who I now believe to be untrustworthy. And I am someone who is very trusting and optimistic. I see the best in people (in dating, often to a fault). But in professional relationships, I'm assuming the best. But what I realized is that this person had demonstrated in multiple instances that I couldn't trust them. So to shift my own expectations in advance of the conversation, and get really clear about what my friend's priorities were, at one point I said, "You know, if this isn't a fit, I'm happy to end the contract and step back." And so I don't think every single situation can be negotiated with the other person. I think the key is about understanding what your priorities are in advance and what your point of walking away is.

So I just pulled this out from my book, You Got This. My illustrator and I created these photo booth accessories. We like to talk about the game of "red light, green light," which if you ever went to the roller skate center when you were a kid for birthday parties, I feel like this is hopefully a universal experience. The game is where the referees (who were very cool college students, or you know, older kids, basically), they would yell, "Green light!" and then we would skate as fast as we could. And then they'd yell, "Red light!" and we would have to come to a screeching halt. I was terrible at this game. Objectively very bad at it, I found it very stressful. But the application within negotiation is that we're the refs. We get to call, "red light, green light," when we need a moment to reflect and say, "You know what, I think we've reached a point in this conversation where I'd like to take some time to consider what you've shared. Can we get reconvene in a week from Tuesday?" And so, our game of "red light, green light" is giving ourselves the permission and the recognition that we have more agency than we often think, even if it's with somebody who we perceive to have more power than we do.

Yeah, well, and I know in your book, you talk about self compassion as a negotiation strategy, right? Self compassion is something near and dear to my heart. I didn't always have it, but I definitely try to practice it as much as possible now. Can you share how to use self compassion within negotiation?

The situation that comes to mind most readily is a negotiation that I did not handle the way I wish I had. It was buying my car, a used car. This is another example in which I was engaging with someone who was untrustworthy. They quoted me one price as I was in the bank parking lot about to get the cashier's check to pay for my vehicle. Then they told me a different amount and it was, you know, is it worth $500 to fight and have to look for a new car? And I found myself walking away in a real place of self doubt. It was early in my work on negotiation and I was telling myself, "If I can't advocate for myself in a way that gets the result I want to see, what business do I have teaching and supporting other women on this journey?" 

The couple of things that I've found to be really helpful come from Kristin Neff, whose practices I know you appreciate as well. It really breaks down to three areas, which I've reordered for my own purposes. The first is mindfulness. When we think about what I called my "gerbil ball of anxiety" -- imagine a plastic gerbil ball, but the little rodent is inside of it and paddling as fast as they can, kind of bumping into stuff and going really fast, but not getting anywhere. That's what happens inside of my brain when I'm in a place of anxiety or overthinking or repetitive thought. What Kristin Neff recommends is these three practices to help sort of slow down and give yourself that salve. In that instance, that mindfulness versus overthinking versus that gerbil ball and repetitive motion was, "Wow, what would it be like, if I could just be present to my thoughts? I'm experiencing a lot of self doubt. I'm experiencing a lot of, I'm not good enough, I shouldn't be doing that, I should have done better. I left money on the table, all of these things." And even just being able to name this is what's happening in this moment was helpful. 

The second is to recognize when others have had similar experiences, this idea of common humanity is our second strategy. And to say, this doesn't actually make me less qualified to support people in negotiations, it may make me more qualified, because think about all the other instances in which people have had botched negotiations or have had a bad experience that undermines their confidence. This is actually a very relatable one and it's one I referenced in my book and speak openly about now. Because initially, it was a source of real shame. But once I connected it to common humanity, and recognized this wasn't something that I needed to isolate and never share... this was actually something that brought me closer to the people I work with because I understand what they're going through. 

The last practice is about self kindness and the language we use with ourselves. The language I was using with myself was more akin to Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada, just hateful, really, really mean. And that shift to say, "How can I be kind to myself? How can I forgive myself for not having done this perfectly my first time negotiating a car?" which, you know, the data is very clear that women and people of color, spend more on cars and get charged more on cars. And there's like a whole trope about used car dealerships as being inauthentic and disingenuous. So it was helpful to me to kind of rework my negotiation in the context of self compassion, and ultimately, recognizing that negotiation doesn't need to be deemed a failure. I looked at the situation and said, Okay, I didn't get exactly the price points that I expected. I think that person was untrustworthy, and I can report them to the Better Business Bureau. And I got the car I wanted. I don't have to shop for a car anymore. I went in eyes wide open, I did a very appropriate cost benefit analysis. I don't enjoy shopping for cars, used cars, especially. This one has the right number of miles. It's not orange or a color that I don't want. It's got a radio that I like, right? Like the things that were most important to me, it had all those things, and I had it in hand. And so maybe I could reassess this negotiation with not just self compassion, but also an awareness of what did work well, which was I ultimately got the car I wanted.

Yeah, and you've mentioned this inauthenticity or trustworthiness a couple times. I know authenticity is another big part of being a good negotiator, right? Understanding who you are, and what you what you want. Can you speak to that and how does that show up for you?

Oh my gosh, it's such a great question Mallory! The recognition that what we want may not feel appropriate or we feel like we're not allowed to want it. It is in my own practice that my goal in life is to override the Protestant work ethic. This idea that our value in society is based on how much we're producing and how many hours we're toiling away at these glowing rectangles. And to really reframe it, as you know, "What contributions do I want to have in the world? What do I want my life to look like?" And when I look at negotiations, often they're a microcosm of the shoulds and the expectations that we have of ourselves. And for people who identify as women, there's a lot of socialized expectation. I'm doing a lot of work on myself about my whiteness and identifying as a white woman, and recognizing the messages I got about my performance of whiteness and my performance of gender in these settings and how that makes it harder to figure out what I want, and to communicate it. So much of the work that I do with clients, (though secretly, sometimes work with men), I'll say this is especially true of the women I work with and especially true for people of color I work with, is that it's a lot about giving ourselves permission to want the things that we want. To get in touch with what we want, and then figure out how to advocate for it in a way that's true to us and helps us overcome some of the biases we may face.

Starting to wrap up... what is one resource, whether it's related to negotiation or not, one resource that's really changed your life and why? 

I feel like you know my answer to this. My therapist, Tim Kershenstine, I've been seeing him on and off for eight years. Well, no, nine years now. He's among my longest relationships, and I think the space to do deep introspection about what's most important to me... We talk a lot about the Protestant work ethic, and why I have this impulse to work so intensely, why I have this perfectionism that I struggle with and the need to please, and all of these things that are very much part of my socialization. Having a space to not just do the research about why from a macro level sociological standpoint, I feel this way, but from a very personal individual perspective... how I navigate the world and what's most important to me and how to communicate effectively, it's absolutely been invaluable. And how he shows up in therapy informs how I show up in coaching. So he often says, "You know, if I don't expect to be changed by my clients, how can I expect them to be changed by me?" And the mutuality that comes from knowing even if I'm the leader, I'm responsible for taking someone through a process. I'm so grateful for the ways that I'm influenced by my clients. That's something I learned from Tim.

Yeah, I think that's so true. I've been teaching my first class this summer at Tulane University, and it's so true. It's like... I want to learn with you. Just because I'm the teacher doesn't mean that I have all the answers. Other people might know things that I don't know, even though they're the student. And Tim is amazing. And therapy is amazing. That was something I avoided for a long time because I thought, "Oh, compared to other people, I have it more together. Like, I'm okay." But everybody can benefit from therapy. Um, so what advice would you give to your 20 year old self or to your younger self?

Brilliant question. There's an intensity, that I felt I needed to engage with the world with. I held things very tightly. I'd give myself more permission to go with the flow and trust the process. 

I'm working with a coach I just adore, Jen Vera, and she has been such a gift in helping me recognize things. I mean, as I'm unfolding in my own relationship with money, for example, that I don't have to work so hard at everything. I can bring some more of that lightness to my earlier work ethic and intensity.

Yeah, give yourself some grace, right?

Grace came to mind most readily.

Yeah, that was something that a coach once told me and I had trouble accepting it until years later, but I wish I had been able to live into that more fully at a younger age.

Yeah. Yeah.

Thank you so much for joining us. Can you tell us where people can find & connect with you online?

Absolutely. I'm @LeliaGowland on almost every platform. Actually, that's not true. Please don't follow me on Twitter. It's not worth your time. But I'm very active on Facebook and Instagram, and trying to up my game, as always, on LinkedIn. And my website is LeliaGowland.com.

Thank you so much, Lelia!