POTUS is no pussy: my theory on President Obama's negotiating style

I'm always fielding assaults from my left—and sometimes from myself—saying President Obama is a "pussy," a "wimp," a "coward" or a "bad negotiator." On healthcare, on gays in the military, on taxes for the rich.

What am I defending? I'm starting to think it's his negotiating style more than his policies.

My old pal Tommy is a contractor, and a tough negotiator, no doubt about it. I love to listen to him chew people up on the phone. When he haggles, he starts hundreds or thousands of dollars lower than I would have dared. And he does things like, if he sees a clause in the contract he didn't agree to, just crosses the clause out, signs the thing and faxes it back. It's impressive. He's a good businessman, and he's made a lot of money.

He's seen me negotiate, too. And when it's all over, he calls me a "dumbass."

Which stings, I won't kid you. And I used to concede the point. But now I'm not so sure I do.

Here's how I go about getting what I need: I very carefully figure out what I think the job is worth—what it's worth to me, to the employer and to the market. Usually those are three different numbers, and compromising must be done. But I do most of the compromsing, in my head.

So when it comes time to tell the employer what I will and won't work for, I present the number that I really believe makes sense—not an outrageous first roundhouse that will inevitably be answered angrily by a hard left hook, and then counter-offered back and forth until both sides, like punch drunk boxers, are left to hold each other up in the center of the ring.

When I do this my way, over the long haul (and I keep clients over long hauls) the client comes to understand that my initial offer isn't very far from my bottom line. So the counteroffers, if they come, don't come in too low.

I've made a pretty good living as a freelance writer over the last dozen years, in some pretty tough general economic times and the journalism-business equivalent of the Great Depression. Though I've certainly left some money on the table, especially on short-term gigs where I might have gouged some clients (a couple of whom probably deserved it)—I think I've gotten a fair amount for my skills and the energy I've given, and I simply don't believe a better negotiating style would have significantly improved my income.

Why do I negotate in this polite and rational manner? My shrink might have another theory, but here's mine:

I don't like seeming unreasonable in negotiations with people who need me to be reasonable once they hire me.

I think that's more or less Obama's theory, too. I'm not sure it's always the right theory—there's a chance that both of us behave the way we do because we're adult children of alcoholics, or something—but I do appreciate how he goes about it.

If he's afraid of something, it's not Republicans: It's being seen by others as unfair, or insane.

Maybe I'm not defending Obama, as much as I'm defending myself.

Maybe I should stop.

(But it's in my nature.)

Comments

[james green]

Insightful and admirable

[Kathy]

Very interesting. There's a refreshing sanity to not wanting to seem unreasonabl by people who, if the negotiation is successful (which in my case means more that I got the gig, as opposed to actually being fairly paid, but still...) will expect you to be reasonable. Amen.
There's a parallel rationale for why Canadians seem overly polite to the rest of the world. The risk in being aggressively defensive of your right to not having your heel bashed from behind by a grocery cart is that the very person you holler at and possibly flip the bird to on your way out of the store could be the one you need to ask for help from to push your car out of the snow in the parking lot. There just aren't that many of us up there, the living is hard, and we need each other. It's more a question of prudence, survival, and long-term thinking than one of politeness.
Maybe Obama also has a Canadian back there somewhere in that glorious soupy gene pool of his.