Over the past three months, the two teams negotiated fiercely with each other, were vicious, and lost the semblance of civility after the first month. Sometimes hot tempers had led them to cruelty. Then, out of frustration or desperation, a team lead negotiator told his counterpart, in an extremely cruel tone, accept our offer within the next three days or we will leave this talks and never come back! With that edict, time was to assembled. He had unleashed a tick-tock time bomb that would explode the negotiation unless someone denied the situation. And, the way he made his pronouncement left him no leeway to save face.

How do you use time to advance your negotiating position? It is one of the most precious assets that a negotiator has. The following thoughts are ideas for how you can use the time to improve your efforts.

Time frames:

Some negotiators try to use time to create a sense of urgency (eg sale ends tomorrow, get it now; I only have ‘x’ amount of time to finalize this deal). In those situations, its use is an attempt to force the opposing negotiator to take specific immediate actions. The challenge is what to do if the sought action doesn’t happen by the set deadline date: You’re left in a weak position if you have to come up with a lame excuse for why the deal is still available. Unless you’re ready to face the consequences, don’t make tough statements as the leader of team one.

When you use time frames to create a sense of urgency, give yourself some leeway to escape if your demands are not met. To do this, instead of setting a hard deadline (eg sale ends tomorrow), set a softer one (eg sale ends soon). The sense of urgency isn’t as great in the second situation, but you’re less likely to push yourself into a corner.

Exceeding the deadlines imposed:

Deadlines can bring a negotiation to a slow death. Therefore, you should be careful when they are issued. When faced with a time deadline –

• Take care of your time – Be aware of the time you invest in the negotiation. Psychologically, the more time you spend negotiating, the more likely you are to stay committed. That can make you more susceptible to falling prey to time constraints. If you don’t think the negotiation is redemptive, get out of it. And do that sooner rather than later.
• Control your emotions – When negotiating, the more you control your emotions, the more control you will have of the negotiation. Time is a factor that weighs on the mind of a negotiator. Therefore, to combat it, control your perspective and the emotional stress it generates for you. Never let time go unnoticed, that’s a control factor.
• Have a backup: You can take the pressure off when you have alternative options; having them can be the escape valve from the pressure of time. If you have alternative options and suspect the other dealer may be putting together time, don’t expose their backup plans (for example, if I can’t get it from you, I can get it from the other dealer, and it may be less) – Doing that can momentarily stun to the other negotiator, but you will also have given him another point to attack (ie, find out how viable your endorsement might be). If you must, let your deadline pass and see what you do. It will lay out your strategy by revealing how candid the deadline was.

In every negotiation, negotiators look for actions to control their counterpart: arming time is one of those actions. To be more successful in your negotiations, keep an eye on time, know what to do when faced with deadlines, and be cautious when issuing them. Time is a negotiator’s precious commodity, use it wisely… and all will be right with the world.

Remember, you are always negotiating!

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