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Learn to negotiate to nurture your own needs this year

Monday, January 7, 2008 11:17 PM CST

A new year is upon us, and many of us have engaged in the well-practiced art of making new resolutions.

Unfortunately, many of us begin with full steam forward but often feel derailed because of input from others.

This year, the gentle art of negotiating to nurture your own needs could be the key between success and thwarted plans.

What are negotiation skills?

Many people consider this a skill limited to trade unions or foreign diplomats, but it is a subtle skill that can be used to nurture our own inner needs.

It involves a dynamic and interpersonal exchange with some specific steps that are used, no matter what the situation. It also involves the process of gathering and exchanging specific information to engage in a dynamic process to solve problems and bring situations of conflict (either internal or external) to some successful resolution.

Steps in the negotiation process

Nurturing your needs and being successful at meeting your own goals doesn't usually occur naturally. The old adage, "We do not plan to fail, but fail to plan." is so true when it comes to negotiation skills.

The first step is to identify what your goals are and what issues surround meeting these goals. You need to be strategic and thoughtful, because it is at this stage where you must identify what would be the obstacles to meeting these goals and how can we work with those within our support network to mobilize these obstacles.

For example, if you want to save some money for a new car this year, think about what will prevent you from being able to save money and decide how to work with this obstacle. If you enjoy going out to eat often, perhaps planning to save money from two nights out per month could be a goal to help in your overall process.

Because eating out may involve other people, either family or friends, it will be critical to think about how they fit into the equation. This is where the second step in the negotiation process comes in: estimating other people's needs and their "bottom line" as well as your own bottom line.

In the second step of the negotiation process, you must think about what is important to each member involved in the goal at hand, as well as your own.

At what point would you no longer compromise your needs or, by the same logic, the needs of others? If eating out with friends proves to be costly, and you would like to tighten up your belt, brainstorm some options that would be less costly but still not compromise anyone's values or expectations, such as a less expensive restaurant or a meal cooked together.

The third step in this process is understanding what you would be willing to give up. When trying to save money, for example, there may be expenses that aren't negotiable, while others can be. If you plan to eat out with friends, a concession may be to have a progressive dinner at various people's homes, or eating out less frequently.

Lastly, once you think through goals, issues and ways to mobilize others, it's time to develop an agenda for action. Once you have thought through what is important and what is not, it becomes easier to develop a plan of action and take action.

This agenda will include not only what your goal is but also some action steps toward meeting this goal. What more could one want than some success, and building negotiation skills to nurture one's needs is a first step.

ELAINE T. JURKOWSKI is an associate professor and graduate program director at the School of Social Work at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. She has worked as a registered clinical social worker with people who have disabilities, mental health concerns and older adults, and she is a member of the Jackson County Mental Health Action Team.