In this workshop, Ms Rix shared the basics of negotiation, emphasized the importance of listening, and led the participants through a negotiation exercise.

Malene Rix, an executive advisor and trainer in negotiation and process facilitation, led this workshop on negotiation skills. She opened with a general definition of a negotiation and spoke about a quality that many women have that makes them very good negotiators and explained why it is such an advantage.

She taught the participants about how each party sees the result through their own lenses and how the process and the relationship are significant. She listed the various filters that people have on their lenses (gender, culture, age, educational background) and then explained why they are important and which filter is the strongest of them all.

AS an exercise, Ms. Rex asked the participants to spend a few minutes sharing their own previous negotiation experiences with each other. When she asked for examples from their conversations, a participant said she and her partner talked about how to negotiate with a really strong person from a different culture. Ms. Rix advised her of the steps that must be followed before the negotiation even begins to ensure that the playing field is level and why beginning a negotiation before those steps are completed can lead to a less than optimal result.

“Having been brought up in a collectivist culture, you (Japanese) have something for free that the rest of us (from individualistic cultures) have to struggle really hard to get, which is to look out for the other person and their needs,” she said. She explained how that could also become an Achilles heel and what to say and do to ensure that it didn’t become one. She reminded the participants of the fundamental purpose of a negotiation and told them the one question to ask their negotiating partner after he or she says “no” to keep the negotiation alive.

Ms. Rex explained the reason that some women negotiate skillfully on behalf of their company or family, but don’t skillfully negotiate on their own behalf. She advised the participants on how to approach a negotiation and then on how to know when to walk away if they aren’t getting what they asked for.

“Children are great negotiators; they know that the no is the beginning of the negotiation, not the end.” She also explained what children understand that women often don’t, and how we can learn from them.
She emphasized that women often worry that a “no” will damage the relationship, but men don’t usually worry about that.

A participant asked how much time should be spent asking questions in a negotiation. Ms. Rex replied by giving the percentage of time that she thinks is optimal for asking questions and then reminded the participants to keep the goal of the negotiation in their mind at all times.

Ms. Rex offered valuable advice when asked a question about how to teach young girls to negotiate; “We teach girls that disagreement is bad, so they learn to compromise. We teach boys that it is okay to disagree and they learn to negotiate.”