The Most Overused Negotiating Tactic Is Threatening to Walk Away
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Professional negotiators and researchers alike hail the BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement, or “walk away” outcome) as a negotiator’s primary source of relative power. But relying on even the best of alternatives as leverage can be tricky business.
Your relative power in a negotiation is your capacity to use resources to influence another’s circumstances; and a BATNA’s role in that regard can range anywhere from significant to non-existent. Consider the obvious challenge of a negotiator who thinks she has a very strong alternative, but discovers that the other side has a relatively stronger one. This type of BATNA asymmetry can occur in several varieties (e.g., no BATNA vs. strong BATNA, or deals where the incentives on each side are completely different). A negotiator’s BATNA-based power in these situations is virtually meaningless as would be any corresponding strategy based on the same.
Negotiation by its very nature requires compromise, which means there is no such thing as absolute power in negotiations. Every negotiator has some power and there’s always some degree of mutual dependence. So be careful not to short-circuit your main power source because you are so focused on alternative power sources. Your BATNA can help you determine what is probable if the current deal fails to materialize; however, it’s incapable of revealing a deal’s full potential. Only you and your counterpart working together at the table have the power to create a deal that not only exceeds the BATNA, but perhaps makes it altogether irrelevant.
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