What’s the Issue?

In 2007, I was an in-house counsel at a corporation that was going through a demerger that year to become two separate companies.

To facilitate the break up, some employees were assigned to the Better Company and others were assigned to the Lesser Company. So, what’s the issue?
We were told that no one could switch sides unless we “traded” with an employee of equal pay grade. Initially, I was selected to go to the Better Company. My supervisor was selected to go to the Better Company as well, and he would be its General Counsel. I thought I had hit the jackpot!

A couple weeks later, however, I was called into an office with my supervisor and my supervisor’s supervisor, the woman who was selected to be the Lesser Company’s General Counsel. My supervisor was leaning against the wall staring at his shoes. The General Counsel was sitting upright in the chair behind her desk. She leaned forward and told me:

“We need you to switch with [a male attorney in our group] so he can go to Better Company. You’ll stay here and manage litigation under [Cruella Deville].”

Here’s what I heard, “Be a good little girl and do as I ask.”

Ultimately, I agreed to the trade.

When I started reflecting on how I had handled the “trade,” I realized that I hadn’t spent any time contemplating how to define the issue. My managers had set up the issue as “will you trade with the other attorney?” And I accepted their characterization of the situation.

But there were other ways to look at this issue. For example, I could have said, “I understand that so-and-so wants to go to the Better Company. I also understand that you want me to trade with him. That’s one option. How else can he go to the Better Company?”

And maybe I could have said, “How can we both go to Better Company?”

Like it or not, we are all negotiators. Negotiation is a fact of life. Everyone negotiates something every day.

The good news is that negotiation skills can be learned. Your first step in any negotiation is to figure out how to define the problem so that you are not automatically the loser or in a one-down position.