part0012

In St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, a group of inmates armed themselves with improvised knives and took the warden and some of his staff hostage. The negotiators sensed that the prisoners did not intend to hurt their hostages and would also want the situation to end soon. However, the inmates also feared that the prisoners who give up would end up beaten badly.

The negotiators sent a pair of walkie-talkies to the hostage-takers and instructed them to send out one of them with a walkie-talkie. That guy would walk past the stationed multi-agency law enforcement, get into the paddy wagon to be transferred back to jail. Once back in jail, he would communicate the remaining guys in prison to assure them that he was not hurt. The rest of the prisoners can then go outside, one at a time, and do as the first guy did.

The plan started well. When the guy was about to climb into the paddy wagon, a member of the SWAT team saw his walkie-talkie and confiscated it from him. After some time that his companions have not heard from him, the prisoner who has the other walkie-talkie threatened to cut off a hostage's finger.

After fifteen minutes, the SWAT guy smugly hands the walkie-talkie to the panicked negotiators, who immediately rushed to the jail to have the first prisoner call his companions.

One year after the Dos Palmas crisis, a Colombia-based rebel group kidnapped an American in the Ecuadorian jungle. Jose was born in Ecuador but became an American citizen. He was working as a paramedic in New York when he and his wife, Julie, decided to go back to Ecuador to set up an ecotourism business.

On August 20, 2003, they took eleven people on a white-water rafting trip. They were almost back at the inn when three armed men aimed their guns at Joe’s truck. A fourth guy appeared and held a revolver to Julie’s head, while his companions pulled out Jose from the truck. Jose and his abductors disappeared into the jungle.

When the Bureau got an urgent call about the abduction, Chris immediately organized a team and set up operation headquarters in Quantico. He was keen on applying what he learned from the Dos Palmas fiasco and informed the team he sent to Ecuador that there will be changes in their strategy. Julie agreed to stall for time.

Every day, Chris’s team coached Julie on how to deal with the kidnappers’ negotiator. The strategy was to ask calibrated questions to keep the counterpart engaged. Every time Julie would ask a calibrated question, the other party would ask for more time. This slowed down the process, but Julie had succeeded in bringing the ransom demand from $5 million to $16,500.

With all the delays in the negotiation process, some of the guerillas lost interest and left until only one teenager was left to guard Jose at night. Jose saw an opportunity to escape when it rained and ran off to a small town. He was back to his family in time to celebrate his baby's first birthday.

One evening in 2004, Alastair Onglingswan, who was living in the Philippines, got a cab for a ride home from the Greenhills Shopping Center. He fell asleep and woke up in chains. Alastair was drugged with ether and kidnapped for ransom.

Using Alastair’s phone, the kidnapper got in touch with Alastair’s girlfriend in New York. He wanted a daily payment to “take care” of Alastair while he researched on how wealthy Alastair’s family was. He threatened to sell Alastair’s organs in Saudi Arabia.

Chris headed the negotiation from Quantico, working with Alastair’s brother, Aaron. They thought that the demand for daily payment was the cabbie’s way of assessing the family’s wealth. Other than that, Chris and Aaron do not know anything about the cabbie.

The strategy was to slow down the process by asking the cabbie one calibrated question after another. Purposely, they made scheduling a call with Aaron complicated and delayed their email responses. The goal was to wear down the cabbie and waste his time while the negotiating team read his motives and his approach.

After days of bargaining on the daily rate, Aaron got the cabbie down to a token amount, with a portion of the funds deposited to the cabbie's bank account. After the partial payment, Aaron asked the cabbie, "When we run out of money, what will happen?" The cabbie went silent, after which he replied, "It will be all right." That assured Chris and Aaron that Alastair would not be harmed.

With the frequent conversations he had with Aaron, the cabbie lowered his guard during the time spent talking with Aaron. The Philippine National Police investigators tracked the cabbie’s phone to a house. When they raided it, the cabbie’s wife pointed them to another house. Alastair was freed, and the cabbie, arrested.

A negotiator's job does not end at getting an agreement. Implementing the agreement and ensuring that it happens is as important.

Calibrated questions are useful in offloading the pressure to produce answers to the other party. However, a negotiator must be clear on where they want to lead the conversation so they can formulate appropriate questions.

Asking “how” questions in a gentle tone is a kind way of saying “no,” which shows respects for the other party and indicates a willingness to collaborate with them. The approach’s positivity prompts the other side to reciprocate and do something for you.

A deal that is not implemented is worthless. One other benefit of asking "how" is that it pushes the other party to think and explain how the agreement will be executed. When they do the explaining, it convinces the other party that the solution is theirs.

Ask two questions to push the other party into owning the solution: “How will we know we’re on track?” and “How will we address things if we find we’re off track?” Summarize their answers until they give you “That’s right” or their version of it.

On the other hand, if the other side says, "You're right" or "I'll try," they have not seen the idea as theirs and are not on board with what is being discussed. More calibrated questions are needed.

A few weeks after Jose returned to the United States, Chris visited him for a hostage survival briefing. Chris had one other purpose: since Jose got home safely because he escaped from his abductor, Chris wanted to know if the new strategy failed.

Jose told Chris that the negotiator was supposed to stay in town for the negotiation, but because of the questions Julie asked, he kept coming back to the jungle to seek answers. The abductors also thought about bringing Jose to town and put him on the phone to end Julie’s questions about his condition.

Besides the calibrated questions that Julie asked, Jose’s case succeeded because the counterparts made sure that all the abductors were on the same page. This was the problem with the Dos Palmas case where there were various interests at play.

Almost always, there are other players in a negotiation, who can either be deal-makers or deal-breakers. Getting a deal and having it implemented means discovering how the negotiation affects these other players. Well-crafted calibrated questions will help in that discovery.

Do not focus only on the counterpart's frontline negotiators. Think about those at the back-end who can block the agreements they do not like. Sometimes, the back-enders are more critical than the front liners.

Dealing with liars and aggressive dealers come with the territory, but the more critical concern is how does a negotiator spot them?

Effective negotiators are conscious of the nuances of other people’s words, tone of voice, and body language that permeate negotiations and group dynamics.

A predominant outcome of studies in communication is the Mehrabian rule, named after UCLA psychology professor Albert Mehrabian. It says the only 7% of a message is based on words, 38% on the tone of voice, and 55% on the speaker’s body language and face.

Pay attention to the speaker’s tone of voice and body language. Do they match the literal meaning of the words spoken? If there is a disconnect, the speaker could be lying or unconvinced. Use labels to discover the source of inconsistency, e.g., “You just said ‘yes,’ but it seemed there was a hesitation in your voice.”

The use of labels effectively conveys respect for the other party as the inconsistency is recognized and handled gently. This way, there will be no surprises when it is time to implement the agreement.

Chapter 5 talked about the three types of "Yes." We want to avoid the counterfeit "yes", and we can avoid that trap by following the rule of three.

The rule of three getting the other side to agree to the same thing three times within the same conversation. It ensures that the other party fully understands what they agree to and provides an opportunity for clarification, if necessary. The rule also allows you to address a problem immediately, if there is any.

One technique for applying the rule of three is to paraphrase the first calibrated question you asked. For example, if your first question is, “What is the biggest challenge that you foresee happening?”, you may phrase your second and third question as follows: “What are we up against in this situation?” and “What do you think will the most difficult thing to get around?”

The other technique is first to get the other party to agree, then label or summarize what they said, then finally, as a calibrated question on what will ensure a successful implementation.

Watch out for telltale signs. Liars are prone to use more words and complex sentences to make their words more believable.

Liars would tend to use third-person instead of first-person pronouns to put distance between them and the lie. If the other party is unsparing in the use of “I,” “me,” “my,” and “myself,” it means they are less important than how they project themselves to be.

Use your name to make the other party see you as a person. Use it to introduce yourself and say it in a friendly way.

Julie and Aaron managed to get their counterparts to lower down their demands by saying “no” through a series of “how” questions. The kidnappers’ response to these questions sounded like they were bidding against themselves.

Experience shows that a negotiator can express "no" in a roundabout way four times before actually saying the word. The first "no" would come in the form of the often-used "How am I supposed to do that?” When delivered properly, the counterpart will help you solve your problem for you.

The second “no” would be some version of “Your offer is generous, but I’m sorry, it doesn’t work for me.” The use of the word “generous” encourages the other party to live up to the word, while “I’m sorry” creates empathy.

The third one would be something more direct, like, "I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I can't do that." Verbalizing your lack of ability to perform will generate the counterpart’s empathy toward you.

The fourth version could be “I’m sorry, no”, which, when delivered in the right tone of voice, would not sound negative.

Excellent negotiators do not rely on words alone. They look for subtle signals that indicate if they are being lied to or manipulated. They also know that getting the counterpart to agree is not guaranteed success – the deal must be implemented.

The following lessons are useful tools for getting the deal implemented:

Recall a recent negotiation where you had to say “No.” How did you say it then? If you were to have a do-over, how will you transform your “No” into a “How” question?

Visualize your next negotiation event. What possible offers are you going to say “No” to? How will you express “No?”