Managing Leadership^®

Remember that saying from the old mafia movies? Both sides knew and accepted that events had developed to the point where one wiseguy was going to have to deal with another. Nothing personal. Just business.

Over the past two days we have reviewed the preparation and conduct of a negotiation that popped up regarding the organization of a prominent speaker’s inclusion at a conference. A woman was initially contacted to accomplish this, but then a man who believed he better represented the industrial field of interest insisted on taking it over or, failing that, on being accorded a major part of it. It was that demand of his that led to the negotiation.

As we have seen, the woman defended her position by staying focused on the overall goals that each party - her, the expert speaker, and the man - were dedicated to (perhaps, to varying degree). She added to this how achievement of those goals was effected by the late intrusion into the process of the man, his demand for recognition, and the expert’s prudent desire to maintain - inasmuch as the issue had come up as a potentially contentious matter - comity in the industrial subcommunity.

But the fact remained that both parties in this negotiation wanted something that had progressed beyond the point where it could honestly - or even just realistically - be parcelled out. The woman had done the work and had earned the right to be recognized for it. The man acknowledged that the work had been done, but tried to claim the lion’s share of credit anyway (an apt metaphor, given that it is typically female lions who hunt and bring down prey, and male lions who then saunter up to take the prime parts of the meal).

So her goals were as follows:

1. Retain control up through and during the event to keep it on focus
2. Find a way to accommodate the man’s demands that would not interfere with goal one
3. Do both of those in a way that properly addressed the larger community’s interests as well as those of each of the three parties.

His goal as evidenced by an external view of his behavior appeared to be entirely and unreasonably selfish. Moreover, it cannot be denied that he seemed to be attempting to gain that goal by trying to bully or intimidate the woman into simply yielding points, power, or authority that she had no need to surrender.

But her insight here was fivefold:

1. Despite appearances, the man was probably either genuinely as dedicated to the larger group’s goals as anyone else, or at least vulnerable to the need to pretend to be. As a result, in the end, he would have to show some deference to them.
2. His unprofessional and unattractive behavior was probably generated by sincerely perceived (albeit poorly represented) professional and/or personal needs.
3. If she reacted to his superficial behavior and battled him point by point regarding that, she would have accelerated the descent of the discussion to a personal disagreement in which she had no easily detectable greater standing than him.
4. By working, instead, to try to discover and address the degree to which he had any useful or legitimate claims, she did not merely maintain, but elevated her standing in the issue with respect both to him and the expert, further enhancing her control of the event and ultimate position in the community at large.
5. Maintaining a focus on the issues that offered to motivate the man’s responses, and disciplining herself to ignore those that threatened to diffuse her own, were the keys to finding a successful resolution of the quandary.

So, there may be something to the old saying after all: even when it seems personal, it may really just be business. And if you can stay focused on business, perhaps the others will give up on trying to make it personal.

But that’s just my assessment of what happened here. What’s yours?

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Today’s tip: Making things personal isn’t the only way to cause business to go bad; making things too easy can, as well. Please see this item from BBC News about how scientists are learning to predict when dull jobs are about to lead to mistakes - and the peculiar precautions they are suggesting to prevent that.

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