Host: Philip Brown, Founder of The Negotiation Club
Guest: Martin John, Procurement Professional & Trainer
“Charm opens doors in negotiation that force could never unlock.”
Episode Overview:
In this insightful episode of The Negotiation Club Podcast, host Philip Brown sits down with Martin John, a seasoned procurement professional with over 26 years of experience, now a respected trainer in procurement and negotiation skills.
Together, they delve into the vital role of building positive relationships, particularly in challenging negotiations where the other party may hold significantly more leverage—such as in cases of dealing with a monopolistic position holder.
The episode, aptly titled “The Charm Offensive” explores the art of using charm as a strategic tool to foster cooperation and goodwill. Martin and Philip discuss how charm, when used effectively, can level the playing field by creating an environment of trust and mutual respect. They break down the key ways to incorporate charm into your negotiation toolkit, including:
- Establishing Rapport: Learn how to quickly build a personal connection that sets a positive tone for the negotiation.
- Reducing Tension: Discover techniques to ease the natural tension in high-stakes negotiations.
- Influencing Perception: Find out how to present your proposals in a way that makes them more appealing through subtle charm.
- Encouraging Reciprocity: Understand how a charming approach can lead to concessions from the other party.
BE WARNED:
“True charm in negotiation is rooted in sincerity, not flattery.”
However, not all charm is created equal. Martin warns about the dangers of overusing charm, which can come off as insincere or even manipulative. The genuineness of your charm is critical—if it feels forced or insincere, it can backfire and damage the relationship.
“Charm is about genuine interaction, not exploiting someone’s personal details.”
The episode also touches on the fine line between doing research to connect with the other party and crossing into “creepy” territory, such as over-relying on social media to gather personal information.
At The Negotiation Club Podcast, we don’t just share valuable insights—we transform them into practical tools you can use. Our unique approach takes the lessons from each episode and converts them into actionable resources like the Podcast Negotiation Cards. These cards distill key strategies discussed in the podcast into focused exercises that help you practice and refine your skills.
Listening is only the beginning; true mastery comes from applying what you’ve learned in real scenarios.
Our cards are designed to bridge that gap, making our podcast a truly unique resource for anyone serious about improving their negotiation abilities. Join us, and turn powerful insights into real-world success.
True mastery comes from putting these insights into action, and that’s exactly what The Negotiation Club is all about.
FOLLOW & LIKE!
Don’t miss out on future episodes filled with practical advice and real-world examples. Be sure to LIKE and FOLLOW the podcast for more expert insights, and JOIN The Negotiation Club to sharpen your skills through practice.
Tune in now and start your own charm offensive in your next negotiation!
Welcome to the Negotiation Club podcast with Phillip Brown. The Negotiation Club is the only community focused solely on enhancing your negotiation skills training through practice with others. Today on the podcast, Phil is joined by his friend, Martin John, to talk about charm. Both the way charm can be used in a negotiation, and also what it might tell you about the person who's charming. Here's Phil and Martin. Welcome to the Negotiation Club and the Negotiation Podcast. Now this is where we speak to experts, practitioners and other technicians in the industry about their negotiation skills, their tactics, what they've done in their negotiations that perhaps we could learn from and practice ourselves. Now today on the podcast, I have a friend of mine, Martin John. I've known for a couple of years, but Martin has an extraordinary great background, and he can probably explain what that is. So I'm going to hand over to Martin. Martin, do you want to just introduce yourself? Thank you very much for that introduction, Phil. I'm proud and delighted that you've called me your friend, that makes my heart sing. Thank you very much. And what do you say, an extraordinary and great career or something, 26 years in procurement for those. I don't know whether you can see this, but I probably look as if I've had 26 years in procurement, and a couple of years in supply chain. So automotive, food, tobacco and packaging with the sectors that I've worked in across my career. And now I'm loving what I do in training people in procurement, negotiation and also ethical influence and persuasion. Brilliant. Now, of course you've got the gray hair, I've got no hair, but I do have the gray beard, I guess as well. Now we did just have a little chat beforehand in terms of what kind of techniques or kind of styles we're looking at. And I noticed actually, I noticed you might have just used it on me almost immediately. So what is it that we would like, or what is it that you'd like to maybe share with our audience? Well, one thing that I found that works particularly well, but especially in situations where you don't have much tangible power in a negotiation, so you look into maximise your intangible power. And one source of intangible power is to be charming to the other party. And what I found is that this can be a really useful and powerful technique to disarm the other party, and also get them to reveal more information than they may otherwise ordinarily do without it. I love that intangible power position. So the tangible aspect of it, if I get this right, the tangible aspect of it is really the logical elements, the items of the negotiation. But what we're talking about here is very much the personal interaction. Yeah, that's exactly right. So another intangible power lever would be say your body language, the way you carry yourself, the words you use. But being charming, I find works really, really well. And especially I've used it with suppliers where they've been in a monopoly position. So I've had almost zero tangible power whatsoever. Wow. So this particular style, if we were to try and develop it, to try and practice it, to get this charm offensive type style, this is something that you believe works very effectively when you're in a monopoly position, and perhaps maybe you haven't got the type of leverage that you might have if it was equitable or even you were from a position. Exactly. So we talked briefly about the Crowley Edge Matrix, and if you think about the four boxes of the Crowley Edge Matrix, on the top box, left hand side, well, it depends on what you draw it, of course. When the market is very difficult, so there are few suppliers, high barriers to entry, and you've got relatively low spend, that's the critical box, okay? So you need the supplier more than they need you. And of course, when you're in that position, they're likely to treat you in a colder way. So you're doing everything you can to try and build goodwill with that supplier, to try and give you a negotiation advantage using intangible power because you have no tangible power. And if we think of the top right hand box of Crowley Edge, so that's high market difficulty again, and where the spend is significant, the power is shared typically in that area, and so it's in both parties' interest to collaborate. And of course, because you want to develop and expand the negotiation pie in that box, and then it's important also to be charming to get the most out of that counterpart. That is really interesting. So you're talking about, I refer to it as the Crowley Edge model, I think it's a slightly different pronunciation, but Crowley Edge model, yeah. So the Crowley Edge model, Crowley Edge, Crowley Edge. It's very much a procurement model that's used throughout most procurement areas. Portfolio analysis is the other name for it, easier to say. Yeah, I'll put a link to perhaps a landing page or something which explains it as well. But it is a model that we use in procurement a lot, and where you're referring to it is, in this, as you say, this kind of high risk area. Now the way I always think about Crowley Edge model is if you've got a high risk area, a high risk supply side, you also then need to do a secondary type of portfolio, which is to consider how the supplier sees you, because the supplier might see you as being hugely important. So even though they're critical, they see you as being important. But if they're critical and they see you as basically a pain, then that's not a great place to be in, and I guess that's where you need to be as charming as you possibly can be. Absolutely. When you get a mismatch, so that's the supplier-preferencing model. So the two bad boxes to be in there are nuisance and exploit. And if you find yourself in either of those boxes and you need a good relationship with those suppliers, you need to do everything you can to convince them that you're a worthy customer and worth them investing their time and resource in. Again, that's where the being charming can come into play. Okay. Okay. So how do you be charming? How do you be... Just be yourself, Phil. Just be you. Look at my hats. Just be you. Well, the first thing I want to say about this is it has to be sincere, firstly, because if you're not sincere in whatever you say comes across as being contrived and artificial, then it's really going to blow up in your face and it'll backfire spectacularly. So that's the first thing. But the fundamental thing is, especially when you're meeting someone for the first time, know their name and if they have an unusual name, ask them how it's pronounced, so you get that right first. That shows that you're interested in them and you actually care about addressing them in the right way. As Dale Carnegie said in his book, "How to Win Friends and Influence People," the sound of hearing one's own name is the sweetest sound that people can hear. That is absolutely right, Martin John. Yeah. Yeah. Take. Now, actually, interestingly enough, Michael Phillips actually did this particular technique earlier on a couple of weeks ago. So we've actually already got a negotiation card around using your name. So I love the fact that you just brought this in in terms of the charm offensive. So let's say you've validated, you've got the name right, you've maybe even practiced it if it's particularly difficult, but once you've got that right, what's something else you can do in order to sort of enhance the charm effect? Okay. So many of us who've read and taught negotiation know how important building rapport is in a negotiation in order to get the best results. Countless studies have shown that if you've got rapport, you're more likely to avoid deadlock and be get a better result if you have a strong sense of rapport. So how do you build a strong sense of rapport? Well, one way is taking a genuine interest in the other party. Okay. So asking a question about them and really listening to the answer, maybe paraphrasing their words back to them as well. So that shows that you're actually listening, you're paying attention to them. You're making them feel like the most important person in the world right at that particular moment. So you might do that. You might do this at the start of your your negotiation where I would absolutely insist that we all spend time, whether it's five minutes or whatever, but investing that time to build a rapport and that connection before your negotiation gets underway. So for me, that's it's not it's before you even have the introduction, isn't it? It's like when you just have that chit chat. Yes. Yeah, exactly right. And something else you can do, Phil, is do some research on that person beforehand and fight, you know, one big rapport builder is identifying a similarity you have for the other person. Okay. And that's easy to do because we all have access to social media and people are publishing their interest, their hobbies, their holidays, they've been on, you know, all the time. So do a little bit of prep beforehand. So you can identify that similarity and raise that similarity to awareness with your counterpart early on before the negotiation starts. Right. Okay. Let me just add a little bit. So before the negotiation even starts, there is a moment when there is a little bit of an introductions between you, there's that little chit chat, obviously Brits, we like to talk about the weather. But if you can find something within that chit chat that simulates you, gets you something similar between you, then that will help because I think I've said this before, we like to do business with people we like and the people we like are the ones I like us. So if you find that similarity, it certainly can help. Absolutely. But you've also mentioned around, you know, maybe just checking out that, you know, on LinkedIn, their social posts, if you're really into Facebook, maybe that or Instagram. I personally, I'd find it a little bit weird if somebody came straight and said, Oh, Phil, it was fantastic. I saw your wife and kids, you know, you know, you're playing down at the swings at the on the weekend. I'll be like, Yep. Okay. You bit too charming there. That's right. That's right. That's an important point because there is a line, isn't there, you know, beyond beyond which things start to get creepy, okay, and artificial and forced and you know, you come across as being desperate in trying to find some kind of angle. And I'd certainly say that, you know, family and any personal stuff beyond that individual is off limits, really, and try and keep the similarities just to that, that individual you're dealing with until you've maybe built up a relationship over time. And then, you know, the counterpart volunteers, that information to you. And then, you know, it's in play sounds a really bad expression. But then you know, I've been given permission to maybe talk and ask a question on that topic. Yeah. And I absolutely agree with you on that because I will often listen throughout the entire negotiation. And as you get towards the end of negotiation, people say what they're going to do or where they're going next. And if you take a note of that, the next time you speak to them, you get, "Oh, Martin, yeah, the last time we spoke," you say, "You'll go on holiday, how do that go?" But you can only really do that after you've had that sort of, yeah, yeah. And again, again, Phil, it needs to come across in a natural way, not as if you're going through a checklist, you know, in your complicated CRM system or notebook as I have kind of thing. It needs to come across in a natural way, so it's not contrived and creepy. Yeah. And I'm going to add to that. I think if you look down at them, Martin, so last time you went on, you were on holiday, you'd be like, "Hang on, right, okay." So that sincerity cannot look like it's a pre-planned piece. And just looking down as if you're reading something could actually do more harm than good, even though you've got a nice little conversation point. Yeah, I think you're right. So it's really subtle and it's difficult to get right. And it can blow up in your face spectacularly, if you get it wrong. And if the other part seems to be just being, you know, someone who's just desperate to try and find that angle to connect and using artificial and insincere means to do that. Right. So let's break this down slightly, okay? So we're looking at Martin, John, and the charm offensive here, I think, okay? So we're going to have a card, which is a charm offensive, okay? So Martin, charming Martin. I call it a charm in Martin, couldn't we? Charm in Martin. I like that one. Okay. Anyway, the point is, is that this is all about building the relationship on a personal level, okay? We just talked about the fact that you might want to get the name right. You listen early. There is this introductions. There's a personal introduction, which, judging from what you're saying, is just as important as some of the detailed discussions you're going to have later. So that personal aspect, don't just dismiss it. Really listen into what people are saying. Bottom. You've also just highlighted the fact that using the Kraljek's model, people tend to be charming when they perhaps feel in a slightly weaker position than perhaps if they're in a really strong, assertive position. So for me to practice, I would like to practice being as charming as I possibly can and seeing if that does help, it's difficult to know exactly how it helps, but I suppose that's the question you can ask the other party after you've done your practice negotiation. But I would also suggest that when somebody is being extremely, extremely charming to the point where they have trolled your Facebook and come up with something personal, don't necessarily dismiss it completely. There is always a reason behind what people do. And if they are being ultra charming, it could lend you the idea that they're not feeling in a very comfortable position themselves. Exactly. It kind of gives the game away a little bit, doesn't it, that they're not in such a strong position as you might have otherwise thought they were? I like it. Okay. All right. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm club members, okay, we have another one to practice now, which is going to be, I think we might call it the Charming Martin, oh, the Charming Offensive. So I'm going to close it there. We will send out the links to our audience, those are all following us, you're so absolutely great. I'll also send you the information in terms of the new negotiation card. So that will be available as well. And Martin, have you got any final thoughts, anything you'd like to maybe just add? Well, I've actually, firstly, I'd like to say I'm honored to have had this opportunity of putting my name or a technique to a card. Thank you very much. But no, think about it. I've used this technique a lot in situations where, you know, I've had very little and zero tangible power because the supplier has been a monopolist in that particular segment I've been dealing with. And if you've got no tangible power, intangible power is the only thing you've got. And you know, apart from being confident, coming across as confident, using confident body language and the words that you use, you know, being charming can disarm that counterpart and get you a better deal than you would otherwise have been on the table for you. So it's certainly worth, I've benefited from the, in the past, and I'd recommend others give it a try to. So it takes practice as all skills and techniques and tactics take. So certainly for those of you who are listening, think about practicing this one on purpose. If you want somewhere to practice, then of course we have the negotiation club. We meet regularly every month. So come along and practice with us and there's plenty more you can actually chew there as well. If you haven't got the opportunity to join us, think about starting your own club. Starting new practice with others, we guarantee you will be able to improve upon that. So that said, I'm going to leave you all to practice with purpose and enjoy it. And there you go. So thank you very much, Martin. Take care and stay charming. All the best of all thanks, bye bye. If you liked what you heard today, check out the negotiation clubs dot com where you can find professional development courses, join negotiation club communities, purchase negotiation practice cards, get a private consultation and more. Until next time, thanks for joining us and happy negotiating. [MUSIC] (gentle music)
