Identifying your hot buttons

So before I go any further, I am going to ask you to do something that is more difficult than listing your pause buttons. I want you to list your hot buttons. In seminars around the world, people often get emotional while doing this. The question is: “What makes your blood pressure rise?” or “When are you most likely to get upset in a negotiation?” Write down your answer in this space:

Acknowledging clearly and unequivocally what upsets you in a negotiation is a big step toward avoiding that situation. You recognize your own demons. You won’t get rid of your hot buttons, but you will know to push your pause button as soon as the other party exhibits a certain behavior. Does yelling bother you? If you are aware of that, you can push your pause button at the first sound of a raised voice.
At my three-day intensive negotiating seminars, I ask the participants to share their hot buttons with the group, and they always list a wide range of behaviors. Lying is always one of the first hot buttons mentioned. Many women dislike being talked down to. Everybody seems to have an aversion to yelling, vulgarity, and physical bullying, such as desk pounding. If the group is large, someone usually brings up a new irritant. You are not alone in having a hot button. You are part of the human race. Negotiators (and, in fact, humans in general) deal with many different emotions all the time. I will discuss the most common hot buttons that come up during (and often get in the way of) negotiating.

Dealing with Your Hot Buttons

Everybody experiences emotions and responses. Just because you are involved in a negotiation doesn’t mean that you’ll remain cool, calm, and collected throughout. In fact, the more important the negotiation is to you on a personal level, the more likely it is to stir up your emotional responses. Of course, sometimes we forget that we have pause buttons — especially when someone else is pushing our buttons. For example, you ask a co-worker to do something, and she responds, “That’s not my job.” Feeling your blood pressure rise, you may be tempted to blurt out, “Well, it’s not mine either, blockhead!”
You may think this, but you needn’t say it. You have a pause button. When you push it, you realize that if you utter your first response, you won’t get the job done and you may alienate the co-worker. (Remember, friends come and go; enemies accumulate.) So instead you say, “I understand.” And you do: The person feels overworked and underpaid — don’t we all? Then you may say, “I know that you’re swamped, but this thing has to get done to meet the deadline. Can you give it any time at all?” And the negotiation begins. Now you have a chance of getting what you want. The ability to respond emotionally is a part of every healthy human being. When you feel emotions welling up inside you, having control means that you choose to use these emotions to your advantage, instead of allowing them to send you to the locker room in defeat or cause you to blow up. This section discusses the emotions that commonly arise in any negotiation — at home or at work — and suggests ways to handle them in yourself and others. To negotiate masterfully, you must stay in control of your emotions. This means having the confidence to take control in the first place and the skill to channel your emotions effectively as the negotiation progresses. You can usually do this — with one exception: when people or situations push your hot buttons. Hot buttons are stimuli that trigger a response of resistance and cause you to be tempted to go out of control.

Pushing the pause button to save lives

The most dramatic example of good use of the pause button is during a hostage situation. Hostage situations arise in several different contexts. Sometimes hostages are taken to make a political point. Sometimes hostages are taken in an old-fashioned kidnapping for financial gain. The most common hostage situation arises because something went wrong in a robbery. With today’s swift communications techniques, officers often arrive on the scene of a crime as the perpetrator is coming out the front door, which sends the criminal running back into the building. When that happens, the scared criminal is trapped and has a brand new problem on his hands: the unplanned holding of whoever is inside the bank or store. The criminal doesn’t have time to figure out what a pickle he is in and usually thinks he has some terrific advantage. What happens in real life is that some highly skilled, well-trained law enforcement officials swoop in to negotiate for the release of hostages. The police have a simple mission: Do nothing to endanger the hostages or to prevent getting them out safely.
The television cameras generally focus on some cool cop trained for the task of lead negotiator. This person was typically trained at the twoweek FBI school in Quantico, Virginia. Where does all that cool come from? Truth is that no one can be counted on for constant cool. That’s why a member of the support team is in charge of the pause button. This member’s main task is to continually monitor the entire situation to be sure that all the officers keep their cool —no grandstanding, no heroes, just a lot of hard work. This officer insists on taking enough time to get the captor’s demands in detail. Without such a pause, a captor rarely thinks through and states demands so specifically. If the demands are laid out clearly, the negotiation closes successfully more often than not. The captor usually walks out with his hands over his head. Next time you see such a situation on television, try to find the person standing calmly near the lead negotiator. That person is probably the keeper of the pause button. Wouldn’t it be great to have one person in your life in charge of keeping the cool? But you’re on your own; you have to pack your own pause button. Don’t leave home without it.