S5 Ep20 Negotiations

So today we're going to dive into almost, like, a backroom topic, something that has been a theme of definitely we could say the last few years, we could say the last, you know, seven decades.

But negotiations, which everyone is talking about right, right now in the memorandum of understanding with Iran, between the US and Iran, what's happening there, why does it feel like this is not going the way that we thought it would, um, and how do we understand historically what it actually means to negotiate with a culture that's vastly different from your own? And how is it the Western world and the Eastern world, how do you talk to each other when maybe your negotiation tactics or your, your memorandums of understanding, so to speak, are coming from very different places? Um, I mean, I can just say quickly from a coaching relationship perspective, if you have two people that come from, uh, different backgrounds, different families, different understandings of what it means to work something out, you know, one family just yells until they figure it out, and the other family, you know, has to be speak politely, otherwise there's no getting into anything, those people are gonna have a hard time figuring their stuff out with each other or talking about difficult conversations, 'cause one person's gonna try to yell, the other person's gonna try to shut it down, and now how do you get there? So it seems to me that one of the things that you're pointing to is how do these two very different worlds talk to each other? So where do we start with this?

Right.

So that's, that's a great analogy, by the way.

You get, you have to kind of be on the same wavelength to be able to communicate.

If one side is listening, the other side's just yelling- [laughs]

Right

... you're not gonna get anywhere.

So, I mean, it goes to a really basic point that is not being talked about at all.

Uh, and we're not talking about the Islamic ideology, which plays into it a little bit, but it's the much bigger, uh, discussion of how you need to understand another person's culture.

This is in an interpersonal relationship when you're traveling around the world.

Uh, this is in terms of doing a business deal in another country, if an American's doing a deal in Japan.

And certainly on the macro scale in terms of negotiations of any kind between countries, it's absolutely critical, and it seems to be a point that is being missed.

I remember years ago, HSBC Bank used to have on the jetways going, when you're going into the planes, these, the same image.

You know, the one- I remember one that really stuck out was a guy sitting at a desk, uh, and his feet are up.

So you walk in the room, you see his feet.

Now, in Western culture, that's like this guy is relaxing.

If you were to, God forbid, invite, like, have an Arab sheikh walk into your office and you're sitting at your desk, and the first thing he sees is the soles of your feet, I mean, that deal's off.

Yeah.

So it just shows you something unintentional can be-

Right

... extremely damaging, and understanding where the other side come i- comes from can be extremely effective.

And when we're jumping into the negotiations, let's say, Donald Trump is having in the US government with Iran at the moment, um, you see this is playing a huge role.

I mean, Donald Trump's the, you know, The Art of the Deal.

He's Mr.