Negotiating as an SLP: The key to unlocking your goals

Being able to negotiate is important. With your patients, your colleagues, and especially with management. It may be the most important thing you do in order to reach your most ambitious goals. This is because most often the biggest barrier towards our goals, whether they be for our patients or for ourselves, lie in other people. Their wants, values, perspectives, and personality types all come into play when you are trying to push forward an initiative. Understanding the other person and knowing how to negotiate with them is the key to unlocking your goals. Some view the utilization of negotiation strategies as unfair for some reason. But negotiating is one of the highest levels of communication. It exists in every culture and is instinctive to us as a species (think how good toddlers are at it. I’m not afraid to say that my three-year old has out-negotiated me on MANY occasions). Shying away from negotiating could be the reason you are having trouble implementing that policy change, getting a raise, or landing your dream job. Let’s find out more about how we can effectively negotiate for our patients and ourselves.

For the sake of clarity, the examples used in this blog are geared towards policy implementation, but they can ALL be used in any goal you are trying to achieve in your career and in your life.

Planning Your Approach

Planning out a negotiation tactic is really the only way you can successfully implement it. First, know your leverage. In every negotiation, leverage is key. Leverage can be positive (saving money for the facility), negative (a drop in census), and normative (based on values, such as quality of care or customer service). This is what you are going to need to define to make your case compelling based on the needs and values of the person you’re speaking to. Doing a mock meeting with a colleague can be a great way to focus on your leverage and seek to get the views of this person out in the open. This will allow you to make educated guesses about how they will (and ultimately you will) respond.

Know the Problem

The person you’re negotiating with is not the problem. The problem is something bigger and it needs to be one that you both agree on as a problem before you can make any progress. What if they don’t see it as a problem worth addressing? That can be changed. Everybody has something that motivates them. Finding out what that is will allow you to paint the picture so they can see our problem as their problem too (my overuse of the word problem has officially become a problem).

They’re a Vault

Can’t figure out what it is standing in your way of an agreement? Unsure what motivates them? Then ask. “What’s the root of the problem standing in our way from implementing a free water protocol, Mr. Administrator?” If you’re not comfortable with that approach, there are more subtle ways to basically ask the same question:

What are we trying to accomplish?

What is the core issue here?

What is the biggest challenge we are facing?

How can I make things better for the facility?

What would be the best way to move forward on this?

Shh. Listen

After we ask this question, we need to listen. Novel approach right? You’d be astonished at how little we actually listen to what is said to us. Instead of really paying attention to the answers to our questions, we typically think of what we are going to say next, how we look, how we are being perceived, and possibly what we are having for lunch that day (that last one might just be me, but you get the point). By listening, and I mean really listening (not only to the words, but to the tone and body language as well), we can unlock the core issues and obstacles that are holding us back from moving forward. Then we can use that information to directly address those issues and tie our problem to something they care about (e.g. free water protocol = happy patients = less customer service problems).

No

When you are initially told ‘no’ to what you are trying to accomplish, don’t fret. This may actually be a really good start. If you get a yes too quickly then you may really be in trouble. This could mean that the person is just trying to shoo you away and go onto things they actually care about. Don’t be surprised if this type of yes never comes to fruition because it’s actually a no in disguise. Seeing ‘no’ as a stepping stone will help open up your options and exponentially improve your chances of success. When receiving a ‘no’ response you can ask, “What about this doesn’t work for you?” or, “What would you need to make this work?” to get the to the bottom of why the current situation doesn’t appear to work and find out what the person really wants. Another option is to detail the negatives of not moving forward (remember that leverage thing?). Continuing with the example of a policy change, explain how you just want to be fair to the patients (This tends to be a soft spot even for administrators!). After all, this work is all about the patients to begin with so how could you say no to that (Yes, some do still find a way).

Be Positive

This isn’t just some kumbaya jargon. It actually has tangible effects (for patients too.) Focus on what you can control and believe in the larger impact of what you are doing beyond just yourself. For example with policy implementation think about the impact it will have on your patients, the facility, or your colleagues. In the case of a new job opportunity, think about how you are doing it not only for yourself, but for your family as well. Approaching a negotiation with positivity and confidence should also come across in the language you use. In the event that you aren’t seeing eye to eye with the person, you’ll want to disagree without being disagreeable. Always make sure the other person still has a sense of control over the situation. For example, instead of saying something like, “You’re wrong because...” say something like, “Have you considered the possibility that...” Taking a firm stance leaves no room for flexibility and you’ll want to keep that flexibility to allow them to bend in your direction and still save face.

Set a Timeline

Setting a timeline can be an enormously effective tool in getting an answer as soon as possible. And if you’ve put in the ground work (see above) in making a case for your initiative, hopefully that answer will slide in your direction. What this avoids is the all-too-common avoidance strategy where a non-answer inevitably becomes an easy way to turn down a good initiative. Keep them accountable. Use a specific patient who would greatly benefit from your initiative as an example and make it clear that the benefits won’t be there if we don’t’ move forward soon. Nothing makes people move like a little fire under their butts.

Conclusion

Negotiation skills can help you achieve almost every professional goal you set out to achieve in life. Learning how to read people and how to understand their perspectives, motivations, and needs will not only help you professionally, but will help you in most other areas of life as well. Negotiating sometimes gets a bad wrap. People think of it as a battle. Instead think of it as a dance. Getting a feel for each other’s moves in order to move in sync towards a mutual goal. And there’s nothing like dancing your way towards your goals.

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