Daniel Duty was 27 when the manager of Wheaties asked him to put Michael Jordan on a cereal box. Sales were down. Jordan had already signed a multimillion-dollar deal with Nike. Wheaties had no budget for the star its manager wanted.
When Daniel told me this story, I wondered what someone that early in his career could possibly offer Jordan’s agents. His first move was to let them explain why they had agreed to meet. He asked, “Why are you here?”
What the Wheaties box meant to Jordan
According to Daniel, the agents explained that Jordan wanted to appear on the box because so many great athletes had been there before him. To Jordan, that place in sporting history mattered. The people at Wheaties had been looking at the front of the box as a way to sell cereal. Across the table sat people who saw the same space as a way to celebrate an athlete’s career.
That answer gave Daniel something specific to offer. He could describe what it would mean for fans to find Jordan on a box they could take home and keep. The two sides reached an agreement for what Daniel recalls was a small sum. Had he opened by explaining how little Wheaties could pay, the conversation might have stayed on the one point where he had the least room to move.
Give the other person something to work with
After General Mills and Target, Daniel founded Conlego, where he helps retailers and the brands that sell to them prepare for negotiations. He asks teams to name their own priorities as carefully as they investigate the other side’s. If you want a supplier to suggest a different way to meet your needs, what have you told them about the problem you are trying to solve?
Take a retailer asking a supplier for a lower price. The buyer might need better margins, or might want to sell more units during a particular month. Those goals invite different proposals. A supplier who hears only a demand for a discount has to guess which problem the buyer will use to judge the offer.
A question to take into your next meeting
Daniel recommends setting the agenda, sharing what you hope to achieve and asking what matters most to the other person. Then leave enough silence for the answer. If someone mentions a deadline, a customer commitment or an opportunity they want to be associated with, follow up while you can still change the proposal.
Before your next negotiation, write down the answer you expect to hear when you ask, “What will be important to you in reaching an agreement with me?” Keep it in your notes. Ask the question in the room and compare the two answers. For Daniel, the detail he could never have supplied from his own side of the table was what a cereal box meant to Michael Jordan.
Continue with the conversation.
Daniel Duty shares the experience behind these ideas.
Listen to the conversation ↗By Martin Piskoric. Originally published on 21ce.biz.
