Start Your International Negotiations With Identifying The Right Person

Sometimes the obvious difficulties in cross cultural negotiations lead people to forget the most basic things.

Jumping to automatic assumptions and entering into negotiations with the wrong person.

Identifying the right person you need to negotiate with is easy in your own culture. But in cross cultural negotiations several factors can come into play.

Mistakes Are Easy To Make

Miscommunication on both sides is easy. In some cases it is because of signals that are misinterpreted and in other cases it is based on your country prejudices.

International business negotiations are not easy to navigate. Sometimes even the simplest of assumptions right at the beginning can lead you astray.

How many times have people assumed that the tallest man was the boss and only to find he was the assistant to thesmaller woman to his side?

Better Safe Than Sorry

It’s true, wasting your time negotiating with the wrong person does not happen often. But when it does, it can lead to a fiasco. You waste a lot of your time and increase your foreign lead costs. But you might even jeopardize your future business relationship by accidentally insulting the person who is the real leader.

Do not automatically assume you know whether you are speaking with the right person or not, especially if this is your first international business negotiation or if you are dealing with a culture extremely different from yours on several levels.

Do not always assume the right person is even at the first meeting, even if he thinks he is the right person. You don’t want everyone around you to see you on a wild goose chase.

Reasons Why You Might Start Negotiations With The Wrong Person

Simple communication can easily be complicated by cultural differences. You can not assume to understand the management structure of a foreign company.

• You might assume it is similar to what you are familiar with.
• A key word might have been translated poorly.
• A job junction simply might not have an accurate translation into your language.

And in some cross cultural communication it can take both parties some time in understanding who should be speaking to who.

• There may be a perception from the other company that you are not the right representative to be meeting with the appropriate person in your prospects company.
• Politeness is easily misinterpreted in any cross cultural communication and in business environments the correct way of doing things varies from culture to culture.

Teamwork Helps

This is one of the advantages of teamwork in international sales.

Two people see more than one person.

Often one person is specifically assigned to speak less and spend their time trying to pick up cross cultural communication signals.

Verify Early

Remember to verify whether you are indeed negotiating with the right person early in your discussions, before the real negotiations begin.

A mistake at the greeting phase can be a simple mistake. A mistake at a later phase can be very insulting.

Be Diplomatic

Some people may take offense if asked outright who they are, what they do and who they report for. Most people will even accept a straightforward question if it is early in your communication. But there are always more polite ways of verifying.

For example your team can begin with the junior person, “My name is… I do this job… I work for…”

And you can include a short follow-up cross verification in any of your correspondence in writing shortly afterwards.

Clarity And Trust

Good cross cultural communication skills are all about clarity and trust. And both clarity and trust are needed in both parties. Not only should you pay particular attention to be clear and trustworthy in all points of view. But you should politely ask for clarification and reasons to trust if you do not feel absolute clarity and trust within your negotiations.

Establishing the right negotiation partner is the first part of the international sales process.
Don’t forget to check out the Cross Cultural Negotiation 101 Guide for more articles and tips on international negotiations.

• Cross Cultural Negotiation 101

Other articles on Cross Cultural Communication you may like to read:

• Your Guideline For Successful First Time Cross Cultural Negotiations In Any Culture
• The Most Important Tip For International Sales Negotiations
• How To Prevent Most Cross Cultural Miscommunication By Examining Your Own English Communication
• How To Learn From Intercultural Communication Difficulties
• How Digital Age Communication Wrecked Havoc In Multicultural Communication
• How A Third Culture Kid’s Natural Cross Cultural Vision Can Power Your International Business Expansion
• 3 Types Of International Communication For International Business Success Online

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