Table of Contents
More Praise for Pushback
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Foreword
Preface
Chapter 1: Why Push Back?
Women Leaders Get There by Asking
Women's Distaste for Negotiating
The Cost of Not Asking for What We Want
Pushback and Economic Power
Young Women and Pushback
Women and Negotiating—a Natural Fit
A Four-Step Model of Negotiation
Shoot for the Moon
Chapter 2: Find Your Pushback Style
Trust Your Gut
Your Body of Knowledge
Meet Your Inner Risk Taker
Make a Plan and Make a Start
Won't We Be Punished?
Pushback and You
Your Personal Pushback Style
Do You See Pushback as a Challenge or a Threat?
Go Get It!
Chapter 3: Prepare Psychologically
Who Do You Think You Are?
Your Negotiating Roots
The Locus of Control
Good Girls Don't Ask
The Relationship Trap
How Do You Do Conflict?
The Effect of Fact Finding on Emotion
What Do You Want and Why?
Know Your Power
Find Invisible Guides
Attitude's Role in Aptitude
Role-Play
Get in the Mood
Channeling Your Own Emotions
Look for the Dual Agenda
Go For It!
Chapter 4: Do Your Homework
A Tiered Approach to Preparation
Asking Is Also About Conceding … or Is It?
Practice or Perish!
Chapter 5: Maneuvering Through the Conversation
Understand the Architecture of Deal Making
Open the Conversation Assertively
Set the Pace
Think Co-Investment
Court Your Counterpart
Establish Your Credibility
Anticipate Pushback
Be a Relentless Problem Solver
Appeal to Their Sense of Fairness
Appeal to a Higher Power
Say It Like They'd Say It
Call on Your Conviction
Exercise Silence
Use Your Body
Reach for Expansive, Deepening Questioning
Calling on Delays
De-escalate Deadlocks
Conceding
Managing Bullying and Belittling
Close the Deal
Never Undervalue Your Power
Chapter 6: Follow Up
Do Your Own Postmortem
Initiate a Feedback Exchange
Confirm the Terms
Mulling a Decision Over
Handling “No”
Hear “No” as “Not Yet”
Stay Oriented Toward the Positive
Stay in the Game
Don't Drop the Connection
Don't Be Afraid to Toughen Up
Keep Expanding the Pie
It's a Small World After All
Never Stop Building the Trust
Chapter 7: Push Back to Own Your Career
Overcoming Inertia
See Yourself as a Change Agent
Go Ahead, Be an Opportunist
Be in the Service Business
Leave Some Room to F%$* It All Up
Mentors, Sponsors, and Sages
Refusing, Rebuffing, and Saying “No”
Move Ice Cubes, Not Icebergs
A Model of Continual Improvement
Because No One Else Will Do It for You …
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Index
More Praise for Pushback
Pushback performs the service of arming women with the single most compelling career advancement strategy at their disposal: negotiating skills. Rezvani's day-to-day bargaining tactics are simple to apply, yet intensely effective and stunningly powerful.
—Linda C. Babcock, Ph.D., James Mellon Walton Professor of Economics, Carnegie Mellon University; coauthor, Women Don't Ask
Any woman who has ever swallowed hard and accepted less than she should at work will benefit from this book. Selena provides a template for negotiating gracefully and powerfully for what you want, need, and deserve.
—Sally Helgesen, author, The Female Vision and The Female Advantage
You must read Selena's new book, Pushback. In an age of intellectual capital where value added is so often subjective, it is absolutely vital for women leaders to highlight their contributions and ask for what they want, and this dynamite book will teach you how to find your own voice and style for effectively self-advocating.
—Manisha Thakor, coauthor, On My Own Two Feet: A Modern Girl's Guide to Personal Finance
Pushback is a compelling playbook for taking charge. Selena Rezvani nails the personal tools—from negotiating persuasively to thinking strategically—for the leadership of which all managers are capable and on which all firms depend.
—Michael Useem, professor of management, director of the Leadership Center, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
Copyright © 2012 by Selena Rezvani. All rights reserved.
Published by Jossey-Bass
A Wiley Imprint
One Montgomery Street, Suite 1200, San Francisco, CA 94104-4594—www.josseybass.com
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, 978-750-8400, fax 978-646-8600, or on the Web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, 201-748-6011, fax 201-748-6008, or online at www.wiley.com/go/permissions.
Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages. Readers should be aware that Internet Web sites offered as citations and/or sources for further information may have changed or disappeared between the time this was written and when it is read.
Jossey-Bass books and products are available through most bookstores. To contact Jossey-Bass directly call our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 800-956-7739, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3986, or fax 317-572-4002.
Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If the version of this book that you purchased references media such as a CD or DVD that was not included in your purchase, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Rezvani, Selena.
Pushback : how smart women ask—and stand up—for what they want / Selena Rezvani ; Foreword by Lois P. Frankel. — First edition.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-118-10490-3 (hardback)
1. Assertiveness (Psychology) 2. Leadership in women. 3. Women executives. I. Title.
BF575.A85R498 2012
658.4'09082–dc23
2011052577
For my mom
Foreword
Smart women ask; nice girls just don't get it. The first part of this phrase is part of the subtitle of this book, and the second part is the title of my most recent book, coauthored with Carol Frohlinger. Put them together into one sentence and it tells you a lot about women, negotiating, and the ways in which we sabotage our own best efforts when it comes to getting what is most important to us. Behaving according to the rules you were taught in childhood was appropriate for nice little girls but will never enable you to achieve your adult goals. Nice is necessary for success in any endeavor; it's simply not sufficient.
Case in point. Although I've never met Selena Rezvani, I admired her gumption when she wrote to inquire if I might be willing to provide a foreword for her book. She walked the talk. She asked! And let that be the first of many lessons as you read on. Nice girls just don't get it because they don't ask. Mired in old messages and stereotypes, they long for more—whether that's more respect, money, love, or you name it—but they're hesitant to ask for fear of being labeled too needy, greedy, off-base, insensitive, or a host of other adjectives that are far from the truth. Make no mistake about it. The opposite of a nice girl is not someone who is self-centered, egotistical, or worse—she's a smart woman.
So why do we allow the names we're called when we're assertive, when we ask, and when we stand up for ourselves to wound and immobilize us? Because we live in what Anne Wilson Schaef calls the white male system. By definition a system is designed to perpetuate itself. Think political system, family system, or ecological system. The name-calling, put-downs, and negative innuendo that result when you advocate for yourself are no more than the system trying to keep you where it thinks you belong. And you know what? Each time you acquiesce to these messages the system has succeeded.
In the form of rock-solid research and advice, Pushback offers help in overcoming counterproductive social messages and self-talk. It provides practical strategies that will help you challenge norms and illuminate possibilities you may have never before considered. From negotiating an alternative work arrangement, lobbying for flexibility, or asking for a job that doesn't yet exist, this book delivers news you can immediately use. As a consultant, executive coach, and recovering nice girl, I know how difficult personal change can be. If you knew better, you'd do better. Whether you're the freshest face in your organization or a freshly appointed senior vice president—Pushback provides you with knowledge and tools to amplify your success.
As I often tell my clients, no one will ever take better care of you than you will take care of yourself. Not your boss, your partner, your parents, or your friends. As well-meaning and supportive as they may be, when it comes right down to it, no one knows better than you what's right for you. It's a matter of clearing the path to knowing what you do want and don't want, trusting your instincts, and preparing yourself for life's challenges. The power of Pushback will help you in all three arenas—and more. You're a smart woman. Now, act like it.
January 2012
Pasadena, California
Lois P. Frankel, PhD
Best-selling author, Nice
Girls Don't Get the
Corner Office, Nice Girls
Don't Get Rich, and Nice
Girls Just Don't Get It
Preface
Wanting a raise or a flexible schedule. Craving the chance to lead a coveted project. Needing to sell others on the value of your ideas. Wanting to be heard in a meeting. Finding yourself saying “yes” when you mean “no.”
There are circumstances nearly every day, in every area of life, where we can and need to push back—to articulate, advocate for, and hold out for what we want and what is ours. This book is about building the ability to push back in the arena of work. I believe this ability is the foundation for professional success and fulfillment, and that it can be learned.
Why write a book on pushback for women in particular? In my professional life, I have the opportunity to talk to women colleagues, students, and professionals about leadership and negotiation all the time. Since 2007, I've been immersed in the world of leadership development for women. I've had the pleasure of writing a monthly column for the Washington Post, where I connect with thousands of women about the journey and passage of becoming a leader. These readers, who are dealing with leadership issues firsthand and are in the trenches, tell it to me straight, explaining exactly what they face in the workplace. I also serve as a commentator on NPR's women's show, 51 Percent, where I can share with listeners those issues most pressing for women in the business world. I write a blog for Forbes.com on women and careers that provides tactical guidance for a female audience on how to navigate many common yet hard-to-handle workplace dynamics. And I had the good fortune of volunteering for years as a vice president for the National Association of Women MBAs, a group that encourages ambitious young women to lead, regardless of their chosen career path or interests.
Together with my business partner, Jane Weiss, I co-own a consulting practice, where we work with leaders to help them better engage and retain their female workforce, positioning an inclusive workplace as a competitive advantage. Regardless of where these activities take me, I make a point to have conversations with women who are building their careers right now. No matter what female audience I speak to—whether it's Johnson & Johnson's corporate women's group, business students at Harvard University, or attendees of an international leadership conference—women tend to ask me the same questions, most often related to negotiation, advocacy, conflict, and standing firm:
Given that these questions imply a level of anxiety and discomfort about negotiating, you might wonder whether women are simply born without a “negotiation gene.” The simple but certain answer is “no.” Yes, for many women, negotiating—among other pushback skills—has all the attraction and appeal of cleaning a litter box, and yet, as I show later in this book, women are actually uniquely positioned to succeed at bargaining conversations. Seeing the power in negotiating can move women from apprehension to strength and authority: for this reason, this book focuses largely on teaching negotiating skills and techniques.
For many women, when we're faced with a less-than-optimal situation or circumstance, there are niggling influences guiding us not to act. We might wonder, “Shouldn't I be concerned with what I need, not what I want?” “What if asking for what I want turns ‘them’ off?” “Is it possible for me to be nice and assertive at the same time?” Our own internal monologue might convince us that nothing can be done, that we're not qualified to ask in the first place, or tempt us to avoid the confrontation altogether. We also might have attempted to negotiate before, only to have our request struck down—a factor that led us to deduce that it's easier to sidestep these conversations than to engage in them and suffer defeat. Our own self-questioning can indeed stop us long before we get to the negotiating table.
I've written this book for every woman who wants to build her pushback skills and reach her career goals, and I believe the techniques and advice given here will help any working woman to claim what she wants and what is hers. In particular, I want to reach women with leadership in their sights. As part of the next generation of women leaders, you are primed to thrive in the work world—finally assuming the high-level positions in which women have historically had a nonpresence. You certainly don't lack drive or ambition. In fact you hold unprecedented power—outnumbering men in the workforce,1 garnering more advanced degrees than men,2 and controlling more than half of the world's overall wealth.3 Women's opportunities today would no doubt be unrecognizable to many of our grandmothers and great-grandmothers.
And yet, the job environments that greet you are not yet truly gender inclusive. The policies and structures that you navigate will be largely man-made. You may have a few high-ranking role models you can relate to but your work culture may feel stifling. Even the benefits extended to you will largely undermine the realities many of you face such as motherhood or the quest for a life outside of work. To be sure, the work world needs “work,” and you're the perfect candidate to change it. If we as women are going to build on the unmatched power and momentum we have today, we'll need to lead the charge. If we want our voices to be heard and to be part of the everyday decision making that affects us, we'll need to keep pushing back.
Luckily, the conditions are lush; the setting and timing are just right. Beyond the fact that women represent a compelling talent pipeline, the world requires feminine leadership like never before. I would contend that women's greater abilities to include, empower, empathize, stabilize, glean, and lead are direly needed in a job market, corporate culture, and economy that are struggling.
You represent the new face of women leaders and role models in the making. By setting your sights high, you will avoid the syndrome that leaves so many people ailing from uncontested, low expectations. Come be a part of asking for what you want and need—in fact, be a leader.
The goal of this book is to offer you a better approach to getting what you want. Based on leadership theory, negotiating strategy, and psychological questioning, combined with the firsthand lessons and experiences of women executives, the chapters that follow can serve as a roadmap for helping you attain your own goals, whatever they may be. My interviews with women executives at the top strata of their fields taught me much about the many forms of pushback, its power, and applications for using these skills every day. These women's insights changed and strengthened me profoundly, and I hope they will do the same for you by helping you to find your own pushback voice, style, and signature abilities.
1 U.S. Census Bureau, “Table 587: Foreign-Born and Native-Born Populationso—Employment Status by Selected Characteristics, 2009,” Labor Force, Employment, and Earnings, U.S. Census Bureau, Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2011 (2011). http://www.census.gov/prod/2011pubs/11statab/labor.pdf.
2 National Center for Education Statistics, “Table 269: First-Professional Degrees Conferred by Degree-Granting Institutions in Dentistry, Medicine, and Law, by Number of Institutions Conferring Degrees and Sex of Student: Selected Years, 1949–50 Through 2005–06,” Digest of Education Statistics (2007). http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d07/tables/dt07_269.asp. National Center for Education Statistics, “Table 264: Bachelor's, Master's, and Doctor's Degrees Conferred by Degree-Granting Institutions, by Field of Study and Year: Selected Years, 1970–71 Through 2005–06,” Digest of Education Statistics (2007). http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d07/tables/dt07_264.asp.
3 Michael J. Silverstein, Kate Sayre, and John Butman, Women Want More: How to Capture Your Share of the World's Largest, Fastest-Growing Market (New York: Harper Collins, 2009), 221.
Chapter 1
Why Push Back?
Last fall, I stood before hundreds of women, presenting a workshop on negotiation skills. The scene was the Pennsylvania governor's conference for women, an event that brings together 4,500 women from around the world, with the aim of promoting gender balance in leadership and facilitating rousing debates, discussions, and learning. The promise of my session was similar to that of this book: to give attendees techniques to maneuver through tough bargaining conversations—techniques they could use in all areas of their lives.
The women who attend this conference are extremely bright—most hold advanced degrees and are very successful professionally. They are also engaged, vocal, and motivated when it comes to shaping the trajectory of their careers. Kicking off the session, I asked the question, “Who in this room counteroffered when negotiating your current salary?” About 10 percent of the women raised their hands.
This picture was uniquely unsettling but not unique. It's representative of women's behavior when negotiating—and not just about salary. According to the research of Carnegie Mellon's Linda Babcock and Sara Laschever, women report “a great deal of apprehension” about negotiation at a rate 2.5 times more than men.1
How is it possible that in the year 2012—when there are more women than men in the workforce2and women earn more degrees than men3—women are still apprehensive about negotiating? After all, we negotiate every day in countless ways. We bargain with our children and partners, making almost daily trades and concessions of our time. We demand a refund on a broken stroller, negotiate with our bosses to ensure coverage while we're on vacation, or ask the hotel maître d' for a room further away from the elevator. We're in bargaining situations all the time. Yet, time and again, my female colleagues, students, and friends tell me resoundingly, “I hate negotiating and I'm no good at it.”
When researching my first book, I spoke with thirty women executives about how they own and use their power at work. I learned that successful women ask for what they want; I even dedicated a full chapter of that book to the art of asking. The women executives I convened figured out through experience that doing good work does not guarantee rewards. They learned that people who are vocal and advocate on their own behalf move up, not those who wait to be noticed. In interviewing them, I also learned that women who achieve leadership status challenge long-standing beliefs. They push back on the “good-girlisms” with which they grew up: “be seen and not heard,” “always be nice,” and “don't be too outspoken.” They don't take “no” as a final, damning answer, nor do they allow rejection to create a deeply personal wound. On the contrary, to survive in a top role, women executives ask for what they want. They're firm. They don't accept what's unacceptable. They speak and maneuver with power.
To understand how women leaders achieve this level of savvy, I sought out even more specific data, turning to a new set of twenty women leaders in the top echelons of their fields. I had the pleasure of sitting down with these women in hour-long mentoring sessions, to hear in their own words about the learning, mistakes, observations, and successes they'd experienced with self-advocacy.
I started each interview by defining the term pushback to be certain we had the same foundation of understanding. The word is often used to mean resistance. I explained that I was using it rather more broadly—and more positively. In the context of those interviews and of this book, pushback represents the group of skills that allow us to take a stand, be firm, or advocate on our own behalf. It also encompasses our adeptness at advancing a cause, making a request, and persuading others of the merits of our view. We can use it to go after what we want, and we can use it to defend what is ours and what we need.
We're called on to push back when
Pushback is not always a formal process, as you can see from the previous examples. Sometimes a simple switch in the way we view our role can be action enough to drive a negotiation or debate in a favorable direction. Seeing the other person in a nondeferential and a more equal, peer-to-peer way can also make all the difference in getting the outcomes we want. What's more, pushback is not always about a grand issue or dealt with on a large scale. Each scenario, large or small, requires similar skills. If you're tackling a negative experience with a maître d' or looking to challenge your boss, you'll need a firm voice, you'll want to be ready for a different range of reactions, and you'll have to be crystal clear about your main message. It's important to know where you won't give an inch and where you're open to considering alternatives and options or hearing their side. Ratchet this up to the top level—to Middle East peace negotiations, let's say—and you'll find that our world's leaders have to summon a similar mind-set. Pushback skills, you see, can be called on by anyone, anywhere, in any debate situation.
In my interviews for this book, I asked women questions about preparing for negotiations—navigating and communicating one's way through them. I asked how they physically carried themselves in a tough conversation. I asked about the nuts and bolts of pushback how-to and about the inside dish—the stuff no one tells you about in the corporate world but that you need to know in order to thrive in it. I learned about how to gain self-worth, how to engage in office politics positively, and how engaging allies can drive the outcome of a pushback situation. I also queried the women about how they manage relationships after a tough conversation or when they're called on to hold repeated negotiations with the same person.
What caught my attention most in analyzing my data was the answer to a numerical question. I asked these women leaders, “Assuming a woman's career success equals 100 percent, what percentage is accounted for by her effectiveness in negotiating and pushing back?” Of the twenty responses I heard, the answer was compelling. The executives I met with felt, on average, that a full 60 percent of a woman's career success hinges on her pushback skills. One interviewee said, “Pushback and being firm is a large part of your career. You have to operate like you're a shareholder and like you own the company.” Although technical skills, academic or business pedigree, and people skills are necessities for those who want to lead, command of your own voice and ability to advocate, according to successful women executives, ranks higher. You can assess for yourself how important pushback is in your particular industry and work environment, but the longer you spend in the corporate world, the more you'll find that 60 percent figure to be rather convincing.
After interviewing more than fifty women executives in writing my columns and books, instead of seeing negotiating and other pushback skills as one part of women owning their power at work, I've come to see it as the most important tool at women's disposal. What's more, it's a tool that the top women leaders I interviewed developed through practice. By committing to the art of asserting themselves and taking risks, these successful women became skilled at learning to negotiate, advocate, stand firm, and push back. And so can you. This book will show you how.
How is it that so many women survive professionally without asking for what they want? Negotiation, after all, can make the difference between getting by and flourishing. In their research, Linda Babcock and Sara Laschever made an interesting discovery: women often experience negotiating passively—something that is being done to them—whereas men see themselves as an active participant in a strategic pursuit. As part of their research, they asked women and men to pick metaphors that they associate with the practice of negotiating. Women most often selected “going to the dentist,” and men more often chose “a ballgame” or “a wrestling match.”5 This finding demonstrates, in a painfully clear way, that women not only think of negotiating as a passive experience, but also as uncomfortable as getting a cavity fixed.
Women hesitate to negotiate and push back for many reasons. Chief among them, I would argue, is a relentless—and often subconscious—belief that relationship should trump outcome or agenda. For example, let's say that Janelle, a twenty-eight-year-old junior account manager, is passed over to lead an important new project at work. She is inclined to protest or try to change her boss's mind but doubts quickly start to creep in. How might pushing back change the existing relationship between her and her boss? “What if I'm laughed at, belittled, challenged, or disregarded?” she wonders. The damage, it seems to Janelle, could be irreparable, and is thus not worth the risk.
A second common reason why women shy away from self-advocacy is a paralyzing need for perfect conditions. We are often plagued by misgivings that emanate from the seductively simple questions, “What if I'm wrong?” or “What if I'm not ready?” Both men and women face uncertainty and doubts, to be sure, but men tend to handle this predicament differently than women do. Research shows that in self-assessments, men tend to overestimate their abilities and women commonly underestimate theirs. Take for example a study conducted internally by Hewlett-Packard. The IT giant noticed that women incumbents were applying for internal job openings much less frequently than their male counterparts. Leaders commissioned a study to learn more, and what they found was revealing. Although men noted that they would respond to a job posting if they met 60 percent of the requirements, women would only apply for open jobs if they thought they met 100 percent of the criteria listed. Similarly, banking company Lloyds TSB found that although female employees were 8 percent more likely than men to meet or exceed performance expectations, they tended not to apply for promotions.6 Often we women feel we have to achieve perfection, that we need all of the answers—along with guaranteed outcomes—in order to take a risk (even though risk involves taking action without total certainty).
Raising our hands then, either as participants or as resisters, can feel like an impossibly loaded affair. If we must seamlessly maintain our relationships while getting every fact and figure exactly right—if we are insistent on “victory or bust”—no wonder we don't want to ask for what we want!
Pushing past our discomfort with advocacy, risk, and negotiating, however, is critical for our success. Negotiations are among the most materially significant dealings we have in our personal lives, and they are particularly important at work. What other conversations create value, drive growth, or increase monetary profit at the same rate? When we hesitate to ask for what we want, it substantially hurts our earning potential, our access to plum work assignments, and our opportunities for promotions. From a broader perspective, not asking for what we want limits our input in decisions that affect us, making our voice a barely audible whisper. Not asking encourages us to accept what is, to consent to that with which we disagree, and to leave a world of opportunity unclaimed.
Take Fatima, a thirty-seven-year-old accountant, who had to decide whether or not she wanted to take a particular job. Fatima was being courted by a local firm with a good reputation. She liked the people she'd interviewed with, her commute to work would be shortened by taking this job, and she felt comfortable and at ease in the work culture the company fostered. The job seemed a clear improvement over her last position, and promised to come with a talented swath of colleagues and a boss who was hands-off. There was only one issue: she wouldn't get paid quite as much as she was making at her current job.
Although she was bothered by her current fate of being perpetually strapped financially, Fatima nonetheless accepted the job. Six months later, she put her finger on an uncomfortable thought. She felt a perceptible resentment toward herself and the company. She was working hard, delivering what she was supposed to, and yet she complained, “I feel like I'm being taken. I'm giving a lot, but not getting much in return when it comes to money.” She griped at home—and to anyone else who'd listen—about how she wasn't being paid fairly.
You can imagine Fatima's bitterness when, while having lunch with Rachel, a newly hired accountant, she excitedly told Fatima she was able to negotiate a much more favorable salary than the last job she'd held. Incredulous, Fatima demanded, “How did you do it?!”
“I just asked for it,” said Rachel breezily.
Fatima paid too much for not pushing back on her salary offer. Not only did she acquiesce to continuing to live with money worries, her resentment negatively affected her relationship with her new employer from day one and gave her unneeded mental stress. The funny thing about asking is that when we get used to living without doing it, any semblance of negotiating becomes as uncomfortable as, say, wearing burlap undergarments. We funnel our discomfort into unproductive and unsatisfying channels: we grumble about our problem to everyone except the person who can do something about it. We lambast ourselves for not having the nerve to protest. We are disgusted at how far we'll go to avoid a confrontation altogether. And we may think back disappointedly to a time when we caved, capitulating way too easily with a smile and a “yes,” when what we really wanted to say was “no” (I've certainly had this experience).
Deciding whether or not to negotiate or advocate is part of something larger—our conditioning. Animal trainers know a thing or two about the effects of habituation. Elephant trainers, for example, tie baby elephants to poles, and the babies can't get loose no matter how they resist and tug. As the elephants grow and develop to massive proportions and great power, however, they don't realize that they can easily free themselves. So as full-grown adults, they don't even bother trying to escape. Similarly, our assessment of our own power, whether right or wrong, drives the action we're willing to take.
Many of us might recall a pushback situation in which we didn't feel the slightest bit powerful. We then attach that feeling to a sense of what we deserve and who we are in the long term. So we don't ask for what we want, and we never get to challenge our deep-seated thoughts of inadequacy, which means we never get to prove them wrong! And so the cycle continues. At the same time, the effect of experience can work in quite an opposite way. By taking action and practicing the thing we're afraid of, we can give ourselves wins that show us we have power and can use it, leading to a virtuous cycle.
Ironically, as uncomfortable as the thought of asking for what we want is, living without negotiating—without insisting on mutually positive terms—is much tougher than advocating your case. Another irony is that our relationships are actually strengthened when we let the other person know what we want and where we stand. Everything from the conditions of our work, to the projects we take on, to the deadlines to which we agree, is negotiable. Our career prospects can be greatly accelerated when we advocate for what we want and, by the same principle, can be heavily weighed down and stalled by inaction. If you're trying to navigate from point A to point B, wouldn't you prefer a high-powered, state-of-the-art propeller boat as opposed to an oarless rowboat? Indeed, between pushing back and not pushing back, there's no contest.
7