Ji Eun (Jamie) Lee

Professional Speaker & Negotiation Trainer

Category: Negotiation Anxiety

Avoid the 3A Trap 😬😔😡

Speaking at Baystate Health Women's Empowerment Summit

Yours Truly Speaking at Baystate Health Women’s Empowerment Summit

Every time I talk about negotiation, I encounter the 3A trap.
What I mean is, someone in the audience invariably describes the 3A Trap — as defined by William Ury in The Power of Positive No — as her experience of negotiating in the workplace.

The 3A’s stand for:

Accommodate: You give in.

You say yes when you don’t want to. You take on the extra workload, but without the recognition or reward. You don’t speak up to address your needs, because you’re afraid of upsetting your boss, your partner, or your colleagues. You accommodate out of fear of losing the validation and approval of others. This is a trap I personally have a lot of experience with.

It’s the path of least resistance when you want to make sure they still like you, even when you hate yourself for having undervalued yourself.

Avoid: You put up walls.

You avoid having the awkward and difficult conversation altogether. It upsets me when other people do this to me. For example, have you ever had an important discussion postponed, only to be postponed again…and again? “Yeah, sure, we can talk about compensation next quarter / next review cycle / next year.” (Might as well be next lifetime!) Or have you ever sat in icy cold silence at the table after a topic of contention was mentioned, only to be ignored?

It can be as convenient to avoid as it is to accommodate. Why brave a difficult conversation, when you can easily hide behind a wall?

Attack: You lash out.

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Should You Negotiate for the Sake of Negotiating?

Columbia
Earlier this week, I had the delightful privilege of leading Negotiation Prowess workshop for women grad students at Columbia University.

It was fun, and I dare say a success!

The individual questions from attendees were specific and challenging, and I’ve been mulling on them ever since.

Which made me see that there were two key recurring themes. Allow me to explain…

1. Should you negotiate for the sake of negotiating?

No and yes.

Let’s start with no. Don’t negotiate for the sake of negotiating. Don’t negotiate because I told you to. Don’t negotiate because your friends or parents tell you to.

Which might sound bonkers to you, especially if you’ve heard me talk or have been reading this newsletter where I stress how YOU SHOULD ASK FOR MORE.

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How to Negotiate like a Hostage Negotiator

How could you do this to me?

I slammed the door shut.

NO! I’m not coming out of this room!

I was sixteen years old, holding myself hostage in the bedroom, wailing and crying.

Mom brought her boyfriend home, unannounced, late at night, when I wasn’t ready to accept any of that.

It was a tough year. My parents separated. Mom, sisters and I moved to a new place. I had no friends, no money, no car. I felt powerless, trapped and hurt.

The wounds were still too raw.

So I resorted to stonewalling, barricading myself behind a locked door, wailing loud enough for my outrage to be heard.

GO AWAY!

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Q&A: I’ve never negotiated for myself. How do I even begin with a recruiter?

keep-calm-and-cultivate-options

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Q&A: How does getting a raise benefit my employer?

May you be a rising star in 2015

May you be a rising star in 2015!

Photo by the talented Melissa Maples

Hi Jamie,

Thanks for publishing Negotiating at Work webinar on The Muse. I’m not sure if it’s appropriate for me to say that a raise would make me happier and want to work even harder. How can my getting a raise make the company tangibly better, given it takes money from the company?

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Steal This Negotiation Role-Play Exercise for Your Own Benefit

Lining up for negotiation role play at Bullish Conference in Miami

Lining up for negotiation role play at Bullish Conference in Miami

Nothing speaks louder than action. So take some time during this season of frenzied feasting and shopping to plan and practice your big scary ask. Take action on building your negotiation prowess. Your future self will thank you.

The role-play is designed to be applicable to a wide range of situations, so you can use it regardless of whether you’re asking for a raise at work or negotiating a saner holiday plan with your loved ones.

Maybe you’re wondering, should you even bother practicing through role-play?

Totally up to you.

But does it work?

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Winter Ambition: Reading List for Ballsy People

Fall is here, meaning winter is just around the corner. Which kills me, every year. The cold weather and shorter days trigger a response in my body that turns me into a stiff, chronically fatigued and antisocial grouch. I hate it. Every winter I battle the impulse to give in and stay in, bundle myself in defeat and down, eat an endless supply of sweet pastries and mope like sorry old Rudolph before that fateful foggy Christmas Eve.

Winter sucks, but it doesn’t have to drain your ambition, focus and drive. We can overcome.

For the ballsy people reading this, I have some book recommendations to help you overcome your inner winter mope. I read them this summer, and they helped me lift out of anxiety and depression, become more present and grateful, and improve my negotiating skills.

The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee by Sarah Silverman

bedwetter

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What if you accepted the first offer without negotiating?

How does abundance look like, for you? Photo by Melissa Maples.

What does abundance look like for you? Photo by Melissa Maples.

What if you accepted the first offer for a new job without even blinking an eye at the lower-than-market salary figure. Worse yet, what if you didn’t even know you lowballed yourself? I’ve made this costly mistake a few times early in my career.

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Confronting life

First.

I’m stealing from a monk.

I read this New Yorker profile on Ittetsu Nemoto, a Zen Buddhist monk who works with suicidal people in Japan. He is a life coach, in the ultimate and literal sense. His workshops are near-life experiences for those who want to die.

I read the article twice, second time underlining segments that really moved and resonated with me. I underlined and circled this:

Nemoto believes in confronting death; he believes in cultivating a concentrated awareness of the functioning and fragility of the body; and he believes in suffering, because it shows you who you really are.

He believes that suffering produces insight.

He also believes that helping people should be like eating, something you just do every day: routine, essential, and beneficial.

He helps people confront the fear of living.

Fear is a great motivator. When we’re afraid of losing something, we work hard to keep it. A job, a relationship, an apartment, a precious stone. Sometimes fear motivates us to act.

But sometimes fear holds us back. It keeps us from speaking up, being bold, going for the things we want. This is the fear I want to see people overcome.

The message is simple. Don’t be afraid.

Sometimes the fear in our heads is an echo of an irrelevant past. I want to help people focus, get past the fear, and act for the present and beyond.

Second.

I’m learning more and more that it’s not about money. Yes, I’m talking about negotiation. It’s about value. If you are good at what you do, the tremendous value you bring to the table will speak for itself.

I live in an expensive city with chaotic streets full of busy people. When you live here, it’s easy to confuse money with value and success.

I believe you have to dig deeper to understand each person’s success. Just as everyone has their own journeys and frustrations, they have their unique definitions of success.

The freedom I relish is extremely valuable to me. It affords me the opportunity to be a student again and to aspire for a different kind of success.

And today I am blessed by the abundance of ideas, of words, and of confessions.

Third

I was wrong.

I thought this stump of a formerly thriving money tree was dead. Last winter, it had grown too big for our bedroom, so C chopped it down to its trunks.

Two weeks ago, I noticed it was sprouting green leaves.

This was taken last weekend.

This was taken last weekend.

To be honest, seeing this kinda spooked me. It’s like the living dead, a zombie. Blind to its shortcomings, unstoppable in its quest for water and light.

But I had to respect its incredible will to live. So we started watering it again.

This was taken this morning.

This was taken this morning.

Flourishing and thriving, on its path back to gloriously beautiful.

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