Let Luke Skywalker Teach You Something ... - Business Negotiation

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In George Lucas second Star Wars movie - The Empire Strikes Back - there is a classic scene where Luke Skywalker is taking Jedi lessons from master Yoda. Luke is standing on his hands, with Yoda sitting on his feet. Yoda tells him to lift up his X-Wing Fighter using only his mind. Luke protests, saying that it is impossible, but then tries. For a few dramatic seconds, the ship is moving but then sinks back into the swamp again. A few moments later, Yoda - using only the Force - lifts the ship and puts it on steady ground, enabling Luke to leave the planet and save his friends.
 
Lesson taught: Luke failed because he thought the task was impossible. He failed because he had the wrong attitude.
 
As an advisor to job seekers wanting to know how to negotiate the salary, I cannot claim to be a master Yoda. I do, however, meet the same challenge quite often.

Again and again I get in particular one type of questions where the questions as such are maybe more important than the answers to them. These are questions like: What can I hope for in the salary negotiation if I am unemployed? How far can I push it if I don't have a job, when will the employer kick me out from the negotiation? And so on.
 
To these people, I always answer the same thing: You are asking the wrong questions! By asking such questions, the employer has already won the salary negotiation, even before it has started. Or, referring to Luke and Yoda, you'll never be able to lift your X-Wing Fighter with an attitude like that!
 
The reaction to my answer is most often frustration or even irritation. This is understandable from a psychological point of view. Once you get stuck in negative thought it feels best to stick with them. A change of attitude causes anxiety.
 
A change of attitude is, however, completely necessary in these cases. Being unemployed is one fact to take into consideration when estimating one's leverage and bargaining position in a salary negotiation. Not the fact. If the unemployed job seeker takes this step from "the fact" to "one fact", s/he have started a change from a losing to a winning attitude. The winning attitude is a necessary condition for success when negotiating the salary. It was when Luke Skywalker adopted a winning attitude that he could defeat the emperor and save his father.

David Hill is a business lawyer and professional negotiator. He provides employees and job seekers with professional advice on how to negotiate a salary on http://www.negotiateasalary.com. Visit his website or his blog if want to optimize your chances of getting a high salary and, for example, learn the negotiation strategies David Hill himself used to get a ,000 raise.

Source: http://business-negotiation.blogspot.com/2012/08/let-luke-skywalker-teach-you-something.html

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