We hear a lot about the benefits of telling the truth in negotiations. But some negotiators find themselves struggling with the question of how trusting to be. Is there a benefit to mistrust in negotiation? Should you always assume your counterpart is telling the truth?
In negotiation, our outcomes depend in large part on our ability to persuade and bond with our counterparts. It may come as no surprise, then, that interpersonal factors such as trust, liking, and rapport are associated with more favorable outcomes, particularly when parties have the potential to create new sources of value. Building trust and a positive relationship with the other side often improves information sharing, which is arguably the most effective means of securing mutually beneficial settlements.
However, there is a downside to experiencing trust in negotiation: A sense of trust leads us to accept information at face value. Feelings of mistrust in negotiation, by contrast, alert us to consider how reality might differ from what meets the eye.
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Are there benefits in dealmaking even when we have doubts about the amount of truth in negotiations?
In the context of decision making, research by Ruth Mayo and Dana Alfasi (of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem), and Norbert Schwarz (of the University of Southern California at Los Angeles) found that distrust shifts individuals’ reasoning strategies. In one study, they found that participants who were naturally less trusting than others were more likely to select evidence that they expected to be contrary to their assumptions—a strategy known as negative hypothesis testing—as compared with participants who were naturally more trusting. In another study, some participants were made to feel distrust toward others by looking at a distrust-eliciting face (such as a picture of someone with narrowed eyes). These participants were three times as likely as participants exposed to a trust-eliciting face (a picture of someone with wide-open eyes, etc.) to engage in negative hypothesis testing.
In one study examining the what happens when participants have doubts that the other party is telling the truth in negotiations, researchers found a greater integrative (value-creating) bargaining potential. Researchers collected data on pairs of college students who negotiated a hypothetical dispute between a carpentry contractor and a condominium developer. In half of the pairs, they made one side experience distrust before the negotiation. In the other half of the pairs, they made one party experience trust.
They found that pairs in the distrust condition were more likely to test their assumptions about the other side—such as their constraints, willingness to pay, and likely moves—by asking many more questions of the other party. As a result, the distrusting negotiators walked away with a much more accurate picture of the other side’s interests and demands. Somewhat paradoxically, a level of distrust helped negotiators discuss issues more thoroughly and reach more integrative agreements as compared with pairs where one party was instilled with feelings of trust before negotiating.
Trust is a critical ingredient in negotiation. But too much trust may lead us to make assumptions about the level of truth in negotiations, which in turn can limit the success of our deals.
What do you think? Should you be trusting in negotiation? Or are there hidden benefits of mistrust in negotiation?
I’ve never been in a negotiation where there was an absolute level of trust between the parties. To some extent, a level of mistrust makes a negotiator more prudent. I think in some cases we can safely say that it’s not necessarily that someone mistrusts their counterpart, but that they are more prudent in trying to understand the information presented and the interests of their counterpart. To take someone at face value in a negotiation without considering anything else would be unwise and could lead to feelings of a win-lose situation when/if the trust at face value is not reciprocated.