“Don’t solution before discovery” & other workplace negotiation strategies
Giving feedback, peer relationships, managing people, postmortems, and premortems.
This week on the Gentle Power Podcast, we cover the uncomfortable negotiations that start after you’re hired: resetting expectations with a peer, giving a co-worker constructive feedback, telling a direct report they’re underperforming.
Our guest is Amanda Gustafson, who coaches leaders through these kinds of conversations. She took a winding path to get here, from a physics degree to running a theater in Troy, Michigan at 23, to a master’s in psychology, to a stint as a dean of faculty at a media arts school, to software consulting.
She also found us the way a lot of our favorite guests do, by cold emailing after following this newsletter for a while. We read all our emails (eventually), so feel free to email us!
Amanda’s main lesson is to treat a tough conversation like a collaborative project. Describe what actually happened instead of labeling the person, get curious before you jump in to fix, and build feedback loops that keep the problem from coming back. Below are some of our top takeaways from the conversation.
Full episode here: YouTube | Spotify | Apple
1. Describe the behavior, not the person
When someone lets us down, we can be quick to jump to conclusions that define who they are. Maybe they missed an important deadline, they bombed a team presentation, they didn’t pull their own weight. Amanda’s training in psychology taught her to refrain from concluding that this is representative of who they are, and instead describe what actually happened.
For example, rather than “I was lazy this morning,” she would say: “I got up this morning and I had a to-do list and I drank coffee and scrolled through videos instead.” Just the plain sequence of what happened, with no indictment of character.
In the workplace, Amanda’s recommendation is to stay close to the actual events that happened: we agreed on noon, this is what each of us did, what got in the way? What were the assumptions going in? Facts, agreements, assumptions, and outcomes are something the two of you can actually work with. A verdict on their character will just put them on defense.
2. Don’t “solution before discovery”
Amanda’s mantra is “don’t solution before discovery.” Figure out what’s actually going on before you jump to the fix.
Gerta experienced this when hiring a video editor. The editor had quoted five clips per episode at his usual rate, and the path of least resistance would have been to just offer a bit more money for a few more clips.
Instead, Gerta asked him to use some of the paid time to walk her through his workflow. Turns out he was rebuilding work by hand: we mark our cuts and clip picks inside our video editing software, and he was redoing all of it in a separate platform, matching timestamps one by one. Once we cleaned up that handoff, the same rate got us ten clips, sometimes twenty, instead of five.
We advise something similar for job offer negotiations. When a client asks us “what should I negotiate first?”, the answer usually isn’t a number yet. The first moves are information gathering: how much room is there on base, on equity, on the elements of the comp package they haven’t mentioned, how urgently do they need to fill the role. Before you make an actual move, ask questions throughout the interview process to figure out the company’s preferences and constraints.
3. Build a feedback loop
Most hard conversations end with relief. People get to the finish line, think “thank goodness, nobody died,” shake hands on “we’ll do better next time,” and move on. Nothing actually changes.
Instead, borrow from the world of software development. “You would never ship a product without testing it,” Amanda said, so why end a performance conversation without one? Before you wrap, agree on the test: what does better look like specifically, and how will you both know the loop closed?
4. Bring it up before it grows
A big reason people dodge tough conversations is fear of the other person getting defensive. Amanda’s approach is framing plus timing. She opens by calling out why the conversation matters and what she’s after, so the other person hears “improvement” before they hear “problem.”
We (Gerta and Alex) run a version of this at home we call “turtles”. Any small annoyance either of us notices gets raised while it’s still a small harmless turtle, before it turns into a big ninja turtle. The longer a thing sits unsaid, the more it grows and bleeds into everything else.
Relevant meme we saw that made us laugh: “If I get a ‘we need to talk’ text, I need to know what it is now or I’m gonna throw up immediately.”
5. Amanda’s hot take: make the gap between value and price huge
We ask every podcast guest: “What’s your hot take on power or negotiations?” Amanda said, “The greater the difference in the right direction between the perceived value of what you’re offering and the price, the easier it is for people to say yes.” She aims for clients to walk away confident they will get at least a 10x return on working with her.
To get there, she starts with discovery. Her first question on the intro call is why the person booked it, and soon after: “how much is this costing you?” Once the pain has a number attached, the value of solving it is obvious, and her price looks small next to it.
This is how we coach candidates too. Companies rarely open at the top of their budget, because they haven’t been sold on your value yet. Make that value clear well before anyone says a number.
6. A negotiation from her own kitchen
We always ask guests to walk us through a real negotiation. Amanda’s was close to home (literally): she had been working on a weekend house project with her partner, which she followed up with an actual postmortem.
While they were working, he had taken the tools out of her hands and taken over the work. As she had learned in her master’s in psychology, she skipped the labels and described the behavior: “you actually took the tools out of my hand and started doing stuff.” He was surprised but heard it, recognized it himself, and said he would not do that again. She had opened by naming what she cared about, that working on the house together is part of her family culture and she wanted them to get better at it, which is what let him respond as a partner rather than getting defensive.
The mechanics were the same ones she uses with the leaders she coaches. Describe what happened and frame it around a shared goal. The same mechanics that lead to a smooth conversation with a direct report will smooth the conversations with the person you live with.
There was a clear theme across everything that Amanda shared, from the workplace to home. A hard conversation goes better when you treat it like a project you’re both working on, describe what happened without the labels, and build in feedback loops to track improvement.
Give the full episode a listen here: YouTube | Spotify | Apple
Connect with Amanda Gustafson: https://www.amandagustafson.com
Warmly,
Gerta & Alex
Founders, YourNegotiations.com
P.S. Are you job searching or have upcoming negotiations?
If you have an offer coming or are mid-process, we’re always happy to help you think through how to approach it. Book a free call here: https://calendly.com/alexhapki/call
P.P.S. Know someone interested in negotiations?
Send them our way and we’ll thank you with $250 for each person who becomes a client. No cap.
A quick intro or an email to alex@yournegotiations.com works.
