The following article is based on Ms. Allison's presentationat the ASCnet Conference, which was held in October in Nashville,Tenn.

RAISE YOUR HAND if you've been trained in the art ofnegotiation. It's not a skill taught in school. You learn it in thereal world. Have you ever bought a car? A house? If you've everhaggled over the price of anything, then you've negotiated. We doit all the time even though many of us haven't been shown how.

Our jobs as insurance agents require that we negotiate,especially with underwriters. Negotiate well, and we securecoverage for our clients and capital for our carriers. Negotiatepoorly and you could lose time, money and customers. The art ofnegotiation is a critical skill, to be used not only with yourunderwriters, but on a regular basis with others.

Before you broker any deal, identify and understand yournegotiating personality and that of the person with whom you'llnegotiate. I call one the “director's” type. Directors make amazingleaders because they're go-getters and goal-oriented. Innegotiations, a director's chief concern is the bottom line.Directors' steadfastness can be frustrating to someone trying tostrike a compromise, since they are often slow to deviate fromtheir original plans.

Next, there's the “processor” type. Processors crave precision.They like order, logic, facts and statistics. They love details. Inthe workplace, a processor's attention to detail can be an asset–afailsafe against potentially embarrassing and costly errors. In anegotiation, however, other personalities may regard this obsessionwith minutiae as a barrier to progress.

Another type consists of “communicators.” They're thepeacekeepers. Communicators become emotionally invested innegotiations and strive to accommodate all parties involved.They're honest, loyal and reliable, unless you cross them. Deceivea communicator during a negotiation, and you may never regain hisor her trust. Have a communicator on your team, and he or she maysacrifice your company's objectives to appease the opposingside.

Finally, there are the interactors. They are the cheerleaders ofthe group. They spur on negotiations with their energy andoptimism. “Don't worry about the details. We can do that, noproblem!,” they rave. Interactors are creative. Duringnegotiations, they'll invent solutions to seemingly insurmountableproblems. But be- ware: An interactor's bright idea may come as asurprise to fellow teammates, who didn't know about or agree to thenew terms.

In negotiations, as in life, some personalities mesh better thanothers. Every personality has an opposite personality, one withcontrary traits. A person with your opposing personality is usuallyyour complementary match in marriage, and your nemesis innegotiation. Communicators will belabor a negotiation until allparties are satisfied, while directors want negotiations to end asquickly as possible. Processors delight in the details, the verything their opposite personality, the interactor, despises.
So what do you do when your boss is a director and you are acommunicator, or when you are an interactor and your underwriter isa processor? Throw up your hands? Run away screaming? No! Youadjust your negotiation style.

There are techniques for working with any personality. Withdirectors, be succinct. Remember, they despise fluff. Interactorsneed structure. Give them deadlines and an agenda. If you arediscussing a policy with an interactor underwriter, for example,create an agenda that lists the three or four areas of the policythat you'd like to examine. Discourage deviations from the plan. Doyour homework when working with a processor. Most underwriters areprocessors. Get the facts and details on the risk or property fromyour client before meeting with a processor underwriter, andnegotiation will go more smoothly. Most insurance agents, on theother hand, are communicators. We are concerned with taking care ofpeople. When negotiating with a communicator, slow down, be patientand play fair. We like to take our time to make sure we've brokeredthe best deal for our clients, our carriers and ourselves.

Once you've established your negotiating personality and that ofyour negotiating partner, it's time to identify who has the powerin the negotiation and what type of power it is. This is animportant step. We're often intimidated by those we perceive to bemore powerful than ourselves, and intimidation diminishes ourability to negotiate. By identifying who truly has the power in anegotiation, we discover that we usually have more of it than wethought.

A negotiator can wield four types of power: legitimate power,expertise power, information power or situation power. Legitimatepower comes from a title or a position. When you, the agent,negotiate with an underwriter, who do you believe has thelegitimate power, you or them? You do. Agents often mistakenlybelieve that the underwriter, by virtue of his or her title, is incharge of a policy negotiation. Underwriters have the power toreject a risk, yes, but remember, they want your business. Theunderwriter would rather make a sale than exercise this vetopower.

“Knowledge is power,” the father of modern science, FrancisBacon, once said. And it is–information power. The underwriter mayknow more about a policy than the agent, but the agent knows moreabout the client and the risk. Don't withhold information thatcould lead to a compromise, but don't divulge so much informationthat you give your information power away. Do your research andshare your findings judiciously to increase your influence over thenegotiation.

Closely related to information power is expertise power.Expertise power is largely a matter of perception. To haveexpertise power, it's not so important that you know more than yournegotiating adversary, but that you appear to know more. Experienceprovides expertise power, but so does confidence in your abilities.Be confident that you can negotiate a compromise and you probablywill.
Situation power lies with the person who makes the decisions. Whohas the most situation power depends on the circumstances. Believeit or not, in most insurance scenarios, the agent has the mostsituation power. You would think the power lies with the customer,who may decide not to purchase a policy, or worse, cancel anexisting one. But wait. The customer is also your client–a clientwho defers to your opinion when it comes to insurance. So inreality, you, the agent, have the situation power.

Let's recap: Who has the legitimate power? You do. Who has theinformation power? You do. Who has the situation power? You do. Whohas the expertise power? You can claim that too. Now let's makethis power work to your advantage.

With your reconnaissance and strategizing complete, you areready to negotiate. Too often, we think of negotiating as a tennismatch. The agent serves a proposal. The underwriter returns with arejection. The agent volleys back with a new consideration. Theunderwriter bankhands another refusal. Back and forth, back andforth, until the underwriter fires off an overhead smash that theagent just can't counter. Game. Set. Match. You lose.

Savvy players know, however, that a successful negotiation isn'ta tennis match, but rather a three-step process. Step one:Establish your conditions. Determine what you want out of thenegotiation, as well as what your opponent wants. To do this you'llneed your secret weapons–”why” and “what else.”

Let's say you have a client who wants to insure a cabin with awood-burning stove. You present the risk to your underwriter, whoresponds, “No, our reinsurer won't allow that.” Here's when youbrandish your first weapon and ask, “Why won't your reinsurer allowthat?” Your underwriter will answer. This is when you unsheatheyour second weapon: “What else could we do with this policy for itto be acceptable to your reinsurer?”

By asking “Why?” and “What else?” you pave the way for step two:Gather information. Perhaps the reinsurer considers the stove afire hazard, or maybe a carbon monoxide risk. Would carbon monoxidedetectors mitigate the danger? What if you put a fire extinguisherin every room, or covered the kitchen in fire-resistant paint? Youmay have to return to the client or a wood-burning stove expert tolearn more about the risk, but this minimal effort will maximizeyour chances of getting what you want. Instead of grasping atstraws as you would have in the tennis-match scenario, you will beable to detect your argument's weak spots in your opponent's eyes,and gather information to strengthen these vulnerable areas.

Finally, you've arrived at the fun part. Step three: Hammeringout your compromise. It's time to make the deal. Most peoplebelieve that step three is the negotiation, but we know better. Asuccessful negotiation, one that satisfies both parties and leadsto more amicable business dealings, begins long before the twoparties pin down the details and shake hands.

Step three, however, can be the most daunting–a point of noreturn. You either hit the numbers or lose your shirt in stepthree. To ease you through this sometimes frightening and stressfulstep, keep the following tips in mind. While they apply tonegotiations in general, they easily can be customized tointeractions with underwriters or clients, as well as negotiationscenarios in your private life.

1) When crafting a compromise, don't narrow the discussion downto just one issue. Hinging the negotiation on one issue is likebeing trapped in a burning high rise with a rickety fire escape:There's only one way out, and you don't want it. If you get stuckon the wood-burning stove issue, move on to another. Your chancesof success increase with every option you have.

2) Don't be the first to name a price. If you name a pricefirst, you give away information power. Let your opponent name theprice. This way, you are the one with the superior knowledge.

3) Know your bottom line. You can't get what you want if youdon't know what it is. Having a limit gives you a negotiation goal.Staying true to your limit will keep you from paying too much oraccepting too little. Once you know your fellow negotiator's askingprice, compare this to your bottom line. If the discrepancy is toogreat, go elsewhere. Never accept an offer below your bottomline.

4) Walk away from the first offer. Even the most naivenegotiator knows not to reveal the best deal first.

By following this tip, I was able to buy a Mercedes Benz and aBMW on the same day. My husband and I had come to the used cardealership so he could ogle his dream-mobile, a 1972 Mercedes Benzlike the one Richard Gere drove in “American Gigolo.” While hefawned, I discovered a BMW 735–with my name on it. My husbandcaught me eyeing the BMW and said, “We can't afford two cars today.That's $6,000 over our budget.” “Not in negotiation,” I toldhim.

As we sat down with the car salesman, I said, “We need $3,000off the price of each car to make our budget.” He laughed. Weleft.

But my business card stayed behind. I'd cordially turned downthe first offer and left my card, thereby keeping the negotiationopen should the salesman change his mind.

My husband begged to go back. “Just look at the chrome on thatbaby!” he wailed. “Walk! Don't even look back,” I replied.

We didn't even make it to the highway before the car salesmancalled us. “You would take both cars today?,” he asked. “We'd go tothe bank and get the financing in a couple of hours,” I said. Bothmy husband and I had our dream-mobiles.

Did I take a gamble? Sure. The car salesman could've turned medown, and I would have missed an opportunity. But new opportunitiescome along all the time. Wait for the one that meets yourstandards.

5) Never reveal deadlines. Salespeople can smelldesperation–don't confirm its presence! Appear relaxed andconfident as you make your deal. If possible, do your bargainingwell in advance of deadlines so you can be relaxed and confident asyou make your deal. Without the worry of an impending due dateclouding your mind, you'll think more clearly and make wiserdecisions.

6) Develop rapport. Smile. Chat. Tell a few jokes. In your questfor a contract, don't forget that you are negotiating with aperson. Your negotiation with this person could mean the beginning(or end) of a long and mutually beneficial businessrelationship.

Follow these negotiation strategies and tips I've given you, andyou'll not only make more money through your existing businessrelationships, but also cultivate lucrative new connections.

Elaine Allison is an international speaker and author of “TheVelvet Hammer–PowHERful Leadership Lessons for Women Who Don'tGolf.” At the age of 19, she was one of Canada's first femalecorrectional officers in an all-male prison. Her Web site is www.elaineallison.com.