Five Tips for Leveraging Time

When I worked in the parts department of an automobile dealership many years ago, one of the sales guys from the showroom let on to me that the easiest customers were those who came in during the day. That’s because, he explained, he would have the rest of the day to work with them and get a good price. The ones he didn’t like were those who came in at night, especially near closing time. Those customers, he confessed, were at an advantage because he’d be quicker to cut a deal in order to get home.

Imagine the extra leverage car buyers would have if they all knew this.

Time pressure is one of your best points for leverage if you are negotiating from a weaker position and your counterpart has an obvious deadline. Your advantage increases as the deadline approaches. Time can be your best negotiating partner if you've got more of it than they do. So here are five tips for leveraging time to your advantage in negotiations:

1. If you know your counterpart has a deadline, don’t let on that you know. Disclosing this knowledge may warn your counterpart that you may use the deadline to your advantage and push for last minute concessions.

2. Be an active participant in the negotiation right up to the end. Although you are leveraging time to your advantage, you do not want to appear as if you are deliberately dragging things out.

3. As the deadline approaches, get your counterpart to make a final offer. Then refuse it and make a counter-offer that is more beneficial to you. Differences between offers at this point should not be extreme, however, unless your counterpart's final offer is unreasonable.

4. If your counterpart refuses your counter-offer, wait for them to make the next move. You are under less pressure to change your offer than they are. If your offer is not unreasonable, they will either concede or make another offer.

And finally…

5. Leverage time skillfully, not forcefully. Get your best deal without squeezing loads of last minute concessions at the deadline. You may be doing business with your counterpart another time in the future, and your collaborative approach will be better received.