Negotiate what you deserve as an architect!

Do you know the parable of the orange? It tells the story of two people who were shopping in a supermarket. They arrived at the grocery section at the same time, only to discover that there was only one orange left on the shelf. They argue for a few minutes over who was the person to see it first. Since they can’t reach an agreement, they decide to cut the orange in half for a ‘fair’ distribution.

But what did really happen that day? One person just wanted to make marmalade from the rind, so he throws the fruit away and keeps the outer skin. The other wanted to press juice so he makes orange juice from the fruit, while obviously throwing the rind away.

Mind-blowing, right? If only they had taken the time to negotiate, and understand what each of them wanted to do with the orange, the results would have been twice better!

The first time I heard this symbolic story, it was in the introduction of an audiobook called ‘The Art of Negotiating the Best Deal’. That’s when I knew it was going to be a good book.

All my life, I hated negotiations because I always felt that there was going to be a ‘winner’, and a ‘loser’.
Negotiating my salary as an architect for instance? Obviously, the boss will ‘win’ with his arguments, his superior position, and I will end up getting whatever he/she really wants to pay.

Did you ever feel that way too? Well, this book made me realize that we are not as powerless as we think we are. Worst case scenario: let’s suppose that the boss agreed to pay X salary amount, and not a single penny more. Do you think that you’ve played all your cards? Wrong.

You can still negotiate the commute fees to be covered, the amount of hours that you’re willing to work, the social security enrollment, the flexibility to work from home when needed, the number of vacation days allowed, a permission to work on the side for your personal architecture projects, a permission of including the projects you contributed to in your personal portfolio (crediting the firm of course), a letter of recommendation prepared personally for you, and so many variants other than the salary.

Do you realize now all the possibilities?
The key here is to negotiate interests not fixed positions.
An example of fixed positions would be the boss wanting to pay X dollars as a salary, and you wanting Y dollars. There’s no room to manoeuver here, and you both lose.

In contrast, you may accept to work for X salary if you are allowed to work on the side for your own architecture projects, as it would be a big advantage to you. As for the boss, maybe he/she has budget restrictions for the salary but doesn’t mind at all giving you more time and work flexibility. Now, that’s what we would call a win-win! Just like the parable of the orange should have ended!

Amazing, right? And that’s only scratching the surface here. In my opinion, the real deal inside this audiobook is a ready step-by-step formula to prepare for negotiations. I’ve used it several times already to know what to say/do in advance! Let me know in the comments if you’d like me to summarize that part of the book in another blog post while giving you examples from our architecture life.

Meanwhile, if you’re interested, you can find the full audiobook here. It may not be addressed to architects particularly, but if you want to get more in career and life, the real stories narrated inside will give you a practical and actionable approach.

And by the way, if you’re wondering what are audiobooks all about, here’s some information for you: Audible is an Amazon company that provides audiobooks. What this means is that, instead of reading physical or digital books, you can listen to them through an app on your phone. As simple as that.

My friend told me about it around 4 years ago. I was nagging that I had to drive to work two hours daily back and forth. And well, I have to confess that Audible made the traffic surprisingly enjoyable.

Pro tip: if you don’t want to buy the audiobook now, you can sign-up on Audible for a free one-month membership trial and you will get it for free! Through this link.
Even if you cancel your membership before the month is up, the audiobook will always be yours.

And voilà! We hope that this article has woken up the little negotiator inside of you. And don’t forget to let us know on Instagram, or Facebook, or down below in the comments if you’d like a blog post - part two to help you excel in negotiations.