Chef (2014) Open Road Films, Fairview Entertainment & Aldamisa Entertainment
Christmas is fast approaching and as my mind turns to where I will be spending it, inevitably I start eyeing up various pieces of tech, clothing, accessories and homewares that I have my eye on both to give and receive. As I move around the stores (party food, yay!) mindful not to send the delicate glass Frida Kahlo baubles crashing to the shop floor, I also start to think about the Christmas menu from breakfast to supper.
I started this list over the weekend to take my mind off a couple of book to film negotiations playing on my mind. In fact, it had the opposite effect as it occurred to me that the art of negotiation is not unlike food shopping.
Bear with me.
If you think about it, as you pour over the latest juicy recipe by Nigella, Nigel or your favourite go-to chef, you make a note of the ingredients, seasoning and garnish.
In negotiation terms I would describe these respectively as “essential”, “preferential, depending on your palate” and “frou frou flourish”.
Everyone has a negotiation style and I like to think on a good day mine is straight talking and firm but also friendly, justifiable and solution-based. If I can’t justify something, I won’t push it which means breaking the news to your clients and taking the time to explain to them why in the context of the overall deal, this point sits somewhere between seasoning and garnish (as ingredients ought always be identified and communicated when the dish was first contemplated).
The best negotiations I find, are when your opposite number shops in the same food store as you and you occasionally bump trolleys as you trade up and down the aisles. Things become tricky when you encounter someone on the other side of the table who plays a game of chicken at the other end of the aisle and you both spy that last remaining bottle of truffle olive oil (a current obsession with everything and remarkably few outlets offering it).
Dealing with someone that views every item on their shopping list as an ingredient from the outset or swaps seasoning and garnish to an ingredient mid-way through a negotiation, is tricky, unless you think you can achieve the same dish with alternatives.
“But, why should I?” you wail, with the faint thud of a foot stamp.
This is a good question to ask and to answer it fully is a two-step process. First, you have to look at the intention behind your opposite number’s assertion: is this truly a fundamental item to the dish or is it simply the way that they have always made it? Just because their previous guests loved the meal prepared a certain way, does the seasoning suit your taste and isn’t that garnish a little de trop?
You also have to ask and answer that question yourself. Particularly if you’ve not communicated your ingredient in advance to the other side.
When you reach an impasse, especially where a demand is driven by stubbornness or familiarity, I find it helpful to remind myself (as demandor and demandee) why the dialogue started in the first place. Genuine collaboration emerges from a common aim to bring two or more parties’ expertise together to create a new opportunity. Ideally, that opportunity is not like any other offering out there, or if it is, the parties desire to either improve it or take it to a fresh and exciting place together.
Negotiation sets the tone of parties’ relationship to each other: the chef de partie to the main event. It identifies the skills and plays a role in delivering the dish to the pass, but it is not the main event nor should it overpower it.