Start with No

The Negotiating Tools that the Pros Don't Want You to Know

By: Jim Camp

Narrated by: Robert Jordan

Start with No offers a contrarian, counterintuitive system for negotiating any kind of deal in any kind of situation - the purchase of a new house, a multimillion-dollar business deal, or where to take the kids for dinner.

Think a win-win solution is the best way to make the deal? Think again.

For years now, win-win has been the paradigm for business negotiation. But today, win-win is just the seductive mantra used by the toughest negotiators to get the other side to compromise unnecessarily, early, and often. Win-win negotiations play to your emotions and take advantage of your instinct and desire to make the deal.

Start with No introduces a system of decision-based negotiation that teaches you how to understand and control these emotions. It teaches you how to ignore the siren call of the final result, which you can’t really control, and how to focus instead on the activities and behavior that you can and must control in order to successfully negotiate with the pros.

The best negotiators:

• Aren’t interested in "yes" - they prefer "no"
• Never, ever rush to close, but always let the other side feel comfortable and secure
• Are never needy; they take advantage of the other party’s neediness
• Create a "blank slate" to ensure they ask questions and listen to the answers, to make sure they have no assumptions and expectations
• Always have a mission and purpose that guides their decisions
• Don’t send so much as an email without an agenda for what they want to accomplish
• Know the four "budgets" for themselves and for the other side: time, energy, money, and emotion
• Never waste time with people who don’t really make the decision

Start with No is full of dozens of business as well as personal stories illustrating each point of the system. It will change your life as a negotiator. If you put to good use the principles and practices revealed here, you will become an immeasurably better negotiator.

©2011 Jim Camp (P)2020 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"Jim Camp offers easy-to-apply strategies to help make you a more effective negotiator. You’ll learn techniques that you can use immediately to improve your negotiating skills by reading this book." (Joe Mansueto, chairman, Morningstar Mutual Funds)

"This book is an amazing read and right on target." (John Kispert, chief financial officer, KLA-Tencor corporation)

"Jim Camp’s negotiating system is a powerful set of disciplines and tools that helped our salespeople function in our customers’ world - which ultimately led to a better negotiating process with our customers. Start with No describes his approach in detail and is recommended reading for our entire staff." (Scott Sturm, vice president of sales, Entegris Corporation)

Great set of guidelines for negotiation

Great book if you are new or mid experience with negotiation. Has guidelines, rules, tips on how to approach and execute negotiation.

Great book, not without its shortcomings

The book is great overall, and provides a lot of great advise on strategical approach to the negotiations. Some of the the advice, like "the best presentation you can give is the one your adversary never sees" were real eye openers. But I think this book is a bit misleading with "no win-win" dictum, I think what is really meant is "don't settle just to make your counterpart feel good, try and negotiate the conditions you deserve and can adhere to, but remember that your adversary needs to stay true to the deal was well".
P.S. The exemplary dialogues are so unnatural, you can almost hear Oblivion soundtrack playing behind.

Jim remains one of the greats

Jim Camp is phenomenal, and his negotiation rules, practices, and techniques are second to none. I read his book five or more years ago and was thrilled to see that they finally recorded it. Robert Jordan, as one of Jim’s long time confidants, serves as the perfect narrator.

Great book on negotiation

Great book for someone looking to sharpen their sales tools and negotiation tactics. Great summary at the end.

All the techniques are explained effectively efficient!

This book definitely is a great read and can be utilized for people who are in sales, marketing, or any other field in any industry. It relates to all negotiations and gets the best outcome to any deal or situation. All techniques discussed in this book has stories that proves or supports the narrative.

Lessons

Has a few points in the book that you can use for the rest of your life.

Good starter kit for negotiating successfully

This book is a valuable tool to learn about negotiating successfully. I liked Carter’s no BS approach and real life examples. But sometimes it is hard to collect all the valuable information when listening on the go. A must read for sure.

Listened to it twice

Completely agree with the premise of this book. it's made me a better negotiator and sales person.

Learned a new way of thinking

it was a great listen. loved it. must read to open up your mind

Good, practical, easy to follow advice

Good, practical,easy to follow advice. Illustrates points w/ real life stories. This book is applicable in all walks of life, not just business.