Negotiations work best when both sides have matching personality traits—even if they’re both disagreeable—according to research from the Terry College of Business.
Conventional wisdom suggests that people who are outgoing and accommodating are better suited to negotiate, but a study co-authored by Fadel Matta and collaborators at several institutions found that two sides can reach accord through their common discord.
“Normally, you would consider agreeableness—that you’re cooperative and kind—to be a good thing. And being disagreeable—being cold—to be a bad thing,” said Matta, assistant professor of management. “But with negotiations we find that’s not necessarily true.”
Similarly, he said, being extroverted does not always translate into deal-making success.
At their core, negotiations are about a relationship, according to Matta. And like a relationship, they work best when both parties approach it the same way.
“If you’re a jerk and I’m a jerk, then it might seem like we’ll never get anywhere in negotiations, but it’s actually more useful to put two similarly minded people together,” he said.
The study was published in the Journal of Applied Psychology.
This brief appeared in the fall 2017 issue of Research Magazine. The original press release is available at https://news.uga.edu/releases/article/negotiations-researchs-jerks/.
