Negotiation Skills for Examiners - Part 1

Sunday, December 22, 2002 | 0

A big part of the claims examiner's job is negotiating. Benefits, liens, attorney fees ... the list seems endless. This article on negotiation skills is the first in our next series of essential examiner skills.

Negotiation Skills - The Fundamentals Of Successful Negotiations

Negotiating is a problem-solving process used to resolve conflicts in which all parties attempt to find a solution to which all will voluntarily agree.

There are six fundamental principals of negotiation: 1) Focus on your target; 2) Manage information successfully; 3) Position your theme advantageously; 4) Know and maintain your power; 5) Emphasize needs over wants; and 6) Concede strategically.

In this article we'll review the first two fundamentals and follow up on the other four in subsequent articles.

Focus

Focusing on the target means that the preliminary work has been done to set up your negotiating parameters with a final goal in mind. In other words, have you done your homework sufficiently to understand what the risks and rewards are, and to establish what your goals are? At this stage you need to ask your self the following questions:

Have sufficient facts been gathered and verified to permit a good understanding of the issues from the perspective of all parties so that you can counter points as necessary?

Specifically in the claims examiner context, have you completed your settlement evaluation and obtained adequate authorization for what your outside position is?

Have you identified an opening offer sufficient to achieve your target? This is particularly important - too high of an opening figure makes you look like you're going to give away the farm. Too low of an opening figure and negotiations may terminate prematurely. As we will see in later discussion, your opening figure will necessarily depend on how your opposition perceives you. If you have a reputation as a "straight shooter", you may not need to massage your opening figure much. Alternately, if your opposition perceives that you have much more hidden away in your pockets, then starting out too high will put you in a worse position as time goes on.

What is your "walk-away" figure? You need to set boundaries. At some point in the negotiations, there will come a time where you need to say "no".

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, you should always ask yourself whether you are staying focused on your target (case resolution/closure)? Too often negotiations go astray because the parties lose sight of what the ultimate goal is, and end up negotiating for negotiation's sake where a battle of egos ensues. Always come back to the fundamental question: what is the goal and are my negotiations moving towards that goal.

Manage Information Skillfully The successful negotiator has critical information at his or her fingertips that allows points to be made on the fly. A fumbling, ill-informed negotiator is a weak negotiator. Information management is critical to successful negotiations.

Before going into negotiations, evaluate the fact you have on hand. What additional factual information will be needed to make a proper claims evaluation? Do you have all of the medical data and reports necessary to make the point you need? Are your reports complete and valid from an evidentiary standpoint?

Evaluate the quality of your information. Know what the sources are of your information. If your information is challenged, you need to know the best way to obtain and verify information from those sources.

Information can be either an advantage in negotiations, or a disadvantage. In dealing with a workers' compensation claim, generally, all information must be disclosed, but sometimes there is information that need not be disclosed, and there are times when it appropriate (i.e. advantageous) to disclose certain types of information. Be prepared and understand what are the key facts and critical claim issues. Think ahead: What are the most difficult questions that you could be asked in the negotiation and how will you answer?

Understand who the person is that you will be negotiating with and their level of expertise. For the size of this industry, workers' compensation on the front lines is surprisingly small and it is not hard to get information or an opinion on a "key player" in this industry. Find out about the person you will be dealing with before entering into negotiations, and get an understanding on how the opposing party's negotiating style affect can the outcome.

Our next article in this series will look at some of the other fundamental principles in negotiations.

Author, Cyndi Koppany, is Director of Corporate Training for Cambridge Integrated Services Group, Inc. E-mail her at ckoppany@earthlink.net.