By Frank Weber
Copyright ©2025
Contingencies.
I spent my professional career working and planning in contingencies. My greatest achievement was the completion and signing of a five-year labor agreement in seven-and-a-half hours. Shockingly, sadly, there was no clue – still no clue at all on either side – of how I did it.
What that means is that I understood very early on that NO plan is EVER foolproof or failsafe…NO PLAN.
Simply put, if you are not prepared to recover from the always looming-inevitable failure, you will lose EVERY negotiation you ever enter.
The effects of contingencies were not only a palpable reality, their use presented tangible working standards – for both sides.
Negotiations are living, breathing, pulsating entities and they can NEVER be treated as though they even hint at offering any desired result. Especially if your only justification is that you are convinced you can never fail.
You will. There is no doubt about it.
Ahhhh…but there’s always hubris.
That deeply rooted belief that some leaders maintain no matter what happens to them.
That deeply rooted belief that “I know better than ANY of these other people. I know better!”
And so they bounce off the ropes when they’re hit solid, but they DO NOT bounce back into the ring. They stagger and slump over in disbelief.
And so they lose.
And so they fall.
And so they fail.
Hubris is fatal.
Contingency is a life preserver.
Contingency is nothing more than a series of plans to accommodate any unforeseen complication that most likely WILL arise.
In simpler words, it’s a way to keep fighting (instead of failing) when the best laid plan falls to shit.
And EVERY plan will face complications, if not outright failure. EVERY PLAN.
“I know better than ANY of these other people. I know better!” are pretty consistent last words for so many lost agendas.
Of course, if you believe in your ‘one-and-only plan’ then you have no concept of negotiation or business practice in general.
No COMPETENT businessman or leader or group will EVER throw ideas ‘off-the-cuff’.
Every seemingly simple – or sometimes even offensive – idea that is presented is CALCULATED. Those ideas are intended to elicit a prescribed response, and the simpletons that don’t understand that single, simple fact, typically begin to destroy their OWN agenda right then and there.
When you have some “absolutely insane” idea thrown at you from across the table, do you REALLY believe that idea is the sole intent of the offer?
Do you really believe that it means your opposition is that crazy and dangerous?
Ask yourself this…
“Why do people refuse to analyze the idea for its true intent and instead jump to straight into theatrics?”
Because hubris does not allow any of these people to even consider that the crazy idea may well be stuck in there to trick them into those exact, ridiculous theatrics.
They can’t be tricked!
After all…THEY know better than everyone else!
No, beneath that one, seemingly insane proposal lies a wealth of contingency.
“If they say this, then we move to that”
“If they block this, then we propose that”
“When it’s all over, the only thing we REALLY have to get is…”
And the side that is prepared for EVERY possibility is the side that is going to win.
It is a very simple precept of negotiation.
Remember the old saying, “Never start with your final offer”?
That’s what it means. Terms are subject to change.
Always be ready for the next inevitable eventuality…because they are there and they are waiting for their turn to throw a wrench.
Let’s be clear on one thing.
NEITHER side EVER gets everything they want.
The losing side will always flat-out refuse to believe that the folks across the table might ‘throw something away’ and worse for the agenda of that losing side, they flat-out refuse to believe that their plan will not win it all, unchanged and completely intact, not giving an inch.
Ahhhh…but hubris will never allow anything different than the ‘old, tried and true’.
Or at least, the old tried and true that holds the losing agenda firmly stuck in the losing corner.
Stomping feet and screaming at the opposition and berating people and defaming the opposition (or any innocent, helpless person that may be in the way) and waving fists in a self-absorbed ‘defiance’ is a child’s ploy.
It is nothing more than a child’s theatrical ploy to try and get his way.
There is zero thought in it.
It is nothing more than a knee-jerk reaction to those People with at least half a brain, that have the audacity to disagree with the tantrum-agenda’s platform.
The tantrum-agenda was never prepared for ANY opposition.
The tantrum-agenda believes that no “sane” person could EVER disagree with them.
The tantrum-agenda has never possessed, does not now possess or will it ever possess any form of contingency for its inevitable failures.
The winning side has, does and always will.
SOLEY because it works more on contingency than it does clutching to hubris.
Important point here…hubris can just as easily be feigned and applied to a negotiation as it can ruin the opposition. If you can’t – or refuse to – see such a simple ploy, you should never have entered the ring in the first place.
Go home.
Stay home.
It’s time for the grownups to talk.
Current theatrics and vitriol are enough to make even a first-grader cringe.
At least a first-grader understands that there are real-world consequences for such disruptions.
Then again, I suppose that’s what’s wrong with a great many people these days.
They know full-well there are consequences for their actions but they do not care because they feel entitled and justified in their cause.
“How dare anyone tell me I’m wrong!”
Ignorant kids that buck the system can end up kicked out of school and keep on losing for the rest of their lives…but at least at their young age, they still have a chance to learn and turn it around.
Ignorant full-grown adults can end up hurting their friends and family and the world at large by way of their childish antics, and they just DO NOT CARE.
I’ve always maintained that, “If you didn’t do it, you don’t know it”
A lot of the people in leadership roles have NEVER led anyone or anything and they don’t know how.
A lot of the people in business have NEVER had to form a plan or a negotiation and they don’t know how.
Again, the absolute WORST part of this scenario is that THEY DO NOT CARE because they are convinced of their OWN superiority.
Hubris is fatal.
Now…run along all you overgrown youngsters that refuse to look beyond the end of your nose.
Go home.
Stay home.
It’s time for the grownups to talk.
Comments