Perceptions and intentions

We judge ourselves by our intentions. We judge others by their behaviour. In a sale, this asymmetry is fatal.

If a document is late, we assume the other side is acting in bad faith. If we are the ones running late, it is merely a bureaucratic setback. This is where a negotiation goes off the rails. Understanding how to avoid it is the difference between an amateur and a professional.

In a market where technical timescales are lengthening and the documentation required grows ever more complex, misunderstandings are a daily occurrence. The best performing agents know that the wrong reading of a single gesture can bring trust down.

Owners who entrust themselves to firms focused on negotiation know they have translators at their side, not merely salespeople. Professionals who read the facts without letting prejudice contaminate them.

The offer had been accepted verbally, but the signature had been delayed for three days. The colleague on the other side was growing agitated: “They are stringing us along, let us withdraw everything”. Instead of answering the accusations, we examined the problem at its root. We did not presume bad faith. We picked up the telephone and asked:

“What is the technical obstacle holding you up at this moment?”

The problem was not the agreement, but one of the owners who was abroad without a digital signature. It was not sabotage, it was logistics. Once the real problem had been identified, the frustration disappeared and we found the solution: an urgent power of attorney.

Put yourself in their shoes. In our way of working, we study constantly how not to infer the other side's intentions from our own fears.

If you treat the person in front of you as an obstacle, they will behave like an obstacle. If you treat them as a partner with whom to solve a complex puzzle — the transfer of a property — you will find a way through.

From a technical standpoint, anticipating the wrong perceptions means preventing:

• misunderstandings over deadlines, by setting realistic and reasoned cut-off dates
• suspicion over compliance, by providing documentation in advance and in full
• anxiety over the bank's decision

A complete dossier at the right moment communicates a clear intention: we are here to collaborate, not to conceal.

Never infer the other side's intentions from your own fears. Separating the people from the problem means approaching the other side and saying: “We are both here to close this sale. What is stopping us from doing it today?”.

It is a shift of perspective that turns opponents into allies.

In recent issues we have explored clarity of mind and the absence of ego. Today we talk about perceptions. Negotiation is not a game of battleships in which you have to guess where to strike. It is a map to be read together.

La Giusta Trattativa continues. For those who know that listening to what is not said matters as much as reading the contract.