Many people avoid making negotiation offers as a range of values, because they expect that co-negotiators will “anchor” on the range’s lower value. 

However, range offers actually led to stronger outcomes in controlled studies by Columbia University’s Daniel R. Ames and Malia F. Mason.
This team suggested that range offers provide “dual anchors” that signal a negotiator’s knowledge of value and politeness.

Range and point opening offers have varying impacts, depending on the proposer’s perceived preparation, credibility, politeness, and reasonableness.

Negotiators’ credibility, interpersonal style, and value awareness are associated with the anchor value’s influence settlement outcomes.

Ames and Mason tested three types of negotiation proposal ranges:

• Bolstering range includes the target point value as the bottom of the range and an aspirational value as the top of the range.
  This strategy usually yields generous counteroffers and higher settlement prices: Recommended approach.
• Backdown range features the target point value as the upper end of the range and a concession value as the lower offer.
  This approach often leads to accepting the lower value: Not recommended.
• Bracketing range spans the target point offer and often has neutral settlement outcomes for the offer-maker.
  This tactic provides some relational benefits because it can be perceived by co-negotiators as more collaborative and less aggressive.

Extreme anchors are often seen as aggressive and may lead to negotiation breakdown, according to INSEAD’s Martin Schweinsberg with Gillian Ku of London Business School, collaborating with Cynthia S. Wang of University of Michigan, and National University of Singapore’s Madan M. Pillutla.
Even high-power negotiators said they were offended by extreme offers, and low-power negotiators were more likely to walk away from these negotiations.

Previously, Mason and team showed the benefit of precise single number offers, and these findings suggest the value of range offers.

The research group concluded that point offers and range offers are independent and interactive processes that influence settlement values:

“…(B)olstering-range offers shape the perceived location of the offer-maker’s reservation price… (In contrast P)recise first offers shape the perceived credibility of the offer-maker’s price proposal.

• When do you present a precise negotiation offer instead of a negotiation range?

RELATED POSTS:

• “Everything is Negotiable”: Prepare, Ask, Revise, Ask Again
• Expressing Anger at Work: Power Tactic or Career-Limiting Strategy?
• Anxiety Undermines Negotiation Performance
• Power Tactics for Better Negotiation
• Women Balance on the Negotiation Tightrope to Avoid Backlash
• Women Don’t Ask for Raises or Promotions as Often as Men
• Women’s Likeability – Competence Dilemma: Overcoming the Backlash Effect
• “Feminine Charm” as Negotiation Tactic

©Kathryn Welds