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.The sticks the furniture and other prop-erty much of it acquired together and with much ego investment isoften another point of angry contention.It s hard to quarrel with Shakespeare s choice of words a man youhave to agree had a way with words but having Othello say that he lovednot wisely but too well may have misnamed what Othello felt for Desde-mona.Again, it s hard to square loving someone so well that you killthem.Perhaps what he meant is not loving so well butLESSON FROM THE STREET #19so intensely, so strongly, in such a way that yourAnger is something toego is so tied up with the object of your affectionexpect in ourselves and inthat a real or perceived provocation is a personalothers, so get ready for it.blow and can produce a powerfully self-destructiveretaliation.Remember the hospital negotiator who believed that her job hingedon the one negotiation with Juan, the insurance company executive? Pamsaw every issue on the table as an issue personal to her, to her career, toher immediate economic survival.She cared, not wisely but, as Shake-speare would have it, too well, too intensely.She saw herself personally sobound up in every issue that she could not negotiate wisely. 48 GET IT! STREET-SMART NEGOTIATION AT WORKSo, in matters that we care about, that our egos are bound up in, werun the real risk of becoming angry, especially as we encounter peoplewho disagree with how these matters or issues should be dealt with andresolved.Think about these scenarios:" Your supervisor gives you a 4 out of a possible 5 in the category takes initiative during an evaluation period when you were solelyresponsible for beginning three new projects, two of which arealready profitable.You didn t get a 5, and you get angry." You are part of a three-person negotiation team.The chief negotiatoron the other side pointedly ignores your comments and offerings,and you are the most experienced person at the table.You get angry." I offered the Florida church a deal too good for them to refuse.Theyrefused it.I got angry.Euripides said that those whom God wishes to destroy he first makes mad.There is some question over whether by mad he meant angry or crazy. Maybe it doesn t matter, because anger makes us crazy and produces self-destructive results.What matters is that we understand anger in ourselves and others, rec-ognize it, prepare for it, and manage it.A SHOW OF ANGER AS A TACTICIt is true, of course, that sometimes anger or the appearance of it can beused as a tactic.In the famous kitchen debate between Russian premierKhrushchev and vice president Richard Nixon at the Moscow Exhibitionin 1959, there was much finger pointing, lapel tugging, and face reddeningas the two men debated the comparative merits of their two systems ofgovernment.Each tried to seem more pugnacious than the other.But care-ful observers, like Harrison Salisbury of the New York Times, characterizedthe angry exchange as a show put on by both men.A show of anger is usually not a good idea as a tactic.It is too easy forthe act to become real; and even if it does not, your playacting, if discov-ered, will badly damage your credibility.But it is important to consider DISCOVER EMOTIONS THAT BETRAY YOU 49that the anger being displayed on the other side may not be genuine.Theharsh words, the personal attack, may be an act.If that is your conclusion,you may choose to ignore the act.Or, you may pretend that the anger isreal and deal with it as if it were, which we shall discuss shortly.REAL ANGER AS DESTRUCTIVEReal anger can be fatal to the constructive discussion and resolution ofissues in personal lives, in the political arena, and in business.My friend Opal Lee, the coal mogul, who made and then broke whatwould have been a very profitable deal for her, was motivated by a form ofanger: indignation.She was indignant that I was going to make money forbeing merely a broker.She thought I was getting something for very littleor nothing.She got indignant, and we had no deal.Now, maybe my dealwouldn t have kept Opal Lee from going broke, but it might have helped.I also learned a good deal about the effects of real anger in the dry-cleaning business.STREET-SMART REALITYANGER AND WHAT TO DO WITH ITAt one point I had a thriving and profitable dry-cleaning business in Ken-tucky and three thriving and unprofitable such businesses in Florida.Ittook a lot of hands-on management to get the profits from the one to off-set the losses from the other three, so I was in the Florida stores a lot.Most people who use dry cleaners are very particular about their clothes.They wear their emotions about their attire on their sleeves, so to speak.If you crush their buttons and don t replace them or replace them withbuttons of a different size; if you don t get out the stain that has perma-nently dyed the fabric of their dress; if an article of their clothing goestemporarily (you hope) missing; if a stain becomes, while in your care, ahole if any of these or myriad other missteps occur, it is a big deal, a dealbig enough to provoke anger.And when customers complain about what has happened, it is neverwhen you are there alone so the issue can be handled discreetly.It s alwayswhen the store is full of customers. 50 GET IT! STREET-SMART NEGOTIATION AT WORKI remember Mr.Bresson, who taught me something about anger inmyself and in others during my dry-cleaning days.He burst through the double glass doors at the Dixie Highway locationlike John Wayne coming into a bar to get the bad guys.He was waving anoversized silk handkerchief.The store was full of people, and I was theonly counter help. You have put a hole in my pochette! he barked.His charming French accent wasn t so charming, I noticed, as I wasintroduced to a pochette, or pocket square, with a hole in it. Look, look.I brought this in to you with a stain and you have given itback to me with a hole.This is a Hermes pochette and it cost $100.Mywife gave it to me for our anniversary! My first reaction was to respond with the same vigor of his complaint. Monsieur Bresson, we could not have put a hole in your pochette.Ourchemicals are so mild you can soak your hands in them.Our equipment isstate of the art.Our people are trained in the care of delicate fabrics. Hermes doesn t make a delicate pochette.Hermes is a French manu-facturer, not American.You could pull an automobile with that pochette! This last was at a decibel level higher than his first sally. We used generally accepted dry-cleaning practices to clean that pochette,Monsieur Bresson.Perhaps there has been a failure in the weaving, some-thing went wrong in the warp and the weft in the silk. Showing a littleexpertise would put him off balance, I thought, but I thought wrong. I don t care about generally accepted or warp and weft. I just knowyou put a hole in my pochette.So what are you going to do about it? Andby the by, stop calling me Monsieur. This is America. My Francophile effort to build rapport having failed, I tried a differentapproach. Why don t I send your pochette to the International FabricareInstitute.We are a member, I said proudly. Let s see what they say. I don t care what they say! I only care what you say! So what do you say? As I considered my response, he went on. And another thing.My wife picked up a black cocktail dress from youlast week.And it was so wrinkled that we had to take it to One Hour Mar-tinizing at our inconvenience and cost I may add to get it re-pressed soshe could wear it that evening. DISCOVER EMOTIONS THAT BETRAY YOU 51Now, things were escalating
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