Course Outcomes

This negotiation course will:
 
  • Discuss negotiation outcomes.
  • Outline a proven process for negotiating dollars, terms, quality, quantity, and other issues that are often the focus of the bargaining process.
  • Suggest a methodology for positioning information in different ways depending on the style of the negotiators.
  • Provide tactics for responding to common negotiation roadblocks: standstills, deadlocks, stalls, and other problems.
  • Offer answers to tricks, traps, and further attempts to manipulate an agreement.

Course Overview

Participants in this negotiation workshop will learn what seasoned negotiators know: skilled negotiators rarely leave anything on the table in error. They’ve planned, worked methodically through a framework, considered a range of creative options, and used their interpersonal skills to an advantage. This hands-on negotiation program explores a range of essential negotiating skills: defining outcomes, following a process, adopting and adapting to styles, determining a disclosure strategy, documenting, making concessions, watching for tricks and traps, and keeping track of the process.

Program Objectives

At this program’s conclusion, participants should be able to:

  • Identify possible negotiation outcomes.
  • Choose a negotiation strategy.
  • Prepare for a negotiation.
  • Practice an eight-step negotiation process.
  • Ask questions to learn about another person’s motivations, goals, and objectives.
  • Demonstrate the use of successful concession making, and keep track of concessions.
  • Recognize dirty tricks and tactics.

The following outline highlights some of the course’s key learning points. As part of your training program, we will modify content as needed to meet your business objectives. Upon request, we will provide you with a copy of the participant materials prior to the session(s).

Workshop Outline

Win or Lose: Understanding Negotiation Outcomes

Knowing where you may end up before you begin is critical to planning any negotiation.  In this opening part of the workshop, participants will explore negotiation outcomes, discuss the importance of goal overlap, evaluate case studies to determine whether there is a possibility of “winning,” and discover when to use the strategy of losing because it actually makes sense. 

The Eight-Step Negotiation Process: The Value of a Framework

Negotiations often fall short because the key players have not paid attention to each step of the negotiation process. This seminar segment begins with participants creating a negotiation model based on their existing knowledge and experience negotiating. Next, we will compare their efforts to a proven eight-step negotiation process and discuss what should happen at each stage.

Understanding What You Have: Before You Make a Move

Too often people jump into a negotiation without having concrete goals or a plan. This seminar segment focuses on tools for understanding the environment, developing a strategy, and researching people and companies. We’ll look at such concepts as ZOPA, BATNA, WATNA, and walk-away position. We will also practice researching a current negotiation partner, and complete a negotiation planning sheet as we consider a case study.  

Good Question: Asking for Information and Keeping Track of What You Learn

Skilled negotiators have superior questioning abilities and are usually good listeners. This part of the program takes a deep dive into the art of questioning and the importance of listening and documenting. During this part of the program, participants will explore such topics as inclusive language, rapport building, disclosure, benefits-first questions, and recapping skills. 

Great Style: Choosing an Approach

In this part of the course, participants will complete a negotiation styles profile. The results of this instrument will provide the group with some insights about their negotiation style preferences and tendencies. During this part of the program, we will also discuss the importance of adapting and stretching. Once the participants have an understanding of the various options available to them, we will work through several case studies to determine when each style makes the most sense. 

Beyond the Basics: Deadlocks, Standstills, and Concessions

Knowing when to give and how much to give are issues with which even skilled negotiators struggle.  In this seminar segment, participants will learn how to recognize, organize, and rank concessions and discover how to use them to their best advantage. In this course component, we will also look at such ideas as “expanding the pie,” “shrinking the deal,” “changing the players,” “shifting currencies,” and other tactics for getting past “no.”

Beware!: Tricks, Traps, and Tactics

Sometimes people don’t negotiate fairly, or they have different ideas about what “fair” means. This segment of the workshop explores a range of traps and tricks of which negotiators should be aware. We’ll look at what each is and examples of how they’re used. Next, we will identify appropriate responses to each tactic.

Setting the Stage: Understanding When and Where to Negotiate

Just as an unexpected negotiation is different from one that has been carefully planned, negotiation over the telephone is not like an in-person negotiation. In this part of the course, participants will review the advantages and disadvantages of various communication mediums, and they will discuss how to handle “surprise” negotiations. 

Show What You Know: Practice Negotiation and Action Planning

The program ends with a negotiation simulation during which participants have an opportunity to practice and reinforce the skills they have learned. Following that exercise, participants will create action plans to improve their next negotiation.

At this training program’s conclusion, participants will have an understanding of how to use their power base for maximum influence in the negotiation process, how to handle dirty tricks, how to make concessions, when to walk away, and what they need to do immediately to improve their next negotiation.