Negotiation Skills Training Workshops

Our public Negotiation workshops and in house Negotiations workshops are enlightening, educational, measurable and fun. Negotiation training workshops can be scheduled at your offices or through our open enrollment workshops. We do offer negotiation skills training workshops to the general public.

Contact us today to discuss your specific Negotiation training needs or to sign up for one of our public negotiations workshops. 

Participants in the Win- Win Negotiations workshop will learn to:

• Develop an effective plan and strategy for any negotiation
  
• Know when and when not to negotiate
  
• Negotiate face-to-face, on the phone, and through e-mail
  
• Learn to become a more persuasive negotiator
  
• Develop a common negotiating language with the other parties
  
• Use negotiation techniques that pull information from the other parties
  
• Read client and employee behaviors styles to maximize closure
  
• Recognize interests and issues and avoid unnecessary positions
  
• Neutralize manipulative negotiation tactics
  
• Minimize negotiation conflicts and deadlocks both internally and externally
  
• Coordinate negotiations within client organization
  
• Meet business objectives by focusing on planning rather than on tactics

No matter how attractive an offer may be, my advice to you is 'do not agree too quickly.' If you do, the other party probably will feel dissatisfied after they have had time to reflect back on the outcome, and you might feel the same way! Even though you have reached agreement, someone probably will feel as though they left something on the table. To reinforce this point, following is one role play exercise that I have used in the past to emphasize negotiation skills.

The scenario is as follows. An individual has a very clean. low mileage, imported, classic sports car for sale. That individual has enjoyed the car for many years, but now finds themselves, like many people, in a position where they need money more than the car. As a result, the car is sitting in front of their home with a sign in the windshield that states "FOR SALE BY OWNER $17,500."

The negotiation skills role play is set up to divide the group into two parts. Each part of the group is then divided into two-person teams, comprised of a buyer and a seller. Different challenges are provided to each of the two groups, and the roles are spelled out for each of the buyers and sellers very definitively as follows:

1. The negotiation skills challenge to the first group of sellers is to negotiate the highest possible price for your car. The negotiation skills challenge to the buyers in this group is to purchase the car at the lowest possible price. This challenge establishes the parameters for free wheeling negotiations.

2. The second group of sellers is told to accept the first offer made by the potential buyer, irrespective of the price. The buyers in this group are told to offer the exact price shown on the sign in the windshield. Under these parameters, there should be no negotiating between the parties.

When asked about their experience, almost all of the buyers and sellers in the first group admitted that they had enjoyed the process of negotiating and exercising their negotiation skills. Typically, they were excited, and wanted to talk about the process itself as well as the ultimate price they paid, or received, for the car. In contrast, while the people in the second group completed the transaction quickly, they admitted that they did not have much fun. In fact, they recognized that the transaction involved no negotiation skills - all of the sellers believed that they could have gotten more for the car, while at the same time, all of the buyers felt as though they had overpaid for the car.

Try it for yourself next time you have a group together and see if your conclusion falls in line with mine -- that the process of negotiation is more satisfying if there is some give and take between the parties.

Negotitation skills lesson learned: Do not agree to something too quickly, or both parties could end up feeling as though they "left something on the table."

Charles H. Newman: http://www.beyondthechickendance.com/

Notes: Negotiation Skills

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