Negotiation Skills Training Course - 1 Day

We are here to answer a single question: How can we get the best result from any negotiation?

To get the best result from any negotiation, people need knowledge, understanding, and skill.

This course will give you the theoretical knowledge necessary to understand the negotiation process, together will the practical skills necessary to put good theory into good practice.

Negotiation is a special form of communication involving two or more individuals or groups, each of which is acting in their own self-interest.

Each party in the negotiation recognises that, to achieve their own self-interest, they need to trade with others, and therefore, they must create and sustain long term, mutually beneficial agreements.

Negotiation is a transaction, over which each party has a veto over the final outcome.
In a normal business context, negotiation requires voluntary consent on all sides.
Negotiation is a process by which all parties should achieve a benefit.

The course is designed to explain and implement every aspect of this definition.

Negotiation is a specialised form of thought process and a set of communication skills.
Negotiation involves two or more individuals or groups, each acting in their own perceived self-interest, and each recognising that, to achieve their own self-interest, they need to negotiate with others, in order to create and sustain a long term, mutually beneficial agreement.

Negotiation is a transaction over which each of the parties has a veto over the final outcome.

In a business context, negotiation requires voluntary consent on all sides.
Negotiation is a process by which all parties should achieve a practical benefit.

Now we know what negotiation is, we will investigate common misconceptions that surround the concept of negotiation. We want to explode myths that occupy most people’s minds, such as the belief that negotiation is concerned with finding the middle ground between two extremes.

Negotiation is more subtle than merely finding the midpoint.

Ultimately the goal of all negotiations is to agree a mutually beneficial, long term solution. In order to do that, negotiators must identify their goals. What they want, and don’t want.

Therefore, we teach a goal setting method.

Negotiation is based upon the idea of “a mutual exchange of values”. So, we need to understand what we mean by value. The same object is valued differently by different people.
If I buy an item, I value the item more than I value the money I must forgo to obtain it.
Value has both an objective and subjective component. Your role as a negotiator is to identify what the other person values highly and think about how you might use that information.

During the negotiation, you will need to trade certain things to obtain concessions. Your aim is to trade things which you perceive as lower value, but that they may perceive as higher value.

These factors are called, negotiable variables. We will identify your negotiable variables, or bargaining chips.

All negotiations must end, at some point. Professional negotiators know when to exit from a failed negotiation and have the courage to walk away. Failure to determine the exit point leads many people to losing more than they need to.

We show you how to determine your negotiation strategy.

In order to have the courage to walk away, you need to have, (or appear to have) a BATNA.

A BATNA is a “Best Alternative To a Negotiated Answer”. If the other party thinks you have no alternative other than to deal, they can drive you to the wall.

We show you how to gain a BATNA.

Goodwill conceding is the act of giving away concessions for free. It is the most common and most dangerous negotiation error. We will discuss the painful consequences associated with chronic goodwill conceding.

During negotiations people can become extremely emotional. They need to be rational, not emotional. We discuss how getting over-emotional can ruin your chances. And how giving concessions based upon the other party’s angry outburst could easily be classified as a rookie mistake.

We know that some negotiators become angry as a purposeful tactic.

We need to understand how to take a call from an upset or angry client. We teach you a special six step method to deal with this type of difficult conversation.

Negotiation is about getting to yes. But along the way, we must be prepared to say, “no”. But you cannot say it like that, because it seems so binary. Negotiators have ways of expressing rejection in a more amenable manner.

We will show you how you can reject the others’ proposals without seeming to be intransigent.

We come to one of the most fundamental truths of negotiation: that of the trader principle.
The golden rule of negotiation is this: never give concessions away for free, instead, trade them.
This is the essence of negotiation and we show how to make it work in practice.

Now you know enough material to do some practice exercises. We give you scenarios, you tell us the correct response.

This is a terrific exercise to see how much of this material has been absorbed.

There are many experienced negotiators out there, who use what we call game plays. Game plays are not strictly correct principles, they are more akin to tricks of the trade, that put pressure on uninitiated or novice negotiators, and which often work well to gain an unearned concession.

We teach these tricks, not so that you might use them on unsuspecting people, but so that you can defend yourself, whenever they are deployed against you (which they will be for sure).

Forewarned is forearmed.

In order to implement the skills we have discussed, you have three tools of communication. Words, voice tones and body language. We will discuss each of these.

There are three aspects to voice tones that make a difference to how people are perceived by others: voice volume, pitch, and pace.

We teach how to use voice to best advantage.

Body language has many aspects: Dress code, posture, facial expression, eye contact, handshake, positioning and accessories.

We teach how to use body language to best advantage.

We will identify some bad speech habits that are common to all terrible negotiators. We will then studiously avoid using them.

We will identify the good speech habits common to all excellent negotiators. We will purposefully adopt them.

We conclude on the subject of mental attitude. Since every human action is governed by a human thought, the quality of your thinking during a negotiation will govern the quality of the result you are likely to achieve. Therefore, it is important to enter into negotiations with the right attitude.

Negative attitudes tend to produce negative results, whilst positive attitudes tend to produce positive results.

We review our notes and pick out the most important points.
We ask you how you might use this training in your next negotiation.

Summary and final action plans