Early on a Wednesday morning thirty delegates assembled to spend four hours learning about negotiation techniques from Bob Spence - an expert negotiator and sales expert.
Obviously it's tough to summarise four hours of training in a few words but here are some key learnings:
1. Environment Counts.
Creating the right environment is key to a successful negotiation. To generate this environment you need to prevent common barriers that often arise / are created. These barriers include creating a hostile / alpha type situation where a negotiator tries to assert authority (making it difficult to negotiate) and the subject unwilling to agree terms etc. Skilled negotiators are more successful when the appear as non-threatening and even submissive.
2. Don't Haggle - it's a great way of highlighting you don't know what you're doing
3. Preparation counts! Prepare a deal so you know clearly what you are offering.
4. Listen. Use the four-second rule to pause and gain useful information.
5. Don't talk about price (in a B2B model) talk about value and quality.
6. Know your tools. A negotiation isn't merely a process - rather a bespoke combination of the right tools, some of which include things like relievers and concessions - designed to assist with the negotiation. Very little of negotiation training is about 'Closure'.
If you'd like to know more about negotiation sign up to our newsletter to find out when our next session will be. We will cover the concepts outlined above in more details.
Thanks to Bob for his time and sharing all his expertise - we can't wait for the next one!
