Initially flawed negotiation preparation system

The problem is that in any traditional negotiation training, it is assumed that the parties should eventually agree.

When I was studying in Cape Town, this bug in the minds of my colleagues opened almost immediately. Even the cunning Arabs, prepared to bargain, handed back sharply when they realized that there might not be any result at all. But the Europeans endured it on the spot.

Let's do it again. There are good conditions, there are normal, there are bad. Some can be turned into others. But if you understand that you cannot make normal conditions out of bad conditions, then the only logical solution is to stop negotiations as soon as possible. You do not need compromises, strange solutions and long conversations. You need to get up and leave.

This means a few common things.

1. You are not required to agree at the end

Suppose you are offered a product for 10 thousand rubles. Success in the negotiations is not a criterion for how much you got it in the end and what difficulties they went through. Success may well be the understanding that you are ready to pay 6 thousand rubles, you will not be given this product for such a price - and a subsequent refusal.

Once again: success is the acceptance of only the offers you need. And it took 5 seconds or 6 days to do this - not very important. The fact that the offer that is not favorable for you as a result of the talent of the negotiator, psychology, pressure and bidding has become slightly less disadvantageous does not change the essence. The result is important, not the process.

First determine a point for yourself when you are ready to agree. Then try to move away from it in a direction favorable to you. Compare the result with the original goal - and, if it does not fit, Adju. Only not “turning the table”, but so that then you can continue if the conditions change. Save all positions, and then, if necessary, continue in six months from the same place.

It is important to understand that many sales are often well trained to convince, call back, put pressure on the psyche, use guilt, distort facts a little, and so on. Hence the second principle.

2. Do not be a humanist

Business is numbers. It’s hard to fool math. Again, if you are asked a metaphor about the growth of the company and good, favorable conditions when asked about the cost of contact in advertising, these are not numbers. You are being deceived somewhere. The same goes for all other things, not backed up by numbers or examples.

Translate dialogue into the plane of mathematics. What exactly does the counterparty give, how much, on what terms, what is needed from you. It is very sobering.

I have a wonderful acquaintance who attentively listens to all the sweet promises in the spirit of “you will make big profits”, logs them nicely and with a charming smile asks if she understood everything correctly. When the negotiator confirms this, the smile becomes even more charming: "Then let's put it in the agreement in concrete formulations."

So, smiling is not necessary, but the method is beautiful.

3. Count pro and contra, and not evaluate them emotionally

In almost any transaction there are things that cannot be directly expressed in rubles. For example, speaking of advertising in the paper press, it can be a feeling of one's own greatness (it is better to throw it out of the equation in general), the need to get the first publications to be noticed; status for a supplier who considers everything according to outdated press coverage mechanics; the need to get into the industry magazine for further contacts with the right audience and so on. The main question is how much would it cost you on other channels.

In any transaction, we mentally draw out a leaflet for ourselves in two parts: what we get and what the counterparty gives. And then we weigh, albeit perhaps not reducing everything to one unit (money). It is important that we clearly understand what we receive and how much.

There is also a seizure of advantage: in chess, a good move does not necessarily lead to a piece - it can provide an excellent position for the further development of the game. The same is true in negotiations: often now an advantage is needed, which will be realized in a year or two. For example, sometimes capturing an advantage can be a good job in the right area in the portfolio (large brands know about it and trade, using it as a lever).

4. See what examples show you

Around this place of negotiations, when you detail the deal, a ballad about cases and portfolio begins. Actually, you are shown mega-successful examples of customers who have worked with this company. Like any portfolio assessment, this should begin with the removal of outliers. Specifically - the best work (the worst was deleted without you, believe me).

And then - just look at the average and bad examples. And expect that you will not get an optimistic forecast, but something in the spirit of 40 other cases. In general, an assessment of the worst work is a good indicator of how experienced the performers are. For a professional, the result is generally stable, and quite rarely the worst work differs by an order of magnitude from the best.

Incidentally, the lack of a coherent “golden” portfolio is not a minus. In general, if a company has 20 successful projects, it may not be particularly interested in the twenty-first.

A successful case in the form of a "crystal dream" should not greatly affect the outcome of negotiations. Mathematical expectation suggests that regardless of the credibility of the counterparty, you will get an average result. If he does not suit you - adyu.

Again, an example from the placement, already - when promoting an application for iOS. Many Runet sites send 5-6 examples of their best materials (supported by their own newsletter and external placements). You should find a couple of other not very popular placements and request statistics on them.

Another cool option is when you are called huge numbers on the main one, and then the attendance of materials below the level becomes a surprise. Remember how everyone thought that the habraeffect is a couple of million people, not 3-5-10 thousand? Because there were no post statistics outside of corporate blogs.

5. Catch manifestations of unprofessionalism

If your project manager writes to you with errors, if the contract is drawn up with a “frame” curve, if you change paragraph 4.2.2 to the request, you should see something like “we cannot” with excuses, and if you are billed with hemorrhoids on your part - that’s all these are not very good signs. Note that there is still a stage of preliminary dipping, a kind of honeymoon. Marriage will be worse.

When the contract is signed, all this will become a harsh life. The general principle is very simple: if you see that "fools with the letter m" communicate with you, then it is better not to work with them. Even if the project promises you golden mountains. Bet on people. There is nothing more important. I know an example of a mega-successful agreement of distant colleagues, where, alas, the coordination of the last picture took six months. All this time, deductions for the license went, that is, in fact, the company lost money every day due to the fact that it had crookedly agreed, hoping that everything would work, all the same adults, everyone needed a result. Not a ride.

6. If you sell, create demand.

The game of negotiation for sale is the creation of demand. For example, we do not sell games and toys, but emotions for people. Therefore, it is important for us to make the sale emotionally, demonstrating a piece of what will be at home with the party, and not pushing the logic.

Often in negotiations for the sale of something you simply do not have a product, but there are means of production. On the spot, you need to be able to understand what the partner needs, demonstrate it with sufficient accuracy without working copies in your hands, get price data - and only then form the product under the agreement. It is difficult to touch something that exists firmly only in your head, but it happens when it is very necessary. Sometimes we ask for a second round in a day or two, and then we collect a prototype for it so that expectations are unambiguous. We get ready and quickly bring something to sit down and play live. Previously, past projects were shown on this market and they said how cool everything is. During the year of this approach, we began to make more than all corporate board games in Russia.

Background

Business is a joint venture. And earn it together. In the general spherical case, the normal counterparty is sincere, does not hide information, adheres to reality and knows exactly the possible jambs. So are you. And if all this grows together, then mutually beneficial cooperation is obtained. If not, the contract is signed, but one of the parties in the end remains dissatisfied or deceived.

The same applies, for example, to the same vacancies. This is a subspecies of negotiations where it is very important to reveal the cards in advance. For example, I remember interviewing a content manager: "Do you understand that this is a dumb, repetitive job without any particular growth prospects?" Try for fun to hear this from eychara in a large company.

It is clear that the situation when everyone is extremely open is emasculated, and is rare. Nevertheless, if you have an internal understanding of where you can safely refuse without any special emotions, this dramatically changes the nature of communication. And every year we have more and more such business meetings, oddly enough. There is, of course, a point with the fact that we consider all possibilities in advance and do not change the price for a fixed piece of work. The reason for lowering the price can only be such things as a change in configuration, a reduction in development time or technological cost reduction, but not the fact that someone has bargained. The negotiation process is not a bidding, but a discussion of the functionality that will be included in the release, and the conditions for its implementation. An attempt to sell more expensively is an offer of additional functionality or additional circulation, for example.

It is also important to understand that often the “push harder” strategy is also generally not very beneficial in expectation. If the transaction is disadvantageous to one of the parties, the counterparty will stop working at a random time. The essence of the bidding is to get for 5 rubles what your counterparty considers profitable to sell for 5 rubles. At the same time, you can squeeze it to 3, and it will take you up to 10 - but in the first case you will quickly lose it, and in the second - it will make you even faster.

Business is not to squeeze and quickly to seize. This is a process building. For a long time.