Negotiation is obviously a key skill for the Buyer, which is where all the preliminary steps will lead them, such as setting up the strategy and an associated organization, segmentation, gathering information from internal clients, searching for suppliers…
A key skill
The good news is that negotiation is a skill that can be learned, both by understanding negotiation methods and techniques and by working on one’s attitudes and behaviors. Negotiation is more of an art than a science, and practice is more important than knowledge of techniques. Every negotiation situation is different; it will depend on the specific business context at a given time for each party and must always be meticulously prepared.
Many completely irrational elements can impact a negotiation, and it is therefore always important to be “present”, attentive and vigilant to your interlocutors.
A successful negotiation is based on the following 3 pillars:
1. The stages of negotiation
2. Strategies and tactics
3. Communication and negotiation styles
The stages of negotiation
There are many books on negotiation, but a simple and universal approach involves following three steps:
• Prepare
• Conduct
• Conclude
Step 1: Prepare
This step is itself divided into 3 phases:
1. Negotiation skills
• Knowing oneself (behavior, psychology…see Communication)
• This phase is similar to personal development techniques (Transactional Analysis, NLP, etc.)
2. The actors (information and influence)
• Who are my contacts? (roles, influence, experience, network…)
3. Define the objectives and framework
• Issues?
Step 2: Driving
To properly prepare your negotiations, regularly and sustainably, you can therefore make a preparation sheet, which will contain for example issues and objectives, names of your interlocutors, negotiation strategy… Don’t forget to also write a checklist of your arguments, and a checklist of the subjects to be addressed in the context of the negotiation.
Finally, to record and control the progress of the negotiation itself, you can use a negotiation management sheet.
Here too, there are 3 phases to follow:
1. Pre-negotiation
A lot happens before negotiations “officially” begin; in some cases, everything is decided before the meeting…
2. Negotiation
• Ritualization…”break the ice”
• Information and exploration
• Use general arguments
• Don’t forget, many aspects are negotiable; it’s not just the price
• Developing influence mechanisms
• Rapprochement/adjustments
• My arguments, my counter-arguments (being creative, preparing evidence)
• Using specific arguments
• Forming an agreement
3. Post-negotiation
• Verify the correlation between objectives and agreements
• Verify applicability
Step 3: Conclusion
• Verify that the points of agreement are clearly understood.
• Verify that the What / When / How questions have been answered.
• Document the agreements (minutes, contract, etc.).
Strategy and tactics
As a reminder, the difference between strategy and tactics is as follows:
• STRATEGY defines the overall direction, the major actions, and the target to be achieved, whereas
• TACTICS are specific initiatives where the negotiator seizes opportunities and circumvents obstacles.
Thus, we will speak, for example, of offensive or defensive strategy, cooperation or confrontation, global or step-by-step… The various tactics will be instantaneous and opportune actions, depending on what the buyer understands, senses, and analyzes about a given situation at a given moment. We can cite up to 268 different tactics, which are divided into 9 main categories (threat, destabilization, manipulation, behavior, reciprocity, argumentation, terminal, time, price).
Communication and negotiation styles
Effective negotiation requires certain prerequisites that call upon “soft skills,” or non-technical skills. The quote from Sun Tzu, the Chinese general and master strategist, is telling:
“Know thyself and know thy enemy, and in a hundred battles you shall not be defeated.”
To this end, the human sciences have developed numerous tools based on proven modules that are worth knowing. The elements below offer well-known and effective approaches.
• Transactional Analysis (Parent/Adult/Child roles) helps decipher attitudes, which is very useful for synchronizing with the other person. It is an essential prerequisite before the concession phase.
• Synchronizing with the other person also depends on mastering “Verbal” communication (visual/auditory/kinesthetic), “Non-Verbal” communication (posture, gestures, expressions), and “Para-Verbal” communication (voice, rhythm, pace, etc.).
• A useful tool is SONCAS to understand the motivations of the other person and adapt your communication accordingly. The motivations of the other person can be classified into six main categories:
S: Security
O: Pride
N: New item
C: Comfort
A: Money
S: Sympathy
• There are more elaborate models based on the work of psychologist Jung, but which require guidance (example: MBTI).
Below is an example model: you can improve your communication by identifying your dominant and auxiliary styles within the Engagement/Cooperation matrix, and by working to systematically adopt the effective style of each quadrant.
