Negotiation Skills Training Classes
With
over twenty-five years of proven industry experience, the
Negotiations
Training Institute of America is the recognized leader in negotiations
training, consulting and performance coaching. Through public open
enrollment classes and private on-session training sessions, we
have helped leading corporations, non-profit organizations and governmental
agencies improve their ability to
negotiate
better outcomes for their constituencies.
First-time
negotiators as well as those with the greatest
competitive
drive and amount of first-hand experience and
negotiations
wisdom can benefit from our time-tested classes. Whether focusing
on
negotiating
a contract with a vendor or jumping in to the often-stressful
car buying process to
deal
with a dealership, our classes provide useful skills, proven techniques
and various classroom role plays to help you
become
more aware of negotiations that you must face on a daily basis.
For more information on our negotiation skills training classes please
contact us.
Negotiations
Training
Out to
Lunch
Neutralizing Tactics:
The Missing Person
Negotiations
can sometimes slow down or simply take a wrong turn when it turns
out that the person who needs to
review
any decisions or must sign off on an agreement is not around.
Many a businessman has been frustrated by thinking that
a
negotiation was about to wrap up only to find themselves starting
at a brick wall. Many of us have encountered this situation.
Chris: "Pat,
I just wanted to follow up on
the
agreement we discussed yesterday afternoon. I hadn't seen a
copy of the contract in our offices and wasn't sure if you had
any
questions on what we decided."
Pat: "Yeah,
I had been meaning to call you. Sorry about that. You know, I really
wish I could sign off on this but I have to have our Senior VP
approve
any expenditure as large as the one we discussed. Unfortunately,
he is visiting family in Montana and can't be disturbed until he
returns in two weeks."
Chris is in
a tough spot.
The
contract was supposed to be in by the end of the month for the
department to make their numbers for the quarter. The person who
apparently can sign the contract is out of the office. Chris might
have a tendency to
drop
the cost so that his client can
sign
off on the agreement... and it's possible the client knows this.
Thus, the Missing Man can be awfully effective.
When people
use the Missing Man technique, they try to play themselves off as
the nice person, doing what they can to help you out while truly
trying to get a better price,
more
agreeable terms or some other
type
of concession that they can pry out of the other party. This
technique is similar to the good guy, bad guy: they really want
to help out but, gosh, to sign off on something this big, someone
else needs to be involved.
One easy way
to counter this tactic is to have
a
clear understanding of who has signing authority before any
negotiations take place. If someone higher up must approve a deal,
that person should be included. What is the point of negotiating
with someone who doesn't have authority to
make
decisions? One way to have this person involved is to ask the
other party if they can set up a meeting that includes everyone.
That allows them to feel like
part
of the process while bringing the right person to the table.
When faced with
the Missing Man, questions can help you circumvent this tactic:
"Is there
someone else in the organization that can
sign
off on the agreement?"
"Can you arrange for a meeting so that I can talk to that person
about what we discussed?"
"How can we get that person involved so we can wrap up our
discussions?"
For Negotiation
Skills Seminar information please
contact
us.
Related:
Negotiation Course
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