How should we proceed? What do we have to pay attention to? What strategy should we adopt?
Constantly something is agreed with others:
- Construction negotiations
- Purchase negotiations
- Price negotiations
- Salary negotiation
- Contract negotiations
- Cooperation negotiations
- …
The rule is: the more important and difficult, the better prepared you have to be.
There are many negotiation strategies. For example, they rely on:
- Partnership
- Avoidance
- Pressure
- Drawback
- …
There are also several negotiation concepts, such as the Harvard Concept. However, they all have one thing in common: There is a good basic process that ensures a successful conclusion:
- Allow enough time for good preparation.
- Put yourself in your negotiator’s shoes.
- Ask lots of questions and look at the situation from all sides.
- Note participants who may not be at the table.
- Set your minimum goal.
- Play with your cards face up.
- Don’t give in too quickly – take your time
- Keep your eye on the goal AND think about success for everyone.
In four of eight steps, the online-constellation-board is invaluable in preparation. Think about the situation and map it out on the board:
- Participants
- Who is involved in the outcome of all?
- Who is at the table – who is not?
- Who should be seated – but isn’t?
- Who is sitting – but has nothing to do there?
- Who is involved in the outcome of all?
- Subject level – What is it about?
- obviously
- in secret
- what else?
- Emotional level – Is there
- Trust
- (common) histories
- (common) intentions
- Affections – Rejections
- Fears or even anxieties
Choose characters, create the first image, and adjust the shape, color, size, and orientation of the characters. Make notes of your thoughts already during the creation process and exchange them with any “co-thinkers”. Now look at the situation from all sides. What do you notice immediately? Use meta-position and look at the situation from a higher-level view of individual characters. Go into the “inside view” of individual figures and consider: What can this figure “see” – what can’t it see? Do the distance, size, color, shape, and orientation of the other figures fit from this perspective? What should be changed? Keep making notes – they will be a valuable reference when the process is interrupted or completed. Try this process a few times and with a little practice your negotiation results will improve !by far!
PS: The consistent use of the constellation-board in the preparations for the purchase of a highly specialized insurance software resulted in a price reduction from 9.8 million euros to 5.2 million – with an extended range of functions!