Guide: Negotiation Techniques, Tools and Strategies: Invaluable Tips for the Project Manager
Can’t We Just Say “Take it or Leave it?”
Project managers negotiate for varying reasons and with different stakeholders, who are all looking out for the best deals they can get. One true measure of a good project manager is the ability to negotiate effectively by arriving at a resulting agreement, which all parties regard as satisfactory.
This means that the stakeholder, whether a client, an investor, a team member, or any entity giving support or approval to the project is more than glad to do future business with the project manager or with the representative company.
Knowing when to negotiate can be regarded as a dilemma by those individuals who need to develop fully this particular skill. They stand in contrast to savvy project managers who can instinctively apply negotiation techniques or strategies in order to gain leverage over an undertaking that is controlled or influenced by another party.
Taking a hard-line stance is not recommended as a best practice in an environment where bargaining is a norm. A seasoned negotiator will attend to the present disadvantages but will weigh all options available by taking into consideration the future requirements and opportunities.
In line with this, we start off with articles that furnish examples about conditions or circumstances, which require negotiation skills. Here, novice project managers get tips on how to successfully strike a good deal.
- Negotiation Tips for Project Managers: Learning From Historic Cases
- Crazy Project Management Problems in the Project Execution Phase
- Negotiating the Advantages and Disadvantages of Change Management
- Dealing with Demanding Clients
- Negotiate Software Maintenance Contracts: Tips & Strategies
- Recognizing and Avoiding Adverse Selection: Looking at Examples
- Different Conflict Management Styles: Which Works Best When?
- Stages of Collective Bargaining
Learning the Basics
Every scientific discipline is acquired first by learning the basics. Understanding the fundamental factors that make up a negotiation strategy helps to close the expectation gap about bargaining for miracles. These entail the establishment of goals and the preparations taken to achieve objectives. This is done by exchanging information on which the leverage or bargaining power and the extent of commitment to the solutions are evaluated.
Readers can enhance their skills by reading the following articles, which delve into in-depth knowledge about the basics of how to work out deals:
- Working Your Way Through Negotiations: A Guide for the Project Manager
- Negotiation Strategies and Processes
- Negotiating for Business Professionals
- Negotiation Tools and Tactics for the Project Manager
- Overconfidence in Negotiations: Is it a Blessing or a Burden?
Analyzing and Determining the Most Suitable Approach
Part of the preparation processes in negotiating contract terms includes analyzing and determining the most suitable approach to use. Arranging a conference in which timelines, conditions, requirements, budgets and scope will be discussed is not as simple as laying one’s plans and strategies on the table. Expert negotiators approach their peers, clients, employees or investors with sufficient knowledge about their counterpart’s emotional make-up and behavioral tendencies.
Discern the relevance of these elements in determining the strategies and techniques to use through the aid of the articles listed below. Their explanations give useful insight on how each method works to effectively achieve negotiation goals:
- Categories of Negotiating Techniques
- Different Approaches to Negotiation
- An Overview of Win-Win Negotiations with Examples
- The Art of Integrative Negotiation
- Disadvantages of Integrative Negotiation
- Comparing Distributive and Integrative Negotiation Strategies
- The Unique Challenges of Multi-Party Negotiations
- BATNA as a Negotiation Tool
Training and Development of Bargaining Abilities
Negotiating is considered an art since it entails developing tactics that could move the other party away from the latter’s entrenched position and toward a satisfactory and mutually beneficial solution. Although some are naturally gifted with the instinct of knowing the right words to say or actions to take, these abilities can be learned or enhanced through role-playing exercises.
Create or simulate scenarios that allow individuals to apply strategies for exploiting potential openings for trade-offs as well as for recognizing pitfalls that could weaken one’s resolve. Learn from this collection of negotiation techniques, tools and strategies, the knowledge about the concept of role-playing and how it can effectively hone a project manager’s negotiation skills.
- Role Play Exercises for Building Negotiation Skills
- Upgrading Customer Service and Sales With Negotiation Role Play
- Understand Culture for Success in International Business Negotiations
- How Belbin’s Team Roles Apply to Project Management
- Game Theory and Project Management
Integrating Studies about Organizational Psychology
In today’s business trends, most decision-makers have come to recognize the need to incorporate an understanding of human behavior in the fields of marketing, economics, organizational management, and innovation. Hence, educational institutions for higher learning are now offering Master’s degree courses in organizational psychology to enhance one’s skills in organizing, managing and communicating.
Explore the information provided by these articles that give overviews about such courses, which would likewise increase a project leader’s ability to negotiate effectively.
- Psychology and MBA Combination: An Analysis
- Crisis Management Distance Education: Master’s Degree in Psychology to Boost Public Relations Career
- An Accelerated Online Masters Degree Conflict Management Program for You
References
- Image: Rebecca Riots by Dr. Blofeld. Depiction Illustrated London News 1843 at Wilimedia Commons under public domain.
- Image: Negotiations to End Apartheid in South Africa by artist Magda Macaskill at Wikimedia Commons under CCA-SA 3.0 Unported.
- Image : The picture refers to the War of 1812 between America and Great Britain and the Russian effort to mediate by William Charles (1776–1820) at Wikimedia under public domain.
- By Thomas Noble of Law Offices of Thomas Noble, P.C, Improving Negotiation Skills: Rules for Master Negotiators.- http://library.findlaw.com/2001/Jan/1/130785.html
- Image: Queen Nzinga in peace negotiations with the Portuguese governor in Luanda, 1657. Scanned from Stenseth, N. Chr. et al. (ed.). Afrika: Natur, samfunn og bistand. Oslo, 1995. Page 563. Wikimedia commons under public domain.
- Image: Gas Turbine System Mechanic 3rd Class Alahnna Taylor, from Vancouver, Wash. role-plays as a suicide bomber during the Paulele Palulu (PAPA) 2009 anti-terrorism field training exercise released by the United States Navy with the ID 090813-N-7498L-022. Wikimedia Commons under public domain.