Negotiate for the value you deserve with Kinnaird Negotiation

Effective and targeted negotiation training designed for multiple levels of seniority and experience is the essential starting point for building negotiation capacity within a business.

Our one and two-day workshops are tailored to the specific challenges faced by each group, using relevant case studies and role plays, often built from the real-world issues and conflicts identified during an interview assessment phase. Questions, challenge and discussion are a key part of all workshops, and participants are encouraged to bring and explore their real-world negotiation issues and problems.

Negotiation for Leaders

A Negotiation for Leaders workshop is a one day course, aimed at business and functional leadership.

Topics covered typically include:

• Learning and applying the basic skills of value claiming (win/lose) and value creating (win/win) negotiation, while still protecting relationships
• The role of procurement in client organisations
• The role of leadership in establishing negotiation targets, process and behavioural norms within the business, and how best leadership can support its negotiators
• The games clients play – opportunities to negotiate within the competitive dynamics of a pitch process where procurement/clients are setting the rules of the game
• Negotiation clinic
• What is going to change in behavioural and process terms after the workshop, when leaders return to their day jobs ?

Negotiation Mastery

Negotiation Mastery is a two day course, aimed at leaders and managers who are negotiating the deals on which the success of the business depends. Through a focus on preparation, process and practice, a Mastery course will take negotiators’ skills to the next level.

Topics typically covered include:

• Learning and applying the basic skills of value claiming (win/lose) and value creating (win/win) negotiation while still protecting relationships
• Using a 6 step negotiation process roadmap as means of delivering consistently higher value outcomes
• Team vs 1:1 negotiation dynamics
• How to deal with hard bargainers and still win
• How to say “no”
• Negotiation clinic

Negotiation Essentials

Negotiation essentials is a one day course, aimed at those who are negotiating regularly as part of their day-to-day role. An Essentials course is designed to give a solid grounding on the key elements of negotiation, with the opportunity to practice.

Topics typically covered include:

• Learning and applying the basic skills of value claiming (win/lose) and value creating (win/win) negotiation while still protecting relationships
• Negotiation planning – the importance of preparation, with an emphasis on how and what to prepare to set up for success
• A variety of negotiation skills tips and tools, all of which are tried and tested in the real world

The “what” and the “how” of negotiation are different learning processes, and it’s common to struggle to bridge the gap between negotiation training and being able to replicate the new skills in the day job.

All too often, when put under pressure, newly trained negotiators revert to type and fail to achieve the higher value outcomes that are possible. Whether it’s individual 1:1 coaching, working with teams through a more rigorous preparation process, trial-running negotiations, or being available to provide “in the moment” coaching during particularly difficult negotiations, Kinnaird Negotiation will ensure that the investment in training delivers.

Individual coaching

We provide 1:1 coaching for individuals where negotiation is a critical part of their role, and who want to personally invest in raising their game to a new level. Typically done over a 3 to 6 month period, regular coaching sessions help embed the learning covered in negotiation training workshops, while working simultaneously on applying the skills to ongoing real-world negotiations. Sessions regularly use video replay techniques to dry-run negotiations, with extensive coaching and feedback around style, use of words and exploring options around different value creating moves.

Team coaching

A rigorous and systematic way to approach negotiation preparation is essential, particularly for teams where multiple and different functional interests, and potentially egos, are in play. Research suggests that negotiators, and especially negotiation teams, are prone to a variety of predictable phycological biases, which often leads to – incorrect assumptions underpinning negotiation strategies; lack of clarity around internal interests and their relative priority; a failure to really think through the questions which need to be asked to fully understand the needs of the other side; an inability to re-frame problems; lack of internal alignment, where the loudest voice is likely to dominate – and all of this in advance of getting across the table with the other side.

“In the moment” coaching

When the pressure is on during high stakes negotiations, it’s often good to be able to run a reality check with an external expert who isn’t emotionally involved with the situation, or the relationships. When it’s all going horribly wrong, it’s reassuring to have someone to call who can help unpick and re-frame the problem, and come up with alternative approaches and strategies to move the process forward in a positive way. We provide video and telephone “hot-line” coaching, when and where you need it most.