Effective Contract Negotiation Training Course

Duration

1 day

What is this course about?

Effective contract negotiation is at the heart of commercial success. The art of contract negotiation is just as important for the support team as it is for the up-front negotiator.

This course helps delegates to both understand the basics of commercial law and know how to arrive at a good deal that will yield the best results with the minimum of risk. The course covers key elements of contract law coupled with a detailed analysis of negotiating methods and skills.

The course also gives the opportunity for delegates to test their own skills through the use of syndicate exercises.

Who would benefit?

• Commercial managers
• Contracts and purchasing managers and executives
• Finance managers
• Sales support team members
• Business development managers
• Anyone seeking to negotiate the best deal on terms of sales and purchase contracts

Objectives

For delegates to gain an understanding of:

• The basics of commercial law
• The tactics and techniques of negotiation
• The actions to be taken prior to negotiation
• The actions to be taken following an agreement

Key topics covered

1. Professional contract negotiation - an introduction and exercise

• 'The Insurance Claim' - agreeing a sum of money
• Limbering up
• Who stands behind the negotiators?
• When to complete and when to combine
• Weighing up the other side
• Bargaining power
• Dos and don'ts

2. What is negotiable? - A canter through contract law

• Common Law, Statute Law and Equity
• Rules for a valid contract
• How contracts can be frustrated
• What happens when things go wrong
• Tank traps for the unwary
• Who has the authority
• The sale of goods and services
• Recent cases and changes in the law

3. Negotiation strategy

• This session includes team exercises and the showing of the video
• Negotiation: a life skill
• Principled deals: the Harvard Law school system
• Lasting business relationships need trust
• A liar needs a good memory
• Taming the trickster
• Preparing to negotiate
• Desk research
• Our best interests
• Their best interests
• Knowing our own team and colleagues
• Perceiving the other team and their colleagues
• What to do if we don't get a deal
• Avoiding dangers of the quick deal
• 'In a good deal, everybody benefits'

4. Team negotiating

• Setting up the team
• Training the team
• Working together
• Playing at home and away
• Back up at home
• Location and timing
• The agenda
• Who leads and when? Passing the ball
• Setting up the team
• Washing up when the job is done
• Negotiating in groups
• Leaders in groups

5. The contract variation

• Mastering the brief
• Predicting the other sides' objectives
• Planning the approach
• Maintaining progress
• Carrying out the strategy
• Getting a result

6. Negotiation

• First steps in negotiation
• Exploring the ground
• Preliminary discussion
• Not getting bowled middle stump
• Detailed bargaining - the 'if' and 'when'
• Summing up the deal
• The post mortem

7. Tactics and tricks of negotiating

A survey of the manoeuvrings that can go on around the negotiating table, with some of the antidotes that may be applied:

• The emotions - shouting and pleading
• When to drink brandy and when to eat garlic
• The Hard Man and the Soft Man
• The Russian Man
• 'You'll have to do better than that!'
• The Chinese Krunch
• Negotiating by phone, fax and e-mail
• The emotions - when to shout out and when to weep
• When to offer gifts and when to refrain
• Ploys
• Pressure tactics