Do you struggle to get things done because you overthink your work? Try these three tips to overcome “analysis paralysis.”
Many times I’ve heard it said that perfect is the enemy of done. A big barrier to executing initiatives is analysis paralysis. The team gets bogged down on proving their case is 100% accurate and risk-free before they act. That slows down execution and leads to missed opportunities. By understanding the risks you face and making appropriate trade-offs between timeliness and accuracy effects, you can speed up execution and break through analysis paralysis. Read more
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/20210707-Woman-Biting-Pencil.jpg?fit=1920%2C1280&ssl=112801920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2026-10-21 06:30:182026-10-21 03:30:54How to Break Free from Analysis Paralysis
Your domain masters are an invaluable asset—don’t take them for granted. Do everything you can to make them happy and keep them around.
You might be lucky enough at some point to have a domain master on your team. These people are in the upper right quadrant of the leadership matrix. You don’t have to put in a lot of time and energy and you get outstanding results. Your domain masters demonstrate a long track record of consistent, outstanding performance. They’re happy in their current role. They don’t want to take on dramatically different responsibilities. They tend to be your go-to person for information and assistance on specific topics where they have deep expertise. They’re some of the most valuable assets on your team. They require very little leadership capital from you. And they consistently deliver those great results.
There are some easy ways to spot a domain master. They have a quiet confidence. They tend not to complain. They’re not usually very self-promoting about their own work. They’re self-starters. They overcome obstacles on their own. People seek out their expertise, especially when it relates to an area that this person knows a lot about. People seek to work with them. A lot of times they’re highly recruited by other teams in the organization. And most of the domain masters I know tend to have a really good work-life balance.
I had one domain master on my team who knew everything about this business unit. When we had a question, we called George. He knew everything going back 15 years in this entire business unit. He was the true expert in this space. If you’re wondering who your domain masters are and how you can identify them just ask the people on your team, “Hey, when we have a question about this topic, who do we call?” The name you get back is probably your domain master.
How to Retain Domain Masters
With domain masters, your primary goal is to retain them in the organization. Their expertise is invaluable; you don’t want them leaving. The challenge with domain masters is you tend to rely on them for a substantial share of your teams results. It can be very easy to take these people for granted. Your goal with domain masters is to retain and nurture them. Make sure they know they’re valued for their contributions. Remove obstacles that frustrate them. Make their jobs easier to do.
I had a domain master on my team, his name was George. We gave him great performance reviews. We put him up for internal rewards for the awesome job he was doing. We got him out of a noisy call center environment and put him in a much nicer office space. We also increased his autonomy and authority to do his job. I wanted George happy, I wanted to keep him around. I took action to make sure that he was happy and stayed in the organization.
The benefits of effectively leading a domain master include you keep them on your team and producing great results. You retain them for the broader organization. You become a beacon to attract other high performers to your team because they see you treat your people well. This individual can also serve as an example for the rest of your team. They can train other people who come into the team. Your domain masters are an invaluable asset—don’t take them for granted. Do everything you can to make them happy and keep them around.
Want to learn more about developing your team? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to assess and improve your strategic plans. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260915-Businessman-Giving-a-Presentation-to-3-Colleagues.jpg?fit=1920%2C1282&ssl=112821920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2026-09-16 06:32:582026-09-15 21:05:47How to Identify and Retain Domain Masters on Your Team
Rising stars are quick to understand their roles, they deliver outstanding results, and they require very little guidance.
Your team members who are in the upper right quadrant of the leadership matrix are your exemplars. One type of exemplar is your rising star. Rising stars are your future leaders. They’re eventually going to be taking over your role. These people require very little leadership capital investment, and they deliver great results. They’re typically quick to understand their roles, they deliver outstanding results, and they require very little guidance or assistance from you as they do their work. They actively seek out new growth opportunities.
There are some pretty easy ways to spot a rising star. First, they make a strong early impression. You put them in the role and they’re on their way. They’re dedicated, they have a strong sense of pride of ownership in their work. They quickly master their role and deliver high-quality results. They’re always seeking out new ways to improve their role, as well as pursuing growth opportunities to improve themselves. They volunteer and help out other people, and a lot of times people from other organizations are going to try and recruit these people away from your team.
I was very fortunate to have a rising star on my team at one point. I brought him in to run one of my business units. One of the first things he did was say, “Mike, give me a couple of weeks. I’m going to come back to you with the strategic plan.” Two weeks later, he came back with a very buttoned-up strategic plan that laid out the next three years, the major initiatives he was going to pursue, and the resource allocation for how he was going to get it done. He then went on to build very strong relationships with every member of his team, as well as the external business partners he worked with. I knew for this individual I could step back, not put in a lot of time and energy, and just get out of his way and let him deliver those outstanding results.
If you have a rising star on your team, make sure you spot them early and give them the space to grow and deliver the results that you expect.
Want to learn more about developing your team? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to assess and improve your strategic plans. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/20221207-Gold-Stars.jpg?fit=1920%2C1372&ssl=113721920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2026-09-09 06:30:332026-09-09 01:53:42How to Identify Rising Stars on Your Team
Know the different benefits and drawbacks of contractors and employees. Make sure you choose deliberately to drive the outcome you’re looking for.
When you want to grow your consulting firm, you’re probably going to have to bring on additional people. There’s only so much of you to go around. Make deliberate choices about whether the people you bring on will be contractors or employees. Ensure that individuals’ interests are aligned with yours.
If you’re going to bring on contractors, you don’t run into all the employment and tax issues and they’re going to be a more flexible workforce. The downside is they can leave suddenly and they don’t always share your personal interests.
If the people you bring on are employees, they’re dedicated to the work, but they come along with a lot of administrative issues you’re going to have to deal with. If you need someone who’s fully committed to building your firm but that person’s only interest is part-time work to supplement their income, you’re not going to be happy with that result. Ensure interests are aligned between you and the people you bring on.
A lot of times I get people who say they want to work with me, and we run a training firm. They’ll tell me, “Well Mike, when you can’t do the training session, just throw me that gig.” The problem is, I don’t need people for bandwidth to do the training. I need salespeople. That relationship won’t work out, so I have to hire different people.
I’ve chosen a structure where I have contractors. I don’t want to deal with the overhead. I don’t want to deal with the administrative issues. That’s great that I have contractors because I don’t deal with those issues. The downside is, sometimes I struggle to get my contractors’ attention and have them focus on building my business versus other interests they’re pursuing.
Know the different benefits and drawbacks of contractors and employees. Make sure you choose deliberately to drive the outcome you’re looking for.
Want to learn more about consulting? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning more about consulting. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/20260811-Growing-Bar-Chart.jpg?fit=1920%2C1222&ssl=112221920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2026-08-12 06:30:262026-08-11 20:08:13Scaling Up Your Business From Individual to Team
Fear in leadership rarely looks like fear. It looks like responsibility, caring, and high standards. Here is how to tell the difference before it costs you.
Today’s post is by Erika Alessandrini, author of Maybe It’s Me: Looking Inward to Create Real Change Through Conscious Choices (Amplify Publishing, 2026).
It didn’t look like fear.
It looked like a leader who cared. Someone who stayed late, caught the details others missed, and never let a ball drop. From the outside, it looked like excellence. From the inside, it felt like the only way to make sure things went right.
That feeling – the urgent pull to step in, to take over, to handle it – rarely announces itself as fear. It arrives dressed as responsibility. As caring. As high standards. It sounds like “someone has to do this” and “I can do it better” and “it’s faster if I just take care of it myself.” It feels like competence. It feels like investment. It feels, honestly, like leadership.
But underneath those reasonable-sounding thoughts is something else entirely.
Fear doesn’t make you careless. It makes you controlling.
Not controlling in the obvious sense – not domineering or demanding. Controlling in the quieter sense: reaching for certainty when uncertainty feels unbearable. Narrowing the space when the space feels too open. Taking on more because letting go feels like a risk you can’t afford. Control – or the illusion of it – is what provides the security fear is craving in those moments. It works, too. Just not for long, and not without cost.
The problem is that fear wearing the costume of responsibility is nearly impossible to detect from the inside. You’re not lying to yourself. You genuinely believe you’re helping. You genuinely believe the stakes require your involvement. And you may even be right – in the moment. But the moment is not the whole story.
Here is what accumulates over time when fear has been running the show dressed as leadership: the team that stops bringing you problems because they already know you’ll solve them. The colleague who defers to you not because they trust your judgment but because they’ve learned that resistance costs more than it’s worth. The relationships that look functional and feel hollow. The leader who appears indispensable and is, slowly, becoming a ceiling for everyone around them.
The cost isn’t always loud. It doesn’t arrive as a crisis. It arrives as a quiet contraction – in the people around you, and eventually in you. And because it accumulates slowly, it’s nearly impossible to calculate in real time. You don’t see it coming. You just wake up one day and something has broken – a job, a marriage, your health – and you’re left trying to trace it back to a pattern that never felt like a problem because it always felt like leadership.
Here is what this is not: a case for doing less, caring less, or lowering your standards. The goal isn’t to step back. It’s to carry exactly what’s yours – no more, no less – and allow others to do the same. One hundred percent responsibility. Not ninety, where you’ve checked out. Not one hundred and fifty, where you’ve absorbed what belongs to someone else. Just yours. Cleanly, clearly, fully yours. And theirs, fully theirs.
That distinction matters because it changes what leadership feels like from the inside. Not lighter in a diminished way. Lighter in the way that comes from finally setting down what was never yours to carry.
So what do you do with this?
You don’t need a new system. You need a single question, asked honestly, in the moment before you step in.
Is what I’m about to do creating capacity in someone else – or dependency on me?
Capacity looks like someone growing, deciding, struggling productively, learning what they’re made of. Dependency looks like someone waiting for you to tell them what to do next. Both can feel like help. Only one of them actually is.
That question won’t always give you a clean answer. But it will slow you down long enough to tell the difference between a choice made from genuine leadership and a choice made because fear handed you a to-do list and called it responsibility.
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/20260705-Boss-Talking-with-Employees-in-a-Meeting.jpg?fit=1920%2C1278&ssl=112781920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2026-07-06 08:02:452026-07-05 21:31:15When Responsibility Is the Mask Fear Wears
When everything feels urgent, nothing gets done, and your team pays the price.
Today’s post is by Liane Davey, PhD, organizational psychologist and New York Times bestselling author.
The following is an excerpt from the title Thoughtload: Manage The Madness and Free Your Team To Do Great Work by Liane Davey, PhD.
A leader I worked with, let’s call her Rebecca, was struggling profoundly with prioritization. She was smart and ambitious, but that made the task of winnowing down activities difficult because she could make a compelling case for why every investment mattered. As a result, her team was stretched across multiple priorities and working nonstop with no results to show for it. Everyone but Rebecca could see that they needed to do fewer things at once: to focus, get traction, work to completion, then move on to the next priority.
For months, this was the crux of our coaching conversations. But each time we made progress by deleting, delaying, or de-scoping an initiative, one of her team members would call me afterward to ask if I was aware that Rebecca had added multiple initiatives since our last session. I would broach the issue with Rebecca and remind her that her job was to help the team make the hard trade-offs and focus on a small set of the most valuable actions; doing one or two things at a time and then moving on to the next would be much more productive than trying to do everything at once. To her credit, she took the message to heart and stopped adding initiatives. Unfortunately, her compulsion to do more led her to start hiding three projects under one initiative heading, like a mom hiding vegetables in the lasagna. To be fair, I don’t think she even realized she was doing it.
At some point, the dilution of the team’s resources across so many activities meant nothing worked, and the situation reached a breaking point where Rebecca’s job was on the line. Only then did she switch into crisis mode and pick one initiative that would save the team. If they could resolve an urgent supply chain issue, they would solve a lot of problems for the company and rehabilitate their image. The supply chain project became the first and only priority. A couple of team members kept the lights on, but everyone else worked tirelessly to implement the project. It became nonnegotiable. Anything anyone needed to progress became top priority for everyone. I’ve never seen her team more productive, more ingenious, or more energized. What they accomplished in six weeks would have taken them at least a year in their former diluted and distracted state. Even two years later, when new challenges emerged, someone would often mention the supply chain project as an example of what was possible when they were all aligned on one clear priority. I won’t say that Rebecca is cured of her pernicious predilection for piling priorities, but now she knows that it’s an issue she needs to continually manage.
Being a manager is a big responsibility, at least if you care about being a good one. For your employees, you are the key connection to the organization and the primary source of intel on what belongs in their thoughtload: what is important, what is legitimately worrisome, and what is worth the effort. If you abdicate that role, your team members’ thoughtload will run rampant, as it did in Rebecca’s team. However, if you embrace your role in helping your employees direct their attention, process their emotions, and use their energy wisely, you have the opportunity to not only reduce their thoughtload but also increase their productivity and decrease their stress. Said more directly, you have the chance to transform the experience of work for your team.
Liane Davey has spent more than 25 years researching and advising teams on how to perform at their best. Known as the “teamwork doctor,” she works with teams from the frontlines to the boardroom, across industries and around the world, from Boston to Bangkok. Through her work with hundreds of teams, including 26 Global Fortune 500 companies (and counting), she has developed a practical, research-backed approach to solving the challenges that prevent teams from working effectively together. She is also the author of Thoughtload: Manage the Madness and Free Your Team to Do Great Work, which tackles today’s most pressing management challenges: over-burdened systems, burned-out teams, and plateauing results.
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
As you’re entering your negotiation, think through the importance of the relationship and the importance of the outcome, then be deliberate about the negotiating style you choose.
You should be deliberate when you enter a negotiation in choosing a specific style of negotiating. The way I encourage people to look at choosing a style is first understand the importance of the relationship. That relationship can have low importance, so somebody you’re just meeting for the first time and you won’t have an on-going relationship with them, or high importance, this is a strategic long-term relationship. The second thing you have to look at is the importance of the outcome of that specific negotiation, from low importance, there’s not a lot of value on the table, to high importance, this means a lot of money for your organization or it’s a high risk outcome.
And what you end up with is a two by two matrix with four different negotiating strategies:
Splitting the pie
In the lower left, the first strategy we put out is splitting the pie. This style means you have a low value of the relationship, you’re not going to see this person in the future and the relationship doesn’t really matter. You also have a low importance of the outcome. It’s not a big deal if you win in the negotiation. For example, if you’re a buying a souvenir from a street vendor when you’re on vacation, you should just look at that from the standpoint of you won’t see this person again and it’s not a big deal if you get the best deal on your souvenir. So what the strategy says is split the pie, just find the middle point where both of you are happy and move on with your vacation. Haggling takes time and energy and effort, just split the pie.
Serving the pie
In the lower right, you have a much higher importance of the relationship, but the outcome is still low in terms of its importance. We call this style serving the pie. You want to maintain the relationship. For example, if it’s a situation where you’re negotiating over payment terms and you want to get paid in 30 days and the customer wants to pay you in 60. This isn’t a big point economically and you could ruin the relationship if you fight very hard over this point, so in that situation, serve the pie. Give your negotiating partner what they want in the interest of maintaining or even strengthening that relationship.
Take the pie
In the upper left, the style to use is take the pie. So the relationship has very low value, but the importance of the outcome is very high. In this situation, you want to extract as much value as you can and you’re not worried about the ongoing relationship. For example, if you’re out buying a car, that’s a high-dollar purchase, and you’re probably not going to see that car sales rep again in the future. So here you should try and take the pie and get as much value as you can out of that particular negotiation and not worry about the relationship.
Expand the pie
The last quadrant in the upper right, the style is expand the pie. The relationship is very valuable and you want to maintain and strength it and the value that’s on the table, the importance of the outcome is very high, so what you should try to do is create new opportunities for both of you where both of you can get more value from that partnership. For example, if you’re purchasing a large IT system from a strategic vendor, you don’t want to ruin that longterm relationship because they’re going to give you ongoing support for the system. So find ways that you can add new features and give more value to your negotiating partner in exchange for them making some more concessions for you. If you can put more revenue in their pocket, perhaps you can get a lower total price.
As you’re entering your negotiation, think through the importance of the relationship and the importance of the outcome, then be deliberate around the negotiating style you choose. This could have huge implications for how much value you get out of that particular situation as well as how important and how strong those future relationships are going to be.
Want to learn more about strategic negotiation? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to set business unit goals. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/20251021-Handshake.jpg?fit=1920%2C1280&ssl=112801920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2025-10-22 06:32:182025-10-21 23:30:16Choosing a Negotiation Style
Thinking through multiple deals and the sequence of those events can help you drive a lot more value out of your negotiations.
When you go through any negotiation process, you have to realize that this deal sets up future deals. Consider this negotiation’s impact on future negotiations. If you don’t, you potentially can make some huge mistakes. Every deal sets precedent for the next one in terms of the numbers, the terms you come to, as well as the tone of that negotiation.
For example, if you’re selling a service and you decide you’re going to set a discounted rate upfront, set your list rate and then offer a discount off of that, versus just offering a lower rate without talking about the discount. Why? Because that rate is going to become permanent. So if initially you set a rate here and say “The first time out, I’m going to offer you a discount,” but then you can go back to that initial rate. If you set the rate here to start, you’re going to be stuck there.
I have this conversation with my instructors when we bring on new clients. And when we send those initial contracts and the invoices, we go to the trouble of saying, “Here are the list rates,” because that number is the number that’s going to survive this negotiation and be used going forward. If you make major concessions in a negotiation this time, trade on them the next time. If you set a precedent on pricing this time and you’re happy with it, refer back to it next time. Anything you do in today’s deal can be used in future deals. It can either benefit you if you’re thoughtful about it, or it can really harm you on the backend if you’re not thinking about it now.
I did a deal once where we overpaid on the purchase of a company because we had to. We were buying that organization back into our company. And we overpaid by a great deal. For future negotiations, we were able to use that price that we paid and extract concessions with those owners in the next deal. We set a much higher price in the future for what we wanted from them. Now the only reason we were able to set a higher price for something we were selling them was because we made the concession here and we traded on it very deliberately in a future deal.
Look at a negotiation you’re going through. Think through, “Will I be happy with the precedent I’m setting now the next time around?” If you’re not, think about changing that precedent. If you’re in the middle of a deal now, think back to a prior negotiation with that partner. Have you given up things in the past that you can get back now because you made those prior concessions? Thinking through multiple deals and the sequence of those events can help you drive a lot more value out of your negotiations.
Want to learn more about strategic negotiation? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to set business unit goals. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/20251015-Negotiation-in-a-Sunny-Room.jpg?fit=1920%2C1280&ssl=112801920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2025-10-15 06:32:472025-10-15 01:42:42Setting Up for Future Deals When Negotiating
Be willing to change your approach in a negotiation, but only do so when you fully understand the benefits and the risks of doing so.
During a negotiation, you can change your approach. You don’t have to maintain your initial approach or your initial position. You can change it at any time. Your opponent won’t maintain their approach or their position, so along the way, throughout the deal, determine your counteroffers and your approach and how it might change and how those changes might benefit your position.
For example, you can become more or less aggressive. You can become cooperative. You might change your anchor. In the initial negotiation, you said the price was here, but you know what? The price just went up or the price went down. You can add negotiating points along the way. Just because you didn’t ask for something right out of the gate, doesn’t mean you can’t add it later on.
Beware of getting locked into a single negotiating approach. Your opponent can and will use that against you. We were involved in a very contentious negotiation at one point. In the beginning, we were very collaborative, but our opponent was very combative. We knew the main points we wanted. They were price and deal structure. We also knew that time was our friend and their enemy.
Now throughout the negotiations, we continued making concessions and we stayed collaborative the entire time, as long as price and structure were acceptable to us. But time passed, a lot of time passed and the other party changed structure and they got very aggressive at one point. But, the thing they missed was so much time had passed that our position was going to change because time was now on our favor.
We turned around and got very aggressive in that negotiation and based on the structure and pricing at that point, we pushed very hard for additional concessions. The other party was caught by surprise by our change in approach and overall, it worked out much better for us. Our willingness to take our collaborative approach and set it aside, understand the impact of time and how it had changed, and change our approach to be more aggressive, drove a lot of value for our organization.
As you’re going through your deal process, think through the approach you’re taking now and if there are changes that you can make, as well as what the impact of those changes might be. Be willing to change approach, but only do so when you fully understand the benefits and the risks of doing so.
Want to learn more about strategic negotiation? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to set business unit goals. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/20251007-Group-Negotiation-in-a-Sunny-Room.jpg?fit=1920%2C1247&ssl=112471920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2025-10-08 06:30:312025-10-07 19:30:48Changing your Approach in a Negotiation
Reflect on your negotiations to improve your performance in future rounds.
Throughout a negotiation, you should be assessing what’s happening. Track major negotiating points over time. See what’s a plus or a minus versus the last round of negotiations. If you go back to your initial goals and what the other party’s initial goals were, their must-haves, want-to-haves, nice-to-haves, and also evaluate it for your end, you can track where you’re making concessions over time. Where’s the other party fighting hard for something? Doing this type of assessment can help you identify what’s really important to them and what’s not. Assessment can help you identify topics that recur and also areas where they’re more willing to make concessions.
Be very aware of prior offers that you make. Make sure you have documentation because the other party can bring them back up later and use them against you. Now the good news is you can do the same thing. But if you’re not aware of an offer you make or an offer, even worse, that somebody on your team makes that you’re not aware of, those things can come back to bite you in the end.
I had a situation where we were negotiating for a long period of time, and after each set of emails, because that was the dominant communication vehicle for those communications, my partners and I sat down and we compared notes. We looked for concessions they were requesting. We also considered negotiating techniques they were using, things like the invisible man where they were saying, “Hey, I need to go check with someone else before I can offer this point,” or a technique called the bogey, where they were making something out to be really important to them, but as we tracked it, it was clear that it really wasn’t. We were able to look at how our old quotes and conversations were being used against us in the deal.
Now the first deal we made with them, we didn’t really understand all of these dynamics, and it didn’t go as well for us as we would have liked. But we learned because we assessed that deal after the fact. It made us much more mindful of how we should structure our future quotes. We knew what was really important to them. We knew how they would use these various tools and techniques against us, like the invisible man or the bogey. And all of our future offers were based on an understanding of how that last negotiation went. We were much more successful in future rounds.
Make sure you’re taking the time to pause and assess what’s going well and what’s not. What are they pushing on, and what are they willing to concede? Think through how that’s going to impact your overall negotiating strategy and the position you take in subsequent rounds.
Want to learn more about strategic negotiation? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to set business unit goals. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/20250930-Group-Meeting.jpg?fit=1920%2C1080&ssl=110801920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2025-10-01 06:30:062025-09-30 23:56:17How to Assess What Happened in a Negotiation
Employees need to know that what they do matters—how it matters, where it matters, how long it matters, for whom it matters, and why it matters.
Today’s guest post is by Wendy Lipton-Dibner, author of What MATTERS Matters Most.
They’d tried everything from bonuses to retreats, and while each intervention produced motivational boosts, the results were always short-lived.
In the meantime, disengagement was spreading throughout the organization, and their frustration was growing by the day.
“Nothing we do matters,” Brian sighed.
“Wait, that’s it!” Kathy exclaimed. “I bet that’s what everyone thinks!
“If our employees believe nothing they do matters, then why would they bother to step up?
“We need to give our entire team proof that what they do really matters.”
They called a lunch meeting for the following week and when they arrived, the auditorium was packed.
Kathy picked up the microphone. “Raise your hand if making an impact in people’s lives is important to you.”
Nearly every hand went up, so Kathy continued.
“Brian and I agree with you. Impact is important, and we think the work each of you do is likely creating a lot of impact.
“In fact, you could be enabling our products and services to deliver way more impact than we ever anticipated.
“It’s entirely possible that your work is creating ripple effects that bring ongoing impacts to multiple areas of our customers’ lives, and we intend to prove it!”
The attendees burst into applause as chants of, “Prove it! Prove it! Prove it!” reverberated throughout the auditorium.
Brian smiled broadly as Kathy instructed each department to make a quick list of the potential impacts their work produces.
The energy was electric as each team moved their chairs together to make a list of their impacts.
Next, Kathy told the group to discuss how they could purposefully infuse impact into existing and future products and services to increase customer engagement, loyalty and growth.
Finally, she invited each department to send a representative up to the stage to read their list.
Each presenter received applause that grew louder with every list that was shared.
“Let’s do a little research study,” Kathy challenged. “Starting today, we want every single one of you to prioritize impact-driven results in everything you do.
“We’ll do this for six months and see how this affects our metrics.
“Thank you for your enthusiasm today. We’ll keep you posted.”
Brian and Kathy stayed for more than an hour, shaking hands with leaders and employees as they expressed congratulations and asked about next steps.
The CMO and CFO stood watching. When everyone had left, they walked up to Brian and Kathy, shook their hands, and said, “Best. Meeting. Ever. What do you need from us?”
Over the next weeks and months, leaders reported increasing engagement among their employees, including increased productivity, initiative, collaboration, innovation, sales, and more.
Six months later, Kathy called the full team together again. This time, she celebrated their significantly increased metrics, spotlighting customer engagement, satisfaction, loyalty, and repeat and referral revenue.
At the close of the meeting, Kathy read a congratulatory email from one of their shareholders, and another from an inspired vendor offering a sponsorship.
Then Brian stepped up to the microphone. “I must confess, I never believed this initiative would work.
“I’m here to tell you guys, you proved me wrong. The impact you made on this organization, and on me personally, is something I will never forget. Thanks everyone!”
This story is just one of many that have shown what can happen when leaders prioritize impact in every area of their organization.
As a social scientist and decades-long organizational strategist, I’ve witnessed the damage employee disengagement inflicts on internal and external stakeholders.
I’ve also spoken with leaders who invested tens of thousands of dollars implementing respected solutions, only to rebound far worse than where they had started.
After serving more than 1,000 organizations in every industry from healthcare to hospitality, my research revealed a missing component that is critical to employee engagement.
The missing piece is also crucial for stakeholder loyalty and ongoing growth.
Bottom line, what leaders have been missing is proof of the ongoing, long-term, Real-World Impact of products and services.
Real-World Impact is the immediate, ongoing, and long-term changes, outcomes, differences, results, events, and experiences that occur after customers, patients, or beneficiaries receive the planned benefits of a product or service.
Employees need to know that the products and services they help research, innovate, develop, design, manufacture, market, sell, deliver, service, and support are creating an ongoing stream of desirable, meaningful, important, potentially life-changing impacts in multiple areas of customers’ lives over time.
Real-World Impact Metrics provide invaluable proof to employees that what they do matters—how it matters, where it matters, how long it matters, for whom it matters, and why it matters.
Real-World Impact Metrics also provide unprecedented proof to customers, patients, and beneficiaries, increasing the value they place on the products they use and the services they receive.
This proof is the missing piece that enables leaders to build and sustain impassioned engagement, unrivaled loyalty, and boundless growth among all stakeholders.
Can it really be that simple? Yes.
Wendy Lipton-Dibner is internationally recognized as the leading authority on Organizational Impact Strategy. President and CEO of Professional Impact, Inc., Wendy is the inventor of the Real-World Impact Metrics // Journey of Impact technology [ProveYourImpact.com], and author of What MATTERS Matters Most™. [WhatMattersMattersMost.com]
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/20250929-Do-What-Matters-Sign.jpg?fit=1920%2C1280&ssl=112801920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2025-09-29 08:02:332025-09-28 23:57:55What Are We Missing???
Overallocating is a strategy that can help you meet your goals by aiming higher than you need to.
When you’re breaking department goals down and allocating portions of that goal to different teams, you can take an approach that’s known as overallocating the goal. This means, when you add up all the subteam goals, they amount to more than the overall department goal. This approach can improve your chances of hitting your high-level department goal, but this approach can also put unnecessary pressure on your teams to deliver more than they have to.
I saw one division that had a $200 million revenue goal. They had five regions. Each region was given a goal of $42 million of revenue. When you add that up, that $210 million. Within those regions, they overallocated too. Each branch in the region got goals that totaled up across the division to $215 million. Then, in the branches, they actually overallocated to their salespeople. The individual sales reps’ goals were added up, and that came to $220 million, so they were 10% over what their commit goal of $200 million was.
The behavior that resulted was some sales reps exceeded their individual goals. Some met their goals. Some fell short. The primary goal of hitting that $200 million of revenue was hit. Everyone was focused on sales, and the division achieved that goal because of this overallocating process. If they hadn’t overallocated, those sales reps who fell short would have cratered the overall division’s goal.
Now be careful about overallocating too much. When you do so, you might be breaking the rule of making a goal achievable. This can also lead to behavior of sandbagging. And if everyone knows you’re going to overallocate, they’re going to take on this sandbagging behavior during the budgeting and goal-setting process. That’s not productive.
Assess whether or not overallocating is appropriate for your organization. If you do it, make sure, when you overallocate, you don’t create that dysfunctional behavior of putting too much pressure on the team. But if you do the overallocation well, it increases the likelihood that you’re going to hit your goals.
Want to learn more about setting business unit goals? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to set business unit goals. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!
Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/20250924-Target-on-Stairs.jpg?fit=1920%2C1222&ssl=112221920Trevor Joneshttps://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.pngTrevor Jones2025-09-24 06:30:372025-09-24 00:58:05Overallocating to Meet Your Goals
