Strategy – Page 6 – thoughtLEADERS, LLC: Leadership Training for the Real World

The 5-Step Decision-Making Process

December 3, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

There are 5 important steps to keep in mind when making a decision.

It’s important to realize that decision-making is actually a process. And it’s the process of selecting a choice from my range of possible options, with a goal of achieving a very specific objective. Now, contrast that with judgment. Judgment is the ability to form an opinion or reach a conclusion based on available information plus prior experience. So as you go to make a decision, there are some important principles to keep in mind.

Prepare

First, be clear about the objective. You need to understand what you’re optimizing for or trying to achieve as you make that particular decision.

Decide Who Gets to Decide

Second, decide who gets to decide and who doesn’t. Be clear about who’s going to be involved in the decision-making process. You need to define who to involve and how to involve them. Some people are going to provide input, other people will provide perspective on implementation, other people will actually make the decision, and having clarity of roles is critical for successful decision-making.

Gather Information

Next, you’ll need to reduce ambiguity and risk as much as is reasonable before making your decision. The way to do that is to gather information, but realize that gathering information takes time. And as you’re taking that time, new sources of uncertainty are going to emerge.

Decide and Communicate

Next, you’ll need to make your choice and make that choice known to the organization. Tell people you’ve made a decision, what the decision is, and why you made it.

Measure and Adjust

And then last, once you’ve made the decision, you need to evaluate and adjust based on new information.

So the decision-making cycle that you should think about following is first, prepare to make the decision, then you actually make the decision, communicate it to people in the organization, execute, which is put the decision into action, and measure and adjust accordingly.

Want to learn more about decision-making strategies? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning decision-making strategies. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

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Want Better Deals? Try These 6 Negotiation Tactics

November 26, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

Use these six techniques as you go through your negotiations. They can be very effective, but each one has their downsides. So be deliberate around picking the technique and understanding the risks that come along with it.

Over the years, I’ve learned some great negotiating techniques and tactics, and I’d like to share them now.

The Invisible Man

The first is called The Invisible Man, and that’s where you’re in the heat of a deal and you don’t want to give an answer right now, or you don’t like the position that the other party is taking, and you just say, well, I have to check with my colleagues before I can give you an answer. That other party isn’t in the room, so you’ve pushed back the negotiation, you’ve bought yourself some time, and now you have the ability to go back to the other party, and say, I know you wanted a 20% discount, but I’ve spoken with my colleagues and the best we can do is 10%. So, you’ve created an invisible authority that the other party has to negotiate against.

The Bogey

The second technique is called The Bogey. Act like something you don’t care about at all is really important to you. And then as you go through the deal, fight hard for that one point, but then you can trade it away later like you’re making a major concession and it doesn’t really cost you anything.

The Nibble

The next technique is called The Nibble, and this is right at the last minute, right before you get a deal done, ask for something extra. It’s not going to be big enough to break the deal, but beware, it can upset the other party. For example, if you’re out shopping for a suit, and you buy two suits and you’re spending a lot of money, and at the last minute, right at the register, say, well, you know what, I’ll buy the suits, can you throw in a tie and a belt? Now, the salesperson is looking at a really big commission and they’re not going to lose that big commission over a tie and a belt, and it’s a small nibble right at the end.

The Highball or Lowball

The next technique is The Highball or Lowball, depending on the position. Start ridiculously high, or ridiculously low, to cause the other party to really reevaluate their opening price. Now, there’s risk in this one, it could backfire and end the deal immediately.

Future Value

Another technique is Future Value. This is where you promise more value tomorrow in exchange for concessions today. Hey, we want to do this deal with you, so we want a much lower price, but we’re going to create a long-term, strategic partnership with you. And in the future, we’re going to send a lot of business your way. Here’s the thing, that business never materializes. Early in my career, I would accept that, and I would make concessions on the promise of that future business. And so many times, I’ve been disappointed when it doesn’t appear. If you’re promised future value, beware of this dynamic. And the best way to make that happen is build it into the contract and say, fine, I’ll give you the concessions, when that future business comes in, and protect yourself from that future value approach.

Multiple Rounds

The last technique is Multiple Rounds. Every time you think you have a deal done, there’s one more negotiator they didn’t tell you about and you have to satisfy their needs, and at each step of the way, that one additional negotiator wants a little bit more of a concession. I’ve been in several situations where we thought we had a deal done and we got the, oh, well, we have to kick it up to my boss, and that boss wanted another 5% or 2%. And after several rounds of negotiations, we gave up a lot of value.

Now, you can use all of these techniques as you go through your negotiations. They can be very effective, but each one has their downsides. So, be deliberate around picking the technique and understanding the risks that come along with it.

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!

Speed Over Perfection: Why Being First to Market is Crucial

November 24, 2025/0 Comments/in Books, Guest Blogger, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

The fast-paced business environment is sometimes necessary, especially when making a name and space for your brand.

Today’s post is by Francisco Serrano, author of Brain-Ding. This is an archived post, originally published in 2020.

When you talk about branding, you are talking about constant change. This fast-paced environment leaves brand managers with no choice: they need to favor SPEED over perfection. That is, if they want to succeed. Especially when launching products.

When innovation is a key element in the industry, processes must be faster. Great businesses such as Amazon understand that decisions need to be immediate and the ability to adapt means the ability to survive. If companies decide to wait until they have the perfect product or service, they are giving their competitors the opportunity to get ahead of the game.

The truth is that chasing perfection slows down the process and in an increasingly dynamic world, you can’t afford to waste time. It is better to launch a product or a service and then build on it, rather than waiting on a faultlessness that might never come.

Being the first to market often means leadership. If you come in second place you might be perceived as a follower, and followers can’t charge premium prices or get to the top of the industry that easily.

Anchoring a Deal in a Negotiation

November 19, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

Anchors are initial points from which you’re going to negotiate. They can lock you into a position, and unfair anchors can kill a deal.

There’s an interesting dynamic that can happen in negotiations. It’s called anchoring. Anchors are initial points from which you’re going to negotiate. They can lock you into a position, and unfair anchors can kill a deal. If you get one, consider walking away. Also understand, if you give the other party an unfair anchor, they may walk away.

When you go to set an anchor, base it in reality with data or assumptions. Many times, the final offer in a deal, will end up within a reasonable distance from that initial anchor. For example, if you anchor your deal at $100 upfront, and that’s your first offer, more often than not, you’ll end up between 80 and $100. If instead, that first anchor was $500, you’ll end up between 400 and 500. That anchor can drive the final deal price a great deal. Now understand, that anchor also has to be based in reality. You can’t just throw a huge number out there, without some basis in fact. If you receive an anchor from the other party, and you don’t like it, change it. Go from one metric to another, and that’s an easy way to switch the anchor.

For example, I know a software company that was going to launch a platform, and the customer wanted to pay them $10,000 for the software. But they also wanted unlimited use of the software, forever. The startup would’ve lost out on significant longterm revenue, if they went with this single purchase price. That initial $10,000 anchor was not a tenable position. Now the startup didn’t argue with that anchor. They changed it. And they said “Well we don’t look at it as an initial purchase price. We’d rather look at it as a subscription model. And we’ll only charge you $100 per user, per year, for a seat license to our software.” They set this anchor based on comparable software sales in the market. And they were able to show their customer, “Here’s what comparable software costs.” They ended up ultimately with a fee structure of $100 for the first thousand users. $90 per year for the next thousand, and then $75 a year for any users over that. And it was an ongoing revenue stream. The startup captured significantly more value over time, because they were able to change the anchor from that initial one-time purchase, to an ongoing subscription.

As you look at the deals you’re entering into, be very aware of what those anchors are, and how they can shape the final outcome of the negotiation. Be deliberate about putting an anchor out there, and offering facts and data to support your in-going point. Because ultimately, that starting point is going to have a huge effect on the final negotiating price.

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!

Structuring a Deal in Negotiation

November 12, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

By understanding your deal’s structure, you’re going to be able to identify opportunities to get a better deal as well as make the deal easier to go through because you can make it better for all parties involved.

Deal structure is going to impact your negotiating approach. There are several things you should look at as you lay out what the structure is. What are the objective criteria that exist and what are the assumptions you’re making about the deal structure? Are there financial criteria that you’re going to look at? Perhaps NPV or ROI, or how much the deal is going to cost. Laying out these objective criteria and some of the assumptions you’re making can help you be more fact-based in approaching the deal.

Next, understand the barriers to the deal. There are a lot of things that are going to get in the way of a deal getting done. The better you understand what these potential barriers are, the better you’re going to be able to negotiate either around them or get things as concessions to help you overcome those barriers.

Third, when does the deal need to be done? Understand the impacts of timing, what’s the value of doing a deal now versus waiting? Does your position get stronger or weaker over time?

And last, understand what would expand the pie. What could make this a better deal for all parties involved? By understanding additional things that you could bring into the deal, you may be able to overcome some of the barriers that were there in the first place.

For example, I had a client at one point that was looking at purchasing some competitive assets. The objective criteria that we were going to use were ROI, return on investment, the dollars os synergies we would get from making the deal, the net present value of making that deal. And we made several assumptions upfront that would help us price the deal. We assumed pricing around the deal, market share we would be able to achieve if we owned those assets, and what sales of the combined business would look like going forward. Assessing barriers was critical, there were regulatory barriers, there were operational and acquisition barriers and lastly, sales price was going to be a barrier that we had to overcome. As far as timing, we had six weeks, this was a bid process, there was a specific date on the calendar that a bid had to be submitted. Timing in this case was critical and we knew the longer we waited, the worse our position got. Finally, in terms of the structure and expanding the pie, we could offer to keep their management team on, we could offer to invest in the business after we purchased it. We could even add financial incentives after the fact if the teams stayed on and helped us grow the business.

So we made it a better deal without having to layout more cash upfront. By understanding the deal’s structure, you’re going to be able to identify opportunities to get a better deal as well as make the deal easier to go through because you can make it better for all parties involved. Spend that extra time laying out the structure and documenting it so that when you take your initial position in that negotiation, you’re able to get the most value out of the entire process that you can.

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!

Understanding Players and Positions in Negotiation

November 5, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

Understanding the players and their positions is going to help you look at how they’re coming at the deal and the points you should either push on or be willing to concede.

Having a good knowledge of the players and the positions they are going to take in any negotiation is going to set you up for success. There are four things you should consider about your opponent.

First, who’s involved in the negotiation and who ultimately makes the deal? By looking at all the parties who are going to have a say, you’ll have a better understanding of what they want and what’s important to them.

Second, what are the must haves, the want to haves and the nice to haves? If you can list out all the things the other party wants to get out of the deal and understand what’s most important to them and what’s least important, it can inform your ultimate negotiating strategy.

Third, what’s your desired outcome from their perspective, and what happens if there’s no deal? The other party has goals. You have to lay out what you think those goals are, and also understand if a deal goes away, how are they going to react?

Last, what are the alternatives to the deal? You’re not the only option out there. They may have other opportunities that they can pursue if the deal falls through with you.

I was doing an acquisition once where it was a very complex deal, and we laid out the players and their positions very clearly. We understood who was involved. It was a family business, so the full leadership team, the entire family was going to be involved and would have to approve the deal. Their must haves were price and that the team had stay on as part of the operations. Their wants were they wanted control over the operations, but they were willing to give that up in the deal, and the nice to have would’ve been a little bit of extra money. Their desired outcome was to make a deal, but also to remain independent or sell to one of our competitors if the deal fell through. We had clarity on what it would take to keep them engaged in that deal process, and what would get them to be willing to make concessions to us.

Understanding the players and their positions is going to help you look at how they’re coming at the deal and the points you should either push on or be willing to concede.

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!

Emotion and Fairness in Negotiation

October 29, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

We like to think negotiations are purely logical, but if you make the mistake of creating bad emotions and bad feelings, it can lead to bad outcomes in your negotiation.

Two things you have to understand as you enter any negotiation are the impacts of emotions and fairness. I know we like to think that negotiations are purely logical, but they’re emotional, and you have to understand how perceptions of fairness, collaboration, and even being taken advantage of can impact negotiating stances and approaches both for you as well as for your opponent.

Imagine we’re walking down the street together and I find $10 on the ground. I pick it up and I decide I’m going to give you some of that money because you’re walking with me. I want you to ask yourself how you feel right now if I say, “I’m going to give you nine of these $10.” How do you feel if I say, “I’m going to give you 18 cents of these $10?” How about if I give you six of the $10? Fairness and emotions impact your willingness to negotiate. Even at 18 cents, you should be happy because it’s 18 cents more than you had before I found the money on the ground, but it feels bad. It feels unfair even though logically it’s a great decision.

Now let’s look at this in terms of your negotiations. You don’t want to be in a situation where you create those feelings in your negotiating opponent where they don’t want to work with you because they feel like you’re unfair. We like to think it’s logical, but if you make the mistake of creating bad emotions and bad feelings, it can lead to bad outcomes in your negotiation.

I’ve felt this personally. I had a client where in the past they would pay us X dollars per class for me to go and teach. Well, a new leader came into the organization and said, “Well, we’re not going to pay you X anymore. We’re going to pay you 40% of X just because we want to because we think the price should be lower.” This was a very difficult situation for me because I took it personally. I couldn’t control those feelings in that moment because it was a personal attack. This person was telling me that I was worth 60% less just because he said so.

Now I know this isn’t what he meant. Logically, it made sense for him to push down the price that we were charging, and I had to step back from the negotiation, set aside the emotions, and approach it much more logically. However, that negotiation could have gone poorly for him because he created negative feelings with me.

Spend some time in your negotiations and think through, “How would I feel if I was on the other side of this offer?” Would I feel good, or would I feel bad? And think about how you position your offers to make sure you take advantage of feelings of emotions and fairness in the deal.

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!

Choosing a Negotiation Style

October 22, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

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!

Setting Up for Future Deals When Negotiating

October 15, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

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!

Business Execution Lessons from the Kitchen

October 14, 2025/0 Comments/in Books, Guest Blogger, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

Today’s post is by Patrick Stroh, author of Business Strategy; Plan, Execute, Win! This is an archived post that was originally published in 2014.

After 20 plus years of life in corporate America, it was time for a bit of a sabbatical. Or maybe better said, it was time to knock some stuff off my bucket list. You know, that list of things that we’ve always said we’ll do someday, but “someday” gets further and further away and our life gets busier and busier and we just don’t seem to have the time, even though we know they are important endeavors. Well, enough – someday is today! I made a commitment to get a couple things knocked off my bucket list – and that is exactly what I’ve done and I think you’ll find a couple of these stories interesting and maybe applicable to you.

First, I’ve always wanted to write a book on business strategy since that is what I love to do most – conduct due diligence, take an executive leadership team through a thoughtful and worthwhile process, create a strategy including innovation, product/service evolutions, generate financial scenarios and then when we are ready, to execute the plan! The key being, to actually EXECUTE the plan and make adjustments as needed. So I finally sat down and wrote the book, but in a very approachable way which entertains while it educates. Think about learning key business strategy tips from the movies, the bible, from growing up on a farm and other eclectic venues. It’s worth a read – trust me.

A second item on my bucket list was to get some real, technical training as a chef. I had cooked my way through college years ago and have become a self-proclaimed foodie. I would take clients out to eat at high end establishments and many times think, “I could make that.” Or, “I could make that better.” Well, now I’ve gotten my chance. When I’m not consulting or writing, I’m taking classes at Le Cordon Bleu in Minneapolis/St. Paul on classical French techniques and dishes. What a blast! And while it’s not always as easy as some chefs make it look, I love it! It’s instantly rewarding to see someone swoon over your creation and enjoy how you have transformed some basic ingredients. So, what does being a chef have to do with business strategy and what should you learn from this? Good question, let me make a simple, but oh so important correlation.

Changing your Approach in a Negotiation

October 8, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

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!

How to Assess What Happened in a Negotiation

October 1, 2025/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

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.

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