 Negotiate effectively at work and you make your life a lot easier. You'll be negotiating every single day with your team, with your stakeholders, with your manager, with customers, with suppliers. Good negotiation skills will firstly help build a great reputation and results as a manager. Secondly create time and resources for you and your team to do your jobs well. Thirdly increase sales and or reduce costs for your company. And fourth help build trust with and appreciation from your team. And those with poor negotiation skills at manager level get left behind. They get the worst end of deals. They are not able to help their team properly. They don't often get promoted as quickly and they have a lot less fun at work. Better negotiation skills will help you every single day at work. I've found these seven actions to negotiate effectively at work super useful in my career. The better you get at negotiating, the easier you'll find creating value for your business. Being good and confident at negotiating is admired and celebrated in many organisations. Make yourself more valuable to your bosses. My name is Jess Coles and if you're new here, Enhance.training shares people management expertise, resources and courses so you can become a great manager that much faster. I've included links to additional videos in the description below as well as a video timestamp so do take a look at these. And if you like this video, please give it a thumbs up and subscribe. So let's talk about negotiation. You do plenty of negotiation every day of your life. I'm aiming to help you prepare for more complex negotiations with customers, suppliers, for resources internally etc. The first action to negotiate effectively at work is to prepare and know exactly what you want. Understanding what you want is a critical starting point in negotiation. If you're not sure what you want, you put yourself at a big disadvantage when negotiating. Some questions to answer to help you define exactly what you want. Firstly, what would be an amazing result for you? Can you define this? And don't worry too much about whether the other side will accept this position at this point. Secondly, what would be your walk away point? This is where what you get back is not really worth the effort of guessing it. Or where you run out of budget or come up against other constraints that you can't change without a loss of effort. Third, what alternatives would be acceptable to you? Fourth, what could you give away that are nice to have for you rather than must have areas? Fifth, if you have multiple points or requirements, can you prioritise these in order and then group them into must haves and nice to haves? Once you're sure about what you want, define it clearly and then prioritise the components of what you want. This gives you a good negotiating platform. Next steps to negotiate effectively at work is to put yourself in the other person's shoes and think through what they might want from you. Do your research and ask others for input so you can work through several scenarios. Before you enter negotiations, the more likely you'll be able to offer them a deal that works for both parties and meets all of your most important requirements in full. List out any assumptions that you're making about the other party's positions to validate during negotiations. Another negotiation tip is to come up with multiple offers that are of similar value to you that might provide different levels of value to the other party. A simple example might be to offer a price at the bottom of what you think will be acceptable to the other party and combine this with the payment in advance. Cash in advance may be more valuable than the extra profit to the other party. The best prepared often get the best deal in negotiations. The second action to negotiate effectively at work is to establish trust and openness early in the negotiations. When at work, entering into negotiations with an open and honest approach usually helps make negotiations successful. I'm not suggesting that you lay all of your cards on the table right away. Creating trust is a key part of negotiating. Being open is a powerful way of creating trust. If you're being open and sharing information, the other party is a lot more likely to reciprocate. Greater knowledge and understanding between parties help create a better deal for both parties. Start small and see how the other party responds. If they share information, you can share more. If they don't give you anything in return, you can adjust your approach. In many negotiations at work, you'll need to work with the other party into the future. Building trust is a great way to get what you want today and it also helps create good foundations for all future negotiations. Establish trust by being open and sharing information in stages. Adjust your approach depending on how the other party reacts. The third action to negotiate effectively at work is to actively listen and don't assume. Making incorrect assumptions when negotiating is so easily done. Many courses on negotiation open with exercises in which both parties are given different briefs to highlight how making assumptions hinder you during negotiations. Try not to make assumptions. Ask questions to find out what the other party's position is. Ask questions to validate any assumptions you have made in your preparation for the negotiation. Keep your questions as open as possible, which gives you much more scope to learn more about the other party. The better each party understands the other, the better your chances of coming up with a deal that works well for both parties. Actually, if you listen to what you're being told, how does this confirm or change your approach? Keep aware of the body language and all the non-verbal clues being provided by the other party. The pauses, the tone and pace of voice, the use of eyes, etc. Are there any conflicts between what you're being told and the non-verbal communication, for instance? Aiming to be listening more than talking during the negotiation. Don't assume. Ask open questions to build a picture of what the other party wants. Keep mentally referring back to the scenarios you plan for and adapt the closest or most appropriate ones. The fourth action to negotiate effectively at work is making the first offer. Making the first offer is a bit of a double-edged sword. You get to set the reference point or anchor point of the negotiation, which usually gives you an advantage. If your first offer is unrealistic, too high or too low, you risk damaging the trust you've built up and delaying or derailing the negotiations. If you've done your homework, have good market knowledge and a reasonable insight into what the other party wants. Putting forward a first reasonable offer means the negotiations start from a point of your choosing. Don't lose the trust you've built up to this point. The fifth action to negotiate effectively at work is don't be intimidated by bullies. You will come across parties that employ bullying tactics such as being aggressive to claim value or refusing to move or provide information or starting with very low or a high pricing or other elements to anchor the negotiations firmly to their advantage. You may get direct or implied threats such as buying from competitors or stopping supply etc. These tactics usually invoke flight or fight responses in us all. We need time to get our reactions back into a rational mode. So use questions to buy yourself time to calm down and think. Mirroring is a great technique which is where you take one to three words from the end of their statement and use them in your next question. A simple example, the customer you must get delivery to me by Friday. You by Friday and then you are silent waiting for their explanation. Mirroring is a great way to get or keep the other person talking. Another useful tactic to employ is labelling. For instance, if they are being very aggressive in their manner, you could state I'm getting the sense there is a lot of tension around this subject. Labelling their behaviour or emotions draws their behaviour explicitly into the open which can help diffuse it or reduce it. Getting explanations becomes easier when emotional states are reduced. When facing strong arm tactics it is very important to manage your own body language. Show calmness use a slow pace of voice with a calm, confident tone. Adopt neutral postures. If you show your calm, unfazed and not intimidated the bully is much more likely to change tact. If you play into their hands they will continue using bullying tactics to try and intimidate and control you and the negotiations. The sixth action to negotiate it effectively at work is how to talk price. The price part of the negotiation is always difficult and the part that most people dread. Talk about price towards the end of the negotiations. I mean, after all if you have not negotiated all the terms how can you effectively price what you are buying or selling? When discussing price don't provide a range provide a specific number. If you provide a range most advantageous to them. Give or ask for a price that allows you some movement after giving it. Be clear on the value that you are providing to the other party. Your price is important but it is rarely the only important element. If you have given a price and the other party pushes downwards on that price ask what they are going to offer in return for you moving on price. This could be better payment terms additional marketing exposure better SLAs etc. This is where your preparation really comes into play. What is valuable to you but may be less valuable for the other party? Avoid negotiating just on price. If you do getting a good deal is a lot harder for you. The seventh action to negotiate effectively at work is to aim for win-win. Aiming for win-win is a very sensible outcome when you need to negotiate effectively at work. You will probably have to work with the other party into the future. Taking the largest slice of the pie you can might be good in the short term but will they do business with you again? A far better aim is to try and enlarge the pie available to both parties in the negotiation. This gives each of you far more room to both walk away with a good deal that meets each party's needs. A simple example of enlarging the pie could be discovering that lower minimum order quantities are more important than price because of the stock issues the other party has. Construct a deal that helps both parties create additional value extra profit for one and better stock management for the other. Aim for win-win particularly when negotiating at work when you need to retain good relationships into the future. In summary to negotiate effectively at work make sure you are really clear about what you want and then prepare both in terms of what is essential and in terms of preparing scenarios based on what you think the other party wants. Manage your emotions and responses during the negotiation and aim to create trust early and maintain it through the negotiations. Spend more time listening when negotiating and aim for win-win outcomes. Enjoy negotiating more effectively. So just to recap the seven actions to negotiate effectively at work are firstly prepare and know what you want secondly establish trust and openness thirdly actively listen and don't assume fourth making the first offer fifth don't be intimidated by bullies sixth how to talk price and then seventh success is win-win. And if you have any questions on the seven actions to negotiate effectively at work please leave them in the comment section below and I'll get back to you. Thanks very much for watching and I look forward to seeing you again soon.