Negotiation at Work: Maximize Your Team's Skills with 60 High-Impact Activities

INTRODUCTION

Negotiation is an interactive activity that requires a variety of skills. It is not limited to the process of making concessions, offers, and counter offers. It requires self-awareness, good questioning, listening, and conflict resolution skills, as well as an ability to understand the needs and interests of others. We have therefore included exercises that cover all of these issues.

THE ORGANIZATION OF THIS BOOK

The exercises in this book are grouped by topic and presented in the following chapters.

Opening Activities (3 activities)

These activities are designed to open a negotiation program or to serve as pre-work materials. As pre-work materials, they begin the process of orientation before people arrive in the workshop.

Planning (2 activities)

These activities are designed to help people understand all the issues they need to consider when planning for a negotiation.

Creative Thinking (2 activities)

We find that many people are limited to yesterday’s answers and are not creative in finding new ways to approach problems. These two activities are designed to address that concern.

Negotiation Skills (4 activities)

These activities are designed to look at the behaviors critical to being a successful negotiator.

Negotiating Styles (3 activities)

These activities are designed to help look at how we deal with conflict. They are best used in conjunction with negotiating styles or conflict resolution feedback surveys.

Assertiveness (3 activities)

These exercises are closely related to the styles section and are designed to show the relationship between assert-ive behavior and successful negotiation.

Questioning Techniques (3 activities)

Critical for all negotiators is the skill of questioning. These three exercises are designed to help participants practice this skill.

Ranking Exercises (3 exercises)

These three exercises stimulate discussion on issues specific to negotiation.

Surveys (2 activities)

These surveys are designed to help people evaluate their current skills. They can also be used to initiate a program. The surveys are self-scoring.

Case Studies (12 cases)

These cases address a variety of issues unique to negotiation. They can be used to support a range of learning objectives.

Negotiation Transcripts (4 transcripts)

These scripts are taken from several negotiation audios and videos we developed. We have also used them, without the videos, as case studies. They are valuable, since each explores the actual dialogue of a negotiation. Tapes of the transcripts are also available.

General Exercises (4 activities)

These exercises can be used in a variety of places in a program. Some are designed to support specific exercises in your program.

Needs and Interests (2 activities)

These activities are designed to help look at one’s needs and interests, as well as those of the other party.

Difficult People (1 activity)

This exercise is designed to help participants practice dealing with difficult people.

Boundary Roles (3 activities)

These three activities are best when used with people who serve in a boundary role function. They explore the boundary role concept and its implications.

Sales Negotiation (10 activities)

These materials are designed specifically to present issues unique to the sales function.

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Excerpted from NEGOTIATION AT WORK by Ira G. Asherman. Copyright 2012 by HRD Press. Published by AMACOM Books, a division of American Management Association, New York, NY. Used with permission.

All rights reserved. http://www.amacombooks.org.