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Best Practices Entrepreneurship Health and Wellness Human Resources Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

What Emotional Currency Do You Accept?

“Emotional currency is the exchange we engage in when seeking self-satisfaction.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“I was just promoted and received the title of ‘Junior Assistant’ in the PR department. I don’t care if others in the department with my skill set are making $13k more than me. I’m a ‘Junior Assistant’!”

Those were the words of a very jubilant individual that was more satisfied with a title than money. His fulfillment came from the emotional currency he’d received that made him feel complete.

What emotional currency do you accept when seeking to placate your needs and wants? The more you’re aware of how and when emotional currency moves you, the greater the chance you’ll have to control the degree of your acceptance of it.

Emotional currency can come in many forms. It can be in the form of a raise; you have more money and thus, you feel better about yourself due to your new financial status. It can stem from acceptance of you by a group or others; you feel wanted. It’s also born from the elevation of your mental wellbeing as the result of how you see yourself. It can also be a manipulator used against you.

So, why should you be aware of the emotional currency you accept and when you accept it? The answer lies in what you’ll do to obtain it based on the circumstances you’re in. A moment ago, I stated that emotional currency can be a tool of manipulation. That means, when you’re emotionally depressed, you’re more likely to leap at the opportunity to enhance your emotional state of mind; a high state of emotional satisfaction is something that everyone seeks. All of us should know our limits so that we don’t merge into a limitless desire to obtain what we need. Plus, the more attuned you are to your emotional needs, the better you’ll be at making decisions that are beneficial to your long-term wellbeing.

You’ve more than likely heard the statement, ‘get a grip’. That means you should control your desires. Once you raise your awareness about the emotional currency you deal in, and the sources from which it’s refilled, you’ll be more mindful of determining the sources you’ll allow to replenish your needs … and everything will be right with the world.

What does this have to do with negotiations? 

In a negotiation, value is perceptional. That perception is based on where you are in the moment of the negotiation. If someone attempts to assuage your feelings by telling you how great a negotiator you are, depending on your emotional state of mind, that compliment may be all it takes to take you for all you have.

Be keenly alert when someone begins to heap praise upon you during a negotiation, especially if it seems to appear out of nowhere. More than likely it’s a ploy to enhance your emotional currency. The real thought may belie the exact opposite of the compliment that’s used to mollify you. To keep from being ‘played like a chump’, accept compliments given to you, but don’t let them deter you from your goals of achieving what you want. Be steadfast in your quest and see what becomes of the compliments. Therein will lie the uncovering of their real intent.

Remember, you’re always negotiating! 

After reading this article, what are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

To receive Greg’s free “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.themasternegotiator.com/greg-williams/

#Emotion #Currency #Business #SmallBusiness #Negotiation #NegotiatingWithABully #Power #Perception #emotionalcontrol #relationships #liars #HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #ControlEmotions

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Best Practices Culture Entrepreneurship Human Resources Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

How To Fight The Negativity Of Cyberbullying

“Cyberbully – A person that seeks power by hiding behind the cloak of anonymity due to his cowardness to confront others head-on. Or, someone too weak in personality that it causes him to seek pleasure by denigrating others.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“He constantly picked on me by posting untruthful things that he said I engaged in. Then, he made unflattering comments about my mother. I found that of particular distaste.”

You may have thought the words above stemmed from two friends in their teens. The statement did come from two friends, but they were CEOs of major corporations. They were discussing the cyberbullying effects targeted against one of the CEOs in cyberspace.

Anyone can come under attack in cyberspace. The reasons for such don’t have to be valid. Do you know how to fight the negativity of cyberbullying? Continue reading this article to gather a few tips that you can use to combat a cyberbully.

Prevention:

Keep your guard up.

Be on the alert for those that might attack you. Some will do so because of the assets they perceive you to have. They may also do so because of the industry your business is in, your ethnicity and/or gender. Some people may just be mentally challenged, which causes them to seek out a target to bully.

None of this is to say that you should become paranoid. It simply means that you should be alert about how and why someone might attack you in cyberspace.

Turn yourself into a small target.

Know that some people engage in cyberbullying for pleasure. Others may do so as the prelude to extortion; extortion can be in the form of gaining leverage to achieve a goal, especially when negotiating.

To thwart a bully’s efforts, turn yourself into a small target. Don’t flaunt your assets in the manner that would attract and invite a possible attack. If you become a victim, keep a prepared set of documents that show you may not have what the bully wants. To do this, you must know what his ultimate goal is. You don’t want him to turn your perceived lack of assets against you and use that to enhance his position. Remember, it’s harder to hit a small target, but you must know what to morph that target into before it can be effective.

Fighting back:

Why me?

Bullies tend to target those persons or entities that they sense as being vulnerable. So, project strength when responding to the bully. You can do this by having others come to your defense and responding on your behalf. You can also respond by hitting the bully where he’s most vulnerable; it’s obvious that you’ll have to know his vulnerabilities to do this, which may require research.

I used the above strategy in an online forum in which someone attempted to bully others in the group. I asked the group if anyone knew that the bully had done the same thing in other groups. Someone said they did and that individual took the bully head-on. The bully retreated and was never heard from again. As an aside, I and the cohort that I used to fight the bully had already discussed this tactic before my ally engaged him. The bully had perpetrated the same tactics in a different forum that my ally and I were in.

Depending on the severity of the cyberbullying, you can get law officials involved, private detectives, etc. Regardless of the countermeasures you engage in, use them strongly enough to arrest the bully’s activities. Crush his will to engage you further so he dares not return to his former activities against you … and everything will be right with the world.

Remember, you’re always negotiating!

After reading this article, what are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

To receive Greg’s free “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.TheMasterNegotiator.com/greg-williams/

#Fight #Negativity #cyber, cyberbullying #Management #SmallBusiness #Money #Anchoring #combat #negotiatingwithabully #bully #bullies #bullying #Negotiations #PersonalDevelopment #HandlingObjections #Negotiator #HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #psychology #NegotiationPsychology

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Best Practices Personal Development Sales

Sales Process: Good, Better, Best…and the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Last week, in part one of this three-part series, I made the case that CRM alone is not enough for an effective sales system.  This week, let’s talk about what B2B selling organizations need instead.

What We’re Going For:  The Goals of a World-Class Selling System.

You should have three goals for any selling system you implement:

1. Drives effective selling behaviors, not to be confused with mere activity tracking. Behaviors that align selling process with a customer’s buying process make the difference between activity quantity and quality.

2. Change deal outcomes: Proactively identify which opportunities in your funnel are at risk…and more importantly, tell individual sellers what to do about it.

3. Replicate Winning Behaviors. Uncover new effective selling behaviors, then replicate them across the entire sales force.

These three goals should drive your selling process. Only then can you decide how to implement any CRM (last week’s topic) into a world-class selling system.  

The Good the Bad, and the Reeeaally bad.

Before we get to the more aspirational implementations, let’s consider less effective ones.

Look at the three goals of a sales system above:  Drive effective behaviors, change deal outcomes, and replicate wining.  Now evaluate the sales systems below on how well they are able to deliver on those three goals

The Good:  Process

In “good”, selling actions (for example, discovery meeting, demo, proposal, etc.), and playbooks are established and used.  A best practice is that selling process is tethered to the company’s marketing stack, etc. This coordinates marketing activities and assets to the selling process.

Selling actions are not tightly connected to a customer buying process (see “better” and “best” further down to see what I’m talking about) , but when well-formulated, they were designed to parallel a “model/average” buying process (remember, it takes methodology to consistently engage with the customer to confirm/align with their individual buying process).

In “good”, there is little real aspiration to improve deal outcomes by applying specific selling behaviors, and the “model sale” is enshrined as the standard; replicating success is capped at this ideal standard.

The Bad: Activity-Based Metrics

When managers start to track seller activities that don’t clearly align with – or meaningfully influence — the customer journey, “process” becomes a hindrance to selling success.  If your sellers are measured primarily on activity-based measures like call volume, demos conducted, proposals lobbed, lunches bought, miles driven, number of deals in the funnel, you start chasing mirages.

In “bad”, metrics emphasize quantity, not quality.  Activities tracked tend to be the easy-to-measure kind, not the success predicting kind.  The activities emphasized here don’t drive effective selling behaviors, don’t change deal outcomes, and don’t replicate winning.

The Ugly:  Activity Before Progress

Sometimes “the bad” is so ineffective that management’s conclusion is to double down on it.  In addition to inefficient activity-focused measures, selling organizations apply reward systems to inefficient behaviors, and draconian compliance measures (sellers must enter activities into CRM or be disciplined). In addition to ineffective selling activity, sales forces are incentivized to engage in “manager repellant” data entry activity. Reports are clogged with garbage, which yield such poor results that managers opt for even worse measures.

The three goals of a great selling system are in a different world from this activity-based tar pit.

Good, Better, and Best

Now let’s explore the more desirable end of the spectrum

CSO Insights has clearly defined several levels of process maturity in their research. According to their findings, these levels achieve progressively better outcomes – on several levels (contact me for more detail and access to the research).  Let’s look at some of the alternatives…what makes good, better and best.

Good:  Process

“Good” was described above.  It’s well-structured selling actions (for example, discovery meeting, demo, proposal, etc.), with playbooks and good marketing stack alignment.

In “good”, selling actions (for example, discovery meeting, demo, proposal, etc.), and playbooks are established and used.  A best practice is that selling process is tethered to the company’s marketing stack, etc. This coordinates marketing activities and assets to the selling process.

Again, deal pursuits are fit to the model sale/expected customer buying process, not extensively customized to a particular pursuit.

CRM for this level is little more than a compliance tool, not particularly valuable as a salesperson effectiveness tool.  The operating assumption is reliance on the process design, not seller acumen—certainly not customer acumen.

Better:  Methodology

At Miller Heiman Group, we distinguish “selling activity process” (as described above) from another kind of process: methodology. Methodology is another kind of process which aligns sellers and buyers…specifically, selling process (above) to customer’s buying process.  Methodology bridges the huge gap between selling activities and behaviors that create customer-perceived value…and then leverage customer value into a compelling case for change.

In methodology, “discovery meeting” becomes a customer-centric process of value discovery and development. “Demo” becomes “connecting our solution to a well-articulated customer value gap by demonstrating only those aspects of our solution that add value to this customer”.  As you can imagine, selling organizations who implement methodologies have higher sales success and better customer relationships.

Today’s CRMs don’t really support methodology out of the box, but methodologies like those from Miller Heiman Group can be incorporated using add-in modules.  Using these, sales professionals begin to use CRM voluntarily, because methodology integrated into CRM finally offers a sales-success payoff for using the tools.

Best:  Dynamic Methodology

Today, the state of the art is methodology with analytics that:

  • Help Sales managers look at opportunities and give high-value opportunity coaching in real time. Managers diagnose, then drive winning behaviors, that change deal outcomes.
  • Give managers a real-time tool to glean best practices from their sellers, then characterize them and replicate them through the entire sales team.

The definition of dynamic methodology is about to change.  Soon, these same dynamic coaching capabilities will be converted from “intitiated by front-line sales managers via personally generated insights”, to rules-engine mediated coaching initiated by the CRM system itself to more quickly and widely distribute management attention to all deals.

The Best is about to get much better.  Real-time dynamic methodology, first with a sophisticated rules engine, and eventually with a machine-learned, dynamic coaching schema, is going to transform the sales performance world.

Your thoughts?

Last week, I asked if CRM is the tail wagging the dog.  As you can see, process/methodology maturity should be your goal, and CRM should be your execution tool.

Agree or disagree?  Have any additional thoughts?  Please share them below, or reach out directly.

To your success!

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Best Practices Body Language Entrepreneurship Human Resources Management Marketing Negotiations News and Politics Sales Skills Women In Business

Lie To Me, Please

“Alternative facts are aversions to the truth, to the degree that the truth remains concealed.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“Okay. If you say that wasn’t you, I’ll believe you. Just know, the person I saw from 15 feet away looked just like you. Even more, when I called your name, the person that wasn’t you turned around, saw me, and hurriedly left the area. As that person scurried away, they walked like you, too.”

Do you know why some people will allow others to lie to them, accept the lie, and be okay doing so? The answer lies in one’s current circumstances and the environment they’re in.

1. Some people will subjugate themselves because of their circumstances (e.g. the liar is the one that pays the bills, earns the money in the relationship, is dominant in the relationship, etc.)

2. They do so for the better good of others that are involved.

3. In other cases, the target of the lie wants to be perceived as fitting into the norms of the group they belong to; to do otherwise might mean expulsion from the group.

4. In yet other situations, it’s easier for some people to accept an altered reality because the truth would hurt too badly (e.g. I can’t believe they’d do that to me. It must not be true.)

5. Some people may go along for a while to see what a liar will do next.

Here’s the point. We’re all driven by our emotions. Thus, our emotions will lend insight into what we’re willing to believe and accept. It’s not until that belief is too heavy a burden to bear that we change our beliefs about others and ourselves. That’s when we’ll take our life in a new direction.

Always be aware of why someone possesses certain beliefs. Having that insight will allow you to understand the person’s source of motivation and thinking. That will also allow you to better assist that individual in determining what reality really is. You’ll be able to use that to benefit yourself and them … and everything will be right with the world.

What does this have to do with negotiations?

In a negotiation, there will be times when you sense that the other negotiator is lying. You may gather such sensations from the manner that the opposing negotiator conveys certain sentiments via their body language (e.g. leaning away when defining a statement as the truth, altering the pitch of their voice while constantly looking away from you when doing so, fidgeting with other items in their proximity).

In such situations, it may behoove you to allow the liar to continue his lies to understand the characteristics of the person you’re dealing with. You may also do so if he’s telling little white lies so as not to embarrass him. Then, when that position no longer serves you, consider confronting him to validate his perception of the truth versus what he professes it to be.

Always remember, people will only do to you what you allow them to do. That means you have a degree of control in every environment you’re in. When it comes to dealing with those that lie incessantly, recognize them for who and what they are and deal with them appropriately.

Remember, you’re always negotiating! 

After reading this article, what are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

 To receive Greg’s free “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.themasternegotiator.com/greg-williams/

#Business #SmallBusiness #Negotiation #NegotiatingWithABully #Power #Perception #emotionalcontrol #relationships #liars #HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #ControlEmotions

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Best Practices Entrepreneurship Human Resources Investing Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

How to Use Anchoring Better in Your Negotiations

“Anchoring is a way to keep a negotiation within boundaries, but it can also be a way to weigh it down.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“We can pay your bill if you’re reasonable about the settlement. That means, we’re willing to start the discussion at $300,000, not the $650,000 that you indicated. Anything else is a none starter. Do you wish to start the discussion?” Those were the words of one negotiator to another. He was using a technique known as anchoring to advantage his position. How would you respond?

The following information will give you insights as to how you can use and defend the technique of anchoring in your negotiations.

What is anchoring?

Anchoring is a strategy that you can use to set boundaries in a negotiation. If you and the other negotiator agree to those boundaries, you have the confinements in which the negotiation will occur.

Be mindful, depending upon the depth of the negotiation, those outposts can be violated and lead the negotiation to unsavory places. Thus, be cognizant of the signals that indicate that the other negotiator might be in the process of abating those boundaries. At the first sign of such actions, note the cause that promoted the change in behavior. That will give you the clue about what to address if you wish to bring the negotiation back in bounds.

Why use anchoring?

As stated, anchoring is a way to set parameters around the negotiation. Therefore, if abided by, the agreement should allow for an easier flowing negotiation.

Boundaries in a negotiation can be a curse or a blessing. That’s the inherent dilemma in using this strategy. If you’re negotiating with a weaker negotiator, you can skillfully use anchoring to limit his abilities, while leaving your options open to explore the upper realms of possibilities. If you’re the weaker negotiator (i.e. fewer resources, little leverage, etc.), you risk being susceptible to an unfavorable negotiation outcome.

Factors to consider when using anchoring tactics.

  1. Negotiation (resources, personalities)

As mentioned above, you should consider the resources that you and the other negotiator have at your availability. The more resources that a negotiator has, the more leverage he can bring to bear on the negotiation. That doesn’t mean if you have fewer resources that you’ll automatically fall into the weaker category. It means, if you’re the weaker negotiator, you should attempt to limit the leverage of the other negotiator so he’ll not be able to employ those resources against you.

In addition, consider the other negotiator’s personality. Some negotiators don’t like to take advantage of others. And other negotiators will stomp on you while you’re down to keep you from getting up. The better you know the personality type that you’re negotiating with, the better you’ll be able to predict what he might do.

  1. Leverage points to consider (i.e. urgency, unseen negotiators, etc.)

If you have a grasp into the urgency, deadlines, and timeframes that the other negotiator needs to conclude the negotiation, you’ll have insights into how you can use anchoring to lead him down the negotiation path. For example, if you know that he must conclude your negotiation before another phase starts with those that are not part of your negotiation, you can anchor his deadline to a timeframe. Then, if he doesn’t make concessions that you request, you can slow the negotiation down.

Anchoring can be an extremely powerful strategy to use in your negotiation. Most negotiations contain some form of anchoring embedded in them with them identified as such. If you’re more aware of anchoring in your negotiations, you’ll be less likely to get sunk by them … and everything will be right with the world.

Remember, you’re always negotiating! 

After reading this article, what are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com 

To receive Greg’s free “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.TheMasterNegotiator.com/greg-williams/

#Management #SmallBusiness #Money #Anchoring #combat #negotiatingwithabully #bully #bullies #bullying #Negotiations #PersonalDevelopment #HandlingObjections #Negotiator #HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #psychology #NegotiationPsychology

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Best Practices Personal Development Sales

CRM: Is the Tail Wagging the Dog?

Note:  This is the first of a three part series on how sales performance management is evolving

According to their marketing materials, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) applications solve just about every sales problem your company has ever experienced. Are the promises true?  Or…does CRM just help make your existing processes (good or bad) more efficient –at best? Do your sales people feel like you own your CRM or that your CRM owns them? Is CRM the tail wagging the dog?

CRM systems have powerful functionality, and are able to analyze more data all the time.  And yet, an alarming percentage of CRM implementations don’t meet expectations – see the chart below (CIO magazine recently found 33%, a more current figure, but not out of line with history).  Those numbers look worse when you examine how “expectations” were defined.

What’s going on? CRM Alone is Not Enough

 There are a couple of reasons why CRM implementations miss expectations:

They typically focus on selling process alone.  I’ll discuss this in greater depth next week, but selling process is the easy part: aligning with the customer’s buying process is where big gains in effectiveness happen.

CRM can only analyze the data it has access to. Order history reports tend to be pretty accurate, but opportunity pursuit data is almost always sketchy at best…especially for lower-performing sales people.

For sales people, CRM is often simply a compliance tool; that is, it’s an administrative system to track actions. If it doesn’t help sales people win opportunities, it doesn’t get used.

Even worse, the actions tracked aren’t quality actions that lead to success, and everyone knows it.  If CRM’s intent is to streamline customer interactions, most implementations don’t measure up. Why? Many companies fall into the trap of tracking what is easy to capture, not what’s important.  Analyzing non-predictive data gets you lots of numbers, charts and graphs, but no real insights.

The tail wagging the dog:

If all CRM is in your organization is a tool to track (the wrong) activities… and you’ve become a slave to tracking those activities, you exist to serve your CRM, not the other way around.

There is a huge difference between a tool that makes sellers more effective and one used by managers to gather semi-meaningful data.  While I don’t want to ignore the importance of lightening a front-line sales manager’s reporting burden, that benefit may not be worth the cost s of implementation.

While they’re billed as sales performance tools, most companies’ CRM implementations fall short. When CRM becomes merely a compliance and reporting tool, you’re in trouble.

Worse, if you fall into the trap of measuring only the wrong activities (unfortunately, that means measuring activities that CRM finds easiest to measure and track), you’re in the worst kind of trouble.  You’re not leading with measuring the right things.  Opportunity counts mean nothing.  Winnable opportunity tracking means something. Understanding how to turn an at-risk opportunity into a winnable one is everything.

What should CRM be and do?

While CRM should also be able to analyze post-sale information, it should be a tool for sales professionals. Companies should set a high bar for their expectations. To be a genuine tool for sellers and their leaders, the next generation of CRM needs to:

1. Drive effective selling behaviors(not mere activity tracking). My expertise is selling behaviors that drive sales – as opposed to activities that sales people could perform.  For example: I want to drive great conversations with the right people, not number of calls completed.  Today’s CRM implementations typically help leaders track the latter, when they know they should be driving the former.  The ideal CRM should help alert sales people to the right behaviors at the right times.

2. Change deal outcomes: using expertise, a CRM system should proactively identify which opportunities in your funnel are at risk…and more importantly, why.  That same CRM system should automatically tell individual sellers what to do about it. Early risk identification and management (mitigation or de-resourcing) would be gold in the hands of a selling organization.

3. Replicate Winning Behaviors. The sales behaviors that predict selling success are observable, trainable, trackable and coachable. Uncovering those behaviors, then replicating them sales force-wide by training, coaching, and tracking those behaviors, allows you to bring all of the sellers on a team to a higher level. A CRM that does this would be a huge advantage for a selling organization.

Where CRM has been.  Where It’s Going

CRM has evolved through three major generations:

  1. Contact manager.An automated Rolodex and tickler file.
  2. Massive powerful DB that does everything – some are capable of managing the ordering and assembly logistics of a space shuttle…although integrating proposals and contracts with enterprise resource planning, etc. were common uses.
  3. Today, State of the art CRMs “’Manage’ the selling process”; that is, ather seller data on their activities.
  • Activity-based selling fits today’s CRM tools best.
  • Activities and behaviors that align selling activities with customer buying processes (customer-centric sales methodologies) are firmly out-of-scope.

My company has had, for years, a skinny software stack for CRMs that allows sellers to practice methodology within CRM.  It allowed sellers to benefit from CRM as a performance-enhancement tool.  Because of that, many clients find that CRM utilization by sellers dramatically increases, yielding data accuracy benefits to the organization. (Ironically, some companies have bought sales training –at least initially–to finally achieve acceptable compliance with CRM).

Today, even the best coaching is done in-person, by managers examining meeting plans, account plans and opportunity pursuits, diagnosing selling behavior gaps, and conducting coaching conversations.  The skinny stack is great for this. Tools that score opportunities and selling methodology behaviors (methodology is what connects sales process to customer buying process) have enhanced the skinny stack tool even further.

The three requirements of a great CRM implementation above are met with this skinny stack.  The challenge:  coaching is almost 100% in-person, a large demand on front-line-manager time resources.

What if there was a true sellers-first tool, that helped sales professionals be great?  What would that look like?

Watch this space…or contact me right away to learn more.

To your success!

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Best Practices Entrepreneurship Human Resources Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

Are You There Yet?

“Perception is driven by attitude and attitude is driven by desire. To be more successful in life, you must allow your attitude and desire to be driven by actions.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“Don’t blame me for your mediocrity when you’re not willing to take the actions required for greater success.” That was the retort exchanged between two individuals that shared a relationship.

To advance in life, one must be willing to take the actions required to move from one position to another. It’s okay to dream, but until you put your dreams into actions, they’re nothing more than images in your mind; they’ll never become your reality. Worse, if not acted on, they could turn into nightmares.

When seeking greater achievements, you must be mentally prepared to enact the actions necessary for those achievements. One achievement becomes a steppingstone to higher achievements. Thus, you should never view yourself as reaching a final-destination, because if you have life, you should seek to achieve more in life. By doing so, you leave a doorway through which knowledge and future opportunities may enter.

Understand that a hopeless mind doesn’t serve you. It’ll leave you in a state of hopeless situations. You’ll be drained by your mental energy leakage, which otherwise could serve as fuel to lift you higher.

You create your own success in life. Where you are today is not where you were yesterday. Where you’ll be tomorrow is the design that you engage in today. That means you’re the person in control of your life. So, if you don’t like yourself or where you are, change it! You have the power, you have the control. Exercise that power and control to take yourself to a better place.

Here’s the point, even if you’re in a very happy and successful place in life, life will change. That means, what exists today will not exist tomorrow. Thus, you must constantly change with life. Once you do, you’ll become part of the evolution of life … and everything will be right with the world.

What does this have to do with negotiations? 

The outcome of many negotiations is somewhat of a foregone conclusion before they start. That’s due to the mindset the negotiators possess as they prepare and enter the negotiations.

If you constantly seek to advance a negotiation, based on the determination you display to achieve your quest (this would occur in the planning and implementation stages of the negotiation), you’ll be empowered with more confidence. The other negotiator will perceive your confidence and address you in a more serious manner.

Never shortchange yourself in a negotiation by thinking that the other party has more resources from which to out-negotiate you. That may be true but remember, David slayed Goliath. He did so by adopting a strategy that gave him an advantage; that began with David’s mental attitude and adopting a strategy to achieve his goals. It’s the strategies that you employ in a negotiation that will give you an advantage too. The first strategy starts with the way you think. Don’t limit yourself by possessing limiting thoughts.

Remember, you’re always negotiating! 

After reading this article, what are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

To receive Greg’s free “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.themasternegotiator.com/greg-williams/

#Business #SmallBusiness #Negotiation #NegotiatingWithABully #Power #Perception #emotionalcontrol #relationships #HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #ControlEmotions

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Best Practices Body Language Entrepreneurship Human Resources Investing Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

How to Combat Bullies That Use Disinformation When Negotiating

“The difference between disinformation and a lie is the degree that one doesn’t want to disclose the truth.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“He said there were four other companies competing for the contract. He told us that we’d better submit a very low bid if we wanted to be the winner. Later, I discovered there were no other companies bidding. He used disinformation to get us to lower our bid.” That was the information disclosed in a debriefing session after members from an organization had engaged in what they thought was a negotiation opportunity to acquire additional business.

Bullies use disinformation in negotiations to enhance their negotiation position; this can be anyone in a perceived position of authority, be they in that position for a short or long-term. Some people label disinformation as lying. The difference between the two is the severity with which the bully wishes to keep you uninformed via the information he delivers to you. It’s very important to confront the bully when you become aware that he’s using disinformation tactics because, if you don’t confront him, you lay yourself bare to more deceit.

Here’s how you can confront, combat, and conquer a bully that utilizes the tactics of disinformation in your negotiations.

Confront

First, identify why the bully is using disinformation as a tactic. Understand what he’s attempting to conceal and what he believes he’ll achieve by doing so.

Once you have a handle on what you believe his intent is, verify your assumptions by confronting him with them. Note how he responds to your queries. While misinformation (i.e. he’s misinformed) can be thought of as him possessing unintended callousness, disinformation is more strategic. In using disinformation, the bully is signaling that he’s going to be more devious in dealing with you.

Combat

One way to combat a bully that employs the tactic of disinformation is to use the tactic on him. It’s even better if he knows that you’re using it. You can state to him that you’re doing so because, if he’s not going to be forthright, then you won’t be either. You can adopt a stern body posture/image to enhance your message. Just be aware that this may take the negotiation into a territory fraught with angst. Thus, you should weigh the degree that you combat him against the possibility of completely alienating him.

Conquer

To conquer the opposing negotiator that’s using this ploy, be prepared to combat him until he relinquishes its use. That may require using leverage to ‘out’ him to others about his usage, along with stating that you won’t allow yourself to be treated in such a manner. It may also require that you threaten to end the negotiation if he persists. Recognize that you’re playing hardball at that time and to win, you may have to get bloodied and/or dirty.

Negotiating with someone that uses disinformation as his ally can be a vexing proposition. The better you can identify this tactic, and the reason it’s being employed against you, the faster you’ll be able to address it. That will help you determine how and to what degree to continue in the negotiation … and everything will be right with the world.

Remember, you’re always negotiating! 

After reading this article, what are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

To receive Greg’s free “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.TheMasterNegotiator.com/greg-williams/

#UseDisinformation #disinformation #combat #negotiatingwithabully #bully #bullies #bullying #Negotiations #PersonalDevelopment #HandlingObjections #Negotiator #HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #psychology #NegotiationPsychology

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Best Practices Entrepreneurship Investing Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

When Should You Act More Like A Stubborn Child

“Childlike behavior can be advantageous to adults when adults use them in an adult-like manner.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“He was told that he should not act like a stubborn child. Then he became more obstinate.” Those were the words exchanged by associates as they discussed the behavior of a friend of theirs.

When they were children, most adults possessed a limitless amount of imagination and a boundless degree of determination. As they became older, more mature, their childlike actions were abandoned so that they could be perceived as fitting into their environments. Unknowingly, conformity to those environment norms may have cost them opportunities.

Do you recall your childhood? When you sought a specific outcome, how determined were you to achieve it? How many ‘adult rules’ did you break in your efforts to uncover the solution to your quest? Then, you got older and supposedly wiser, which meant, you left those childish ways behind. Truth be known, those childish ways served you well then and they can serve you well, now.

When you find yourself in situations that you really want to get to the bottom of why certain actions occurred, or if you want to enhance the probability of a particular outcome, be persistent in uncovering a solution.

The point is, you will only receive in life what your actions indicate you’re willing to put forth to achieve. If something is denied you and you don’t put up a fight to get it, you send the signal to the holder of that source that what you sought wasn’t really that important to you. Either way, you’ve set the stage for future interactions and degree that you’ll fight for what you want. Thus, if you give up easily when requesting something, the person to whom you make that request knows that he only has to say no a few times and you’ll slither back into your den of mediocrity. Your hopes for future opportunities will lackluster and you’ll have no one to blame except yourself.

When it comes to achieving more in life, when appropriate, consider acting like you did when you were a child. Ask why, how come, who else, type of questions. You’ll be rewarded with greater outcomes in life … and everything will be right with the world.

What does this have to do with negotiations? 

Some negotiators use stonewalling tactics to keep you from reaching your goals. They may do so to enhance their negotiation position. If you use probing questions (e.g. why can’t that be done, who else might be able to approve this, what do you suggest we do to avoid this impasse), you’ll receive greater outcomes from your negotiation efforts. That’s true because you’ll acquire more insight into what’s really behind the other negotiator’s efforts to disallow your request. Once you know that, you’ll be better positioned to hone in on the discovery of what he’d rather keep hidden. Your probing with questions, like you did when you were a child, will reveal those hidden opportunities and bring them to light.

#Business #SmallBusiness #Negotiation #NegotiatingWithABully #Power #Perception #emotionalcontrol #relationships #HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #ControlEmotions #Psychology #Perception #ControlLife #Control #leadership #HowToImproveYourself

Categories
Sales Skills

Three Sales Strategies for Even Keel/Indifference

Indifferent or “Even Keel” mode happens when  a buying influence sees no compelling reason to change what they’re doing. Because any change (including a purchase of something different) needs to overcome the uncertainty and interruption factor of that change, indifference happens any time the perceived value an improvement doesn’t outweigh the perceived cost of change.  To get someone out of Even Keel, you need to change their perception somehow:  reduce the perceived cost of change — or increase the perceived payoff from making that change.

Indifference is common, threatening many sales opportunities by causing the prospect to default to the status quo.  It’s often the biggest competitive threat in play. Great sales professionals prepare for indifference so they can plant the seed for perception change during that next meeting…the only one they can count on ever getting.

I was recently asked for a list of the strategies that a sales professional can use to get a buying influence out of “Even Keel” or “indifferent” mode.  He’d read in The New Strategic Sellingabout waiting for the person’s perception to change, and knew there had to be more options available.

Perception is personal. Thus, changing perception should be about people. Let’s examine whomight serve as catalyst for changing a buying influence’s perception to leave indifference behind.  There are three sources of perceptual change:

  1. The prospect changes their own perception based upon perceived change in their environment or situation.
  2. The sales person is the agent of change. That is, the sales person influences the process of changing the prospect’s perceptual change.
  3. A credible (to the prospect) third party acts as perception-changer.

Here are some thoughts on the three strategies for dealing with indifference, to help you prepare for your next sales interaction:

Let the buying influence (BI) change their own perception.

I list this strategy first because many sales people don’t consider it fully. When you are taught to “take control of the call” or something similar, the strategy of letting the flow of events do your work for you is counterintuitive.  While it’s not always the shortest path, it works directly on the perception of the prospect.  There are a couple of variations.

1. Let them fail on their own. When this option works, it works great.  Prospects are likely to transition directly into “I’m in trouble” mode, which is highly leveragable.  It also means you need to politely maintain contact.  Be the one with share of mind to get their first call, then be the most responsive.  Unfortunately, this route can take a long time.  This option is one of the few viable options when the prospect is so overconfident in their current solution that their willingness to listen to anyone is limited.

2. Let them watch as a competitor begins to win. This is a variation of the ‘let them fail” option.  Only certain buying influences will be in a position to see this or care that it’s happening: affected sales people and sometimes  top executives (it can be less impactful to User or Technical buying influences).

The Seller changes the  Buying Influence’s perception

 Note: credibility is foundational for this strategy.  If a prospect doesn’t trust what you are telling them, you can’t build a case for change.  I work with my clients to establish and build credibility at all times — for this reason and more.  Once you’ve got credibility, you can:

Show the prospect that reality isn’t as acceptable as they perceive it; that potential losses from doing nothing are higher than they perceived.  Help them see their problem more broadly (in MHGroup terminology:  help them change their Concept, or solution image.). My readers, who are familiar with my focus on customer value will recognize the imperative to uncover unrealized value.

  1. Uncover and crystalize needs. With deeper investigation, implicit needs become explicit.
  2. Examine the impact of any existing gaps in more detail. What is the “impact of the impact” (including monetizing it).
  3. Think about the prospect’s role in the sale and in the decision dynamic for ideas on possible perception changes. This will help you prepare some high-impact discovery questions.

Mutually discover that you can help them solve a business problem that they didn’t see being connected to your solution. Again, you need credibility with this prospect to secure time to do extra discovery…or to do it in small bites over time.  This means expanding their concept.

Find a sufficiently compelling personal win,tied to a result. If a buying influence sees an adequate (but previously not compelling) business benefit plus a significant newly-realized personal win, that business benefit will become one they are willing to advocate to their peers. Some possible wins:

  • Be the first to respond to a budding problem.
  • Propose a solution before a rival within the company does

Have a trusted third party change the target’s perception.  

 Much of what I said about salesperson-led change above applies below—if your credibility is less than needed, this option might be a good one.  To execute this strategy when needed, you’ll need credibility with that third person.  Here are some options:

A co-worker changes their perception. This person’s credibility will be the key to their mind, and helping that co-worker find a role-appropriate gap may be needed.

  • Might you need to coach that co-worker? How?

Executive adjusts their perspective. Credibility with the target prospect is not a big problem when it’s their boss. Making sure the buying influence saves face or comes out with a personal win should be a point of emphasis.

A Coach changes their perception. A Coach is anyone who has credibility with your target, and who wants your proposal to succeed (Miller Heiman Group alumni: there’s one more criterion. Quiz:  what is it?).  These people can advance and promote the case for change.  Caution:  don’t let your coach cross the line to selling on your behalf, or do anything that damages their own credibility with other buying influences.

Takeaways:

Every salesperson soon learns that status quo is often the biggest hurdle to be overcome in many sales situations.  Buyer inertia is a presence in just about every sales situation, and salespeople need to be able to deal with it.

Salespeople need to build credulity in every customer interaction. This lays the foundation for everything they try to accomplish in the future:, open the prospect’s view to new options , establish value of options…even gain the right to secure a meeting in the future.

Pre-plan how you will bring value to every interaction.  Using your domain expertise in your offer/solution/service/product is of limited value to most prospects.  Apply that domain expertise with insights and knowledge of the prospect’s unique business situation, and your perspective can have that rare value sought by today’s more sophisticated buyers.

If you’d like to talk about creating value with prospects, it’s a skillset I am passionate about helping my clients improve..  Comment below, or contact me directly (mark@boundyconsulting.com) to share your unique challenges.

To your success!