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How to Really Overcome a Bully Before Negotiating

“A bully is a misguided person with perceived power. Extinguish his sources of power and you extinguish the bully.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

Do you know how to really overcome a bully before negotiating with him? There you are. You’re negotiating against a bully! He’s someone that’s willing to lie, cheat, and steal to come out ahead in the negotiation. You think to yourself, ‘what can I do? This son-of-a-gun is not playing fair and I don’t know how to overcome him!’ The answer to, ‘what can I do’ was hidden in what occurred before the negotiation began.

The following insights will allow you to position yourself better to overcome a bully’s ploys before you negotiate with him.

Positioning:

In every negotiation, positioning occurs. It’s shown in the way the negotiators perceive each other and themselves. Thus, positioning is important because it determines how negotiators will interact with one another.

If you know you’ll be negotiating against someone that has bullied others in the past, before entering into the negotiation, attempt to discover the demeanor of those individuals. In particular seek to define whether they were perceived to be weak by your opponent due to their short-comings, or if your opponent felt empowered due to some other factor(s) he had going for himself at the time of the negotiation(s). That information will allow you to best position yourself from a position of strength. A bully’s loathing for weakness is the reason he only picks on targets that he perceives to be weak.

Leverage: (ploys you can employ when negotiating with a bully)

  • Using Other people
    • All bullies look up to someone. If you can find a way to curry favor with the bully’s icon, you can supplant his bullying efforts against you. After all, the bully wants an easy target. If the bully’s icon has favored you, that makes you less of a target to the bully.
  • Bully’s weakness
    • All bullies have an Achilles heel. It may be how they wish to be perceived by others. It may also appear in the form of the bully being perceived in one light versus another. Whatever it is, discover it and be prepared to exploit it during the negotiation if such is called for.
  • Bully’s Persona (his vanity)
    • If you’re aware of the pride a bully takes in having himself perceived in a certain light, attempt to alter that light; have it shine on someone or somewhere else. You will have taken away his source of motivation. Hold it hostage until he dismantles his bullying ways. The point is, hit him where you’ll get the most attention and where it will hurt him the most. Remember, he despises weakness and applauds strength.

Be Stealthy:

Every good negotiator gathers information about the opposing negotiator. When you know you’ll be negotiating against a bully, drip misinformation into places that he seeks to gather information about you. The better you can use such information to misguide him, the more difficult it’ll be for him to assess the type of negotiator you are; always be willing to display a different negotiation demeanor based on the opposing negotiator.

When engaging a bully in a negotiation, there are all kinds of mind games that occur. Utilize the insights above and you’ll be in a better mental state than the bully. The better you play the game, the greater the chance that you’ll be able to overcome a bully when negotiating … and everything will be right with the world.

What are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

To receive Greg’s free 5-minute video on reading body language or to sign up for the “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.themasternegotiator.com/greg-williams/

Remember, you’re always negotiating.

#HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #Bully

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Accounting Best Practices Economics Entrepreneurship Health and Wellness Human Resources Investing Management Marketing Skills Women In Business

Life is Always Testing You; A Negotiation Inspirational Insight

“Tests are meant to measure your improvement. Life’s tests are meant to improve you!” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

“Life is Always Testing You”

“This is a test. For the next 60 seconds …”

“Fear not the passing of time. Fear instead your lack of ability to use the gifts that time gives you.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert

Life is always testing us and thus, life is always a test. Be thankful for that because it means that you’re alive, with the ability to go higher in life.

We plan for one thing and something else happens. We set our expectations upon what we’ve planned for and life zags when we thought it was going to zig. At times, it can drive you nuts! But, you shouldn’t let it. Consider it as just another test that life is putting before you; it’s doing so to make you stronger. It’s doing so to see how quickly you can adapt to unexpected occurrences. To the degree that you don’t let such occurrences create mental angst within you, you’ll become infused with more resiliency in life, for your life. That can serve as a source of motivation to fortify your mental attitude and enhance your aptitude to achieve more in life.

The way we perceive and interpret what occurs in our life determines how we’ll adapt to those occurrences and how well we interact with them. Thus, if you view an occurrence from the perspective that it’s a test from which you can improve your abilities, the new/altered occurrence from what you expected can be viewed in a more positive light. That positive perspective should allow you to deal with the unplanned, unexpected occurrence easier and with less apprehension.

When something doesn’t serve you, don’t let it disserve you a second time. Occurrences will come to you from many different sources. Let the positive things that come from such sources support you. For those that detract from you and your goals, be thankful for their insights as you say goodbye to them, knowing that they too add value to your life.

Once you look at your life’s occurrences as being a value-add to your life, you will have adopted a mindset of openness, acceptance, and a mental state of ease. Once you do that … everything will be right with the world.

What does this have to do with negotiations?

Negotiations are fraught with occurrences that challenged your preconceived plans based on the plans you assembled for the negotiation. Again, to the degree you’re flexible in the flow of the negotiation and you’re adaptable to the changing flow that occurs in/during it, the better a grip you’ll have on determining its outcome. That means you should manage your emotional state during the negotiation, constantly be thinking of any hidden meanings in unspoken and spoken words and any additional insight that body language gestures convey. That assembly of insights will make you a more formattable negotiator, which will lead to better negotiation outcomes for you.

What are you thinking? I’d really like to know. Reach me at Greg@TheMasterNegotiator.com

 To receive Greg’s free 5-minute video on reading body language or to  sign up for the “Negotiation Tip of the Week” and the “Sunday Negotiation Insight” click here http://www.themasternegotiator.com/greg-williams/

Remember, you’re always negotiating.

#HowToNegotiateBetter #CSuite #TheMasterNegotiator #Lifetest

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Accounting Growth Investing Management Personal Development Taxes

How to Get a Charitable Tax Deduction for Remodeling Your Properties

If your home or rental property needs remodeling, consider getting a charitable tax contribution by helping a worthwhile cause. Many charities build and renovate homes for the needy. The tax law allows you to take a charitable deduction for donating used building materials removed from your house or rental property when they are used by a qualified organization.

How much you can deduct depends on the fair market value (FMV) of the materials you donate and when you donate them.

Amount of Your Charitable Deduction

  • For property held for more than 1 year, you will usually get a deduction of the FMV of the materials donated. If the property was used for business or rental purposes, you must reduce the FMV by any gain (if you sold the property) that is considered ordinary income. This is a simple calculation if you ask your tax advisor.
  • For property held less than 1 year, you will usually get a deduction of either the FMV or the cost basis (less any depreciation allowed) of the materials donated, whichever is less.
  • There may be limits depending on how much you contribute and your adjusted gross income, but the good news is, you can carry forward any unused deduction to later years.

Steps Needed to Get a Charitable Deduction

Before you begin your remodeling process:

  1. Get your licensed contractor to give you two bid quotes. One for deconstructing the space that you are remodeling and another one for demolishing it. Deconstructing the space is more expensive than demolition because fixtures, sheetrock, wood studs and more are taken apart slowly and carefully by hand to recycle every last piece as opposed to demolition where they rip out the materials without any consideration for reusing them (e.g. they just go into the dump).

Deconstruction usually is 1.5 to 2 times more expensive than a demolition process. However, since demotion is only a small part of your remodel, it should not add a large cost to your overall remodel.

  1. Find an appraiser that can appraise the reusable materials that result from the “deconstruction” process. Usually they can give you an idea of the FMV per sq. ft. of real property you are remodeling. Appraisal costs range but typically are around $2,000-10,000. They will need to see the materials before they are donated to a charity so they can issue an appraisal report.
  1. Consult with your tax advisor. They usually know a qualified appraiser you can use in your area or one can be recommended by the charity to which, you are going to donate the materials.

Your tax advisor should also be able to determine whether it is cost beneficial to consider getting a charitable deduction. For example, if the appraisal cost is $5,000 and the additional contractor cost of deconstruction is $5,000, the donation you must receive must exceed $35,000 to give you a net tax benefit. Some of our clients have obtained charitable benefits of over $100,000.

  1. Pick a 501(c)(3) US charity in your area that has as their mission to use the materials in their programs such as Habitat for Humanity.

After your remodeling process:

  1. The appraiser will give you a signed appraisal report and an IRS form 8283 signed by both the appraiser and the charity to which, you contributed the material; both must be attached to your tax return.

If these steps are followed correctly, then there is an excellent chance that much of the costs of your next remodel can be claimed as a charitable contribution.

For more information about this and other tax strategies to help you pay only your fair share of taxes email him at ssinger@groco.com

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Accounting Best Practices Entrepreneurship Human Resources Management Personal Development Taxes Technology

What Does It Mean to Be a Leader in the Age of AI? Part 1

With the advent of artificial intelligence (A.I.) and machine learning, it’s time to re-evaluate how we hire, train and lead our employees.

The ability to do a job faster or cheaper will no longer be what sets an organization apart from its competitors, but rather the ability of organizations and its human component to critically and strategically think for the organization and its customers.

With improved critical thinking, machine learning and A.I., an organization will be able to move faster and more effectively than its competitors making it both more interesting and challenging for its human workforce and valuable to its customers.

In an A.I. environment, co-workers will be expected by its customers and the organization to work in teams, improve communication with customers, come up with original thoughts and strategies, explain how A.I. came up to its conclusions and implement their strategies. Objectives of the organization and its customers probably will not change (e.g. enhanced customer and trusted relationships, bottom and top line growth). However, the way the organization uses its human components will change dramatically.

What does it mean to critically think? According to the Foundation for Critically Thinking.org you and your co-workers should be able to:

  • Raise vital questions and problems, formulating them clearly and precisely.
  • Gather and assess relevant information, using abstract ideas to interpret it effectively.
  • Come to well-reasoned conclusions and solutions, testing them against relevant criteria and standards.
  • Thinking open-mindedly within alternative systems of thought, recognizing and assessing, as needs to be, their assumptions, implications, and practical consequences.
  • Communicate effectively with others (in teams) in figuring out complex solutions.

How to go about implementing and dealing with co-workers who are unfamiliar or unable to cope with the new paradigm?

  • Link their compensation and future to these management objectives so they realize the importance of these new organizational directives.
  • Identify your stars who understand and employ “critical thinking” methods and encourage them to lead by giving them authority and autonomy to do so.
  • Recognize, embrace and communicate this as a cultural shift that will enhance the well- being and livelihood of everyone involved.
  • Be prepared to promote team members that exhibit these skills and counsel out those who can’t adopt.
  • Prioritize these skill sets as a core competency of new hires.
  • Make it as a top goal for your organization.
  • Hire the right professionals.