Negotiation techniques

Commonly, negotiations are associated with rivalry, striving to achieve your goals and scoring the best terms of the deal. In order to influence the opponent’s decision and to attain the desired outcome, the negotiating parties use various techniques based on the rules of social engineering and psychological pressure:

Deadline threat

This technique includes pressuring the other party to meet an inconvenient deadline knowing that they already operate under limited time constraints.Delaying the negotiations by, for example, taking frequent breaks, seemingly necessary consultations with experts or postponing meetings, is prevalent. As a result, the other party is cornered into complying with the proposed terms. The slogans pointing towards such a technique are: “Last days of sale” or “Get it today and receive a 30% discount”.

The put-upon employee

One of the parties is setting themselves as an overworked victim of the unfair division of labour. The aim of such a technique is to, through pity and compassion, spark a collaboration effort in the opponent. If successfully applied, the strategy makes the other party more compelled to help and agree to our terms and thus less focused on theirs.

The frontal attack

This technique aims to undermine the opponent and weaken their credibility by saying: “Word on the street is that you have a problem with delivery deadlines...” or “I hear you are struggling with liquidity...”. This strategy is a very risky one, as the opponent might react in a defensive and emotional manner and break the negotiations, therefore it should only be used when the likelihood of success is very high.