How to mitigate the impact of hard business negotiations on long-term relationships?

In a previous post, we touched on the potential impact of ambitious targets and tough negotiations on future business relationships. However, there are times when such tactics are necessary. Is it therefore possible to generate SATISFACTION in the process of business negotiations and when signing the contract? YES! In this case, in addition to hard negotiation knowledge, we offer soft techniques.

Individual supplier work in the purchasing department's strategy

Hiding the joy

Showing moderate satisfaction or enjoyment of the outcome business negotiations, nav even when we have negotiated very good terms, we show the partner that the result achieved is at best „acceptable”. The terms are satisfactory but fall short of our optimum. This prevents the business partner from feeling taken advantage of.

Delaying the adoption

Another technique that affects suppliers' feelings is to accept the conditions they set too quickly. Instant acceptance can cause malaise on their side. For this reason, even if the other party agrees relatively quickly to the partner's high expectations, it is sometimes worth extending the business negotiations with the aim of even slightly improving the other party's satisfaction. After all, if something comes to us with effort we appreciate it more!

Message management

During business negotiations proper message management is extremely important. Using EVENEUM's „No NOs” technique, we deliver positive messages to our business partners, even if our conditions are tough. Negative signals, on the other hand, should be delivered in as few messages as possible.

It is also important to remember that negotiation is only one element of RM [relationship management], more in our article:

Does negotiation help build relationships?

Unfortunately, the reality is often that we meet our partners when we want something, have a problem to solve or need to negotiate a contract. There is a bit of an analogy with private life in this. How often do we call a friend without a specific need, just to ask how they are doing? In business, a good relationship means balancing expectations between supplier and customer. They do not have to be either partnership or aggressive. Relationships need to be appropriate to the situation and fair. The same with negotiations . That is why it is useful to provide good information to business partners - even if it concerns minor issues.

These are just a selection of techniques you can use to build SATISFACTION in your negotiations. Want to know more? Take advantage of our extensive range of negotiation training and coaching.