908 Town & Country, Suite 550 Houston, TX 77024 Phone: (713) 278-7622 info@pmccinc.com
Over the years, PMCC has taught and mentored thousands of project team members from all over the world. One question we often ask is whether they have ever had as much as a half day of training on negotiation. The response may surprise you: less than 15% of them answer in the affirmative! Most project team members learn to negotiate “on the job” and to the detriment of the project fiscal bottom line and the long term relationships between the parties!! PMCC can provide mentoring, training an more importantly – PRACTICE - to your project teams on how to plan and conduct best practice project negotiations.
Key concepts and processes that PMCC can help your company incorporate include:
Respond to Emotionalism with Professionalism! What happens when you respond to the angry comments of the other party by granting a concession? Do you think there will be more or less outbursts as the negotiation goes on? Most project team members have never learned how to respond to this “tactic” during a negotiation. PMCC can train your staff in the proper responses to known negotiation tactics and techniques so that focus of the negotiation is on the interests of the parties and not the anger of the participants!
Stay away from “lawyer tactics”! PMCC was among the first PM firms in the 1990’s to offer “project negotiation” courses as opposed to “negotiation training”’; the distinction is important. In most of the industries that PMCC serves, there is a symbiotic relationship between owners and the service industries that they rely on to get the work done. The types of negotiation tactics that a lawyer might recommend for “winner takes all” negotiation do not apply in industries where the parties work together at various times over a period of decades. PMCC can teach your project teams the negotiating process and how to focus on interests and not positions as they negotiate.
Understand how the negotiation process works? Where should the negotiation take place? How should we be seated? Can either party ask for a recess at any time? After we ask for the deal what should we do? How do we handle a party that is much more powerful than us? PMCC can train your staff, in part, by role playing various negotiation scenarios to help build their confidence for their next real negotiation. (PMCC training course attendees generally relish the opportunity to be the boss in a “negotiating a raise” role-play)! We can also customize our role-play scenarios to address issues that your project team is facing now.
For more information or to schedule a conference call to discuss how PMCC might help your company or project team with project negotiation skills, please call Ben Voivedich or Burt Campbell at 713-278-PMCC (7622).
Sampling of PMCC training courses related to project negotiation that can be customized for your organization:
