The brutal negotiator

July 14th, 2009 · Comments

Ninety-five percent off.

That’s the steep discount big-time CEO and entrepreneur Ken was able to get from negotiating with a large enterprise software company. I used to work for Ken’s company.

I once talked to the business development guy in the other company who negotiated with Ken. He told me Ken was so brutal in negotiation that he wouldn’t want to do business with him again. Later, I heard from several business development and sales executives that they didn’t like to deal with Ken again.

That’s the problem. Ken had developed such a bad reputation as a brutal negotiator that companies were afraid of doing business with him.

Negotiation is one of the most important skills in business. The negotiation class I took in business school was still one of my all-time favorites. I applied my learning to deal with insurance company to settle total loss case, and negotiated job offers.

But, the ideal outcome for any negotiation is a win-win situation. If you consistently take advantage of other parties, you’ll start developing a bad reputation that will eventually come back to hurt you.

Be a strategic and fair negotiator; don’t be a brutal negotiator.