Negotiation Prep

When to use

Use before any negotiation with real stakes — a deal, a vendor contract, a partnership term sheet, a compensation discussion — especially when the current prep amounts to "know your number and hold firm" with no stated BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement) and no estimate of the other side's walk-away point.

What it does

Computes the actual Zone of Possible Agreement (ZOPA) via a bundled calculator using your BATNA-derived reservation price and an estimate of the counterparty's reservation price, recommends an opening anchor that sits inside the ZOPA rather than outside it, and explicitly flags when no ZOPA exists at all — the single most useful thing a negotiation prep exercise can surface, since no amount of negotiating skill closes a gap that isn't actually there.

Method

1. Name your BATNA concretely: what happens, in specific terms, if this negotiation fails entirely? A vague "we'd find another vendor" is not a BATNA; a specific alternative with its own real price and terms is.
2. Derive your reservation price from the BATNA, not from an aspiration. Your walk-away point is the value of your BATNA — going past it in the name of "not walking away empty-handed" destroys value versus your actual alternative, even if the deal in front of you feels like progress.
3. Set your target price — the number you'd genuinely be pleased with, distinct from your reservation price (the number below which you should walk).
4. Estimate the counterparty's reservation price and target price from whatever evidence is available: their known alternatives, public information, past deal patterns, market comparables. State the confidence level of this estimate explicitly — it's the least certain input and deserves to be treated that way.
5. Run the bundled calculator (scripts/batna_zopa.py) to compute the ZOPA and get a recommended opening anchor that sits inside it.
6. If a ZOPA exists, anchor near your target but inside the ZOPA — anchoring outside it (even in your own favor) risks being dismissed as not negotiating in good faith rather than being taken as an aggressive but serious opening.
7. If no ZOPA exists, do not proceed to negotiate on price. The calculator's explicit flag means one of three things: walk away to your BATNA, restructure the deal (financing terms, timeline, scope, bundled items) to create value that shifts one side's reservation price, or revisit your estimate of the counterparty's position since it may be wrong.
8. Prepare for the parts a calculator can't model: the specific concessions you're willing to trade (and in what order, since sequencing concessions signals different things than granting them all at once), and the two or three questions that would most improve your estimate of the counterparty's actual reservation price once the conversation starts.