Mladen D. Kresic is President and Chief Executive of K&R Negotiations, a consulting firm specializing in structuring and negotiating business transactions in the computer, software, Internet and other industries. Mladen has over 31 years experience negotiating business transactions both as a lawyer and a businessman.
Negotiations Touch Every Part of Your Life and Career It doesn’t matter whether you’re buying a car or an enterprise software system: negotiations touch every part of your life, every part of your career, and will have a major impact on your personal success. Dealing with a regular client who, at the eleventh hour, wants […]
Keynote speeches — like the ones that kick off a big sales drive or annual meeting — are fantastic opportunities…that aren’t always leveraged to their fullest. Most executive leaders will take to the podium assured that the top-line strategic messaging of the day, a sprinkling of humor and a few perfunctory rallying cries for the […]
Either through becoming emotionally invested, getting pressure from leadership or being unable to analyze key factors that should indicate retreat, business negotiators often find themselves spending long amounts of time on deals of diminishing — or even illusory — value. One of the cornerstones of negotiation theory is BATNA (best alternative to a negotiated agreement), […]
Some concepts are better expressed using an example. Our client was at a crucial juncture with their customer — a European bank. In just three months, the time frame was expiring on an agreement to provision identity access management. That project had been running for three years, and had progressed substantially as forecasted. So a […]
In January I penned this post about the new plateaus of opportunity that open up for both buyers and sellers when we make the mindset shift to becoming a true strategic partner, rather than just a “run and fetch” vendor that recites features and delivers quotes. There is a fundamental problem (one that is not […]
When competition starts putting the pressure on you, it’s natural to look at price-cutting as the primary way to keep the business. But in the long run, this is a mistaken impulse, unless accompanied by a sound business rationale such as a reduction in scope, change in terms or outcome from the deal. One […]
There is a world of difference between being a vendor that takes orders and being a valued peer or co-strategist. The former defaults to a defensive or reactive position, missing opportunities to help their client, increase the value of an account and build a more durable, mutually profitable relationship. Moving from the master/servant paradigm isn’t […]
The “time factor” — how you manage it against other considerations and use the high-level (or macro) agenda to help create agreement has a huge impact on your success! This was certainly the case during an engagement with one of our technology clients, whose customer was in the European auto segment. All of our client’s […]
I recently noticed and greatly enjoyed Dave Stein’s LinkedIn Pulse post, “If I Have to Sit Through One More B.S. Sales Training Class…” Dave discusses the major pet peeves of a sales “heavy hitter” who bristles at the thought of sitting through sales training meetings conducted by people who have never sold, don’t know sales’ […]
Recently our friend and colleague, Jim Hale, published a blog on territory management and the art/discipline of applying multiple resources and time to effectively generate sustainable sales. In the end, winning Territory Action Planning (TAP™) results in increased customer satisfaction and relationships, higher win rates and overall better revenue and profit results. Because this is […]
