International Negotiation Tactics

Hi guys, we're back in action & this time a little bit smarter & wiser....

On Tuesday, we were exposed to quite an inspriring lady guest speaker/ facilitator named Isabelle Dreuilhe who is a master faciliatator for global negotiations for international corporate conglomerates. Three teams of 11 persons each were formed, each team comprising 2 sales team members & 2 customer team members. We role-played the Dinotis case study whereby the firm is a French based parent company specializing in non-woven medical supplies like theatre gowns, face masks, etc. and this French parent company has now decided to open a manufacturing facility in Algeria to service the African continent, more specifically a SA public hospital based in JHB.

Myself & Albertyn, albeit in different groups, drew the long straw & had the easy task of being customer in the negotiations & so we were off to a good footing, being able to scrutinize & question every aspect of the sales pitch. Out of the 3 workgroups, 1 winning team emerged from each facilitators class & they challenged each other in the finals, attended by the GM of the Dinotis firm & lots of other high profiled Business School associates & affiliates. In fact, there were questions like, why did you only establish in Africa 20 years later, etc? The GM of Dinotis took serious note of some of the sales blockers which the teams presented & he was truly moved, some of the things which looked like he himself did not contemplate, given the look on his face.

The day played out well & we were exposed to all possible elements one encounters when negotiating on an international level where nationalities, cultures & communication barriers could add to the mix of difficult negotiating criteria... certainly not an easy task, with most of the delegates stuttering, sweating, etc. but still managing to maintain composure.

At the end of the day, the hosts, facilitators, associates & affiliates of the business school were all very impressed by the high calibre of the South African delegates attending the programme, we made sure that our national  flag flew high, the flags which our French hosts brought to the table, I might add, this even after our Bafana Bafana beat them in the 2010 SWC knock-out stages, which still seems to be a sore point for them. This bode well for us, including our respective firms which we represent & most of all the country whom most here believe is in some deep dark corner of the globe, you know that some of the French are still of the view that we as South Africans are still running around with loin cloths, beating our hunt to death for mealtimes each day (caveman style) & that the BIG 5 run around us all day long in what can be considered a big backyard.