Team-Building Strategies: Building a Winning Team for Your Organization

Claim your free copy from the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School.

Comment

Discover How to Build a Winning Team and Boost Your Business Negotiation Results

Dear Business Builder,

Peter’s story says a lot about the value of effective team-building. Here’s how he tells it:

It happened one morning in late September in a small auditorium.

We were 27 people who didn’t know each other very well — not very well at all.

Sure, we all worked for the same company, but so did hundreds of other people.

It was unclear how each of us had been selected to attend this meeting, because we represented vastly different departments, job functions and skill sets.

Nevertheless, there we were, assembled in our chairs, attentively listening to one of the vice presidents.

His words were welcoming. His voice was upbeat. His thoughts were coherent. He was even inspiring. So, I initially felt a rapport with this executive.

Of course, the corporate merger project he described was monumental, would involve resolving a myriad of details, and would ignite numerous contentious issues.

And then he said something that was so incongruent and puzzling, that I winced.

“We’ve assembled this team to solve our biggest business challenge,” he announced. “It will require each of you to be skilled at business negotiation.”

But as I looked around, I didn’t see a team. All I saw was a group of ambitious individuals who didn’t even know each other.

Each of us had an individual agenda. We were all competing for recognition and promotion.

How did he expect to organize us? Unify us? Handle disagreements? Solve problems? Make decisions?

How was this experienced and respected business executive planning to transform us from a disparate group of individuals into a viable business negotiation team?

I was about to find out…

Over the next few months, I had a front row seat at a real-time workshop on effective team building.

Mr. Anderson (not his real name) was masterful in his ability to develop common goals and a shared vision of our group’s mission.

• He recognized that the diversity of the group was one of its most valuable assets.
• He created an environment that encouraged communication, both by telling us what we needed to hear, and by demonstrating active listening.
• He taught us how to handle our conflicts … resolve disputes … get consensus for important decisions … and so much more.
• He transformed a group of ambitious, competitive individuals who sought personal recognition for their achievements into a focused, dedicated, unified negotiation team.
• And he orchestrated it all with a light touch, functioning more as a player-coach than as a traditional boss.

Eventually, Mr. Anderson harnessed the team’s talents and energy so effectively that we negotiated all the details of our corporate merger successfully and ahead of schedule.

It was truly one of the most rewarding experiences of my entire career.
Peter’s story is an eye-opener, but not a shock. At the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law, we’ve grown accustomed to these success stories.

The Harvard PON students who master business negotiation and team building become successful CEO’s, cabinet members, ambassadors, diplomats, and advisors to other world leaders.

Now, you can learn the skills required to be a team builder … an effective negotiator … and a negotiation coach.

In Team-Building Strategies: Building a Winning Team for Your Organization, you’ll discover:

• How to “unfreeze” old thought processes so that real change can happen.
• How to structure negotiation training so that it actually delivers results. (Simply reciting interesting concepts and retelling war stories is not a model for success.)
• How to be certain you understand the key concepts and practical applications of a negotiation simulation.
• What to do when making decisions based on faulty intuition threatens your self-esteem.
• How delegating responsibility without adequate authority can stymie negotiations. (The all-important organizational changes required to help negotiators succeed.)
• Measuring responsibility, accountability and dollar impact. (The essential factors for establishing a well-formed outcome, justifying criteria for success, and rewarding performance objectively.)
• A simple exercise for reducing contentiousness and competition. (Simply adopting this mindset can improve the negotiation outcome.)

Effective Business Negotiation Means Getting a Mutually Beneficial Outcome While Earning the Respect of Both Your Team and Your Adversaries.

Team-Building Strategies: Building a Winning Team for Your Organization is a fast-reading report from the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School that provides penetrating insights into:

• Learning to be a skilled negotiator. (It’s essential to a successful business career.)
• Finding an effective negotiation “coach.” (You’ll discover the key to identifying the right mentor.)
• Conducting negotiation training. (A little-known strategy that assures quality results.)
• Getting authorization to act of behalf of your client. (Learn the critical factors.)
• Educating key individuals about the special needs and challenges of your external negotiations. (It’s critical that you know how to do this effectively.)
• Managing principal-agent dynamics. (How to set ground rules and deal with tradeoffs.)
• Budgeting for negotiations training. (Using a systematic solution that could yield a higher return on investment.)

Plus, Team-Building Strategies: Building a Winning Team for Your Organization sheds new light on the myths and realities of:

• Developing the ability to predict what will and won’t work.
• Identifying what techniques to try.
• Understanding what happened “after the fact.”
• Getting consistent results.
• Diagnosing your strengths and weaknesses.
• Analyzing the mutual-gains theory of negotiation.
• Selling your organization on the deal’s value.
• Persuading your colleagues in finance, legal and product development to sign off on a negotiated transaction.

Start Your Journey to Mastering Business Negotiation and Team Building With This Free Special Report From the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School

If you’re like me, you spend a lot of time reading. Books. Newsletters. Magazines. Websites.

It’s practically endless. So, if you’re going to put something on my reading pile, it better be worth my attention.

That’s why I so appreciate a fast-reading report that distills the most essential information down into a format I can read and absorb easily.

I urge you to download your complimentary copy of Team-Building Strategies: Building a Winning Team for Your Organization, right now. Simply click the button below.

I promise, it’s worth your time to read it.

With my sincere best wishes for your business negotiation success,

Sincerely,

Gail Odeneal
Director of Marketing
Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School

P.S. Are you the leader of a team, or merely the referee of a group of individuals trying to achieve personal recognition?

Tough times can create conflicts within organizations.

When conflict threatens to disrupt the harmony on your team, smart leaders are proactive, not reactive.

I urge you to download your free copy of Team-Building Strategies: Building a Winning Team for Your Organization, right now. Here’s how: