Negotiations are a part of life, from deciding where to go on holiday with your family to making a multi-million dollar deal in business. We negotiate everyday. And in the modern world, where companies do business in different countries, it is important to know how to negotiate in English.
In this second of two online exercises on negotiation essentials in business, you'll learn and remember more English vocabulary used for negotiations. In particular, you'll learn the vocabulary for describing both the general progression and the events that happen in business negotiations.
Click here to go to the first part of this 'Essential negotiation vocabulary' exercise
In the following conversation, Geoff a sales executive updates his manager Sally on how the negotiations he is involved in are progressing.
From the context, try to guess what the meaning of the words/phrases in bold are. Then do the quiz at the end to check if you are right.
Sally:'So Geoff, how's everything with your current negotiations?'
Geoff:'Well, some are going well and some are going not so well.'
Sally:'OK, well tell me first about the negotiations with Beaver.'
Geoff:'It's not going well at all. In fact I don't think we're going to win the contract. We've reached a deadlock on the price of the project. As you know we made them a very reasonable offer, it was very competitive. They came back with a counteroffer on Monday where they not only wanted a 20% reduction in price, but also wanted to have 24 hour customer support instead of the 18 hours that we offered them. I told them that we could not do it for that price, because we would make a large loss. But it made no difference, they won't budge.'
Sally:'They were just seeing how you would react. You did the right thing by not reducing our offer. The worst thing you can do now is to panic and back down and give them a much lower price. I would advise you to give them time, they will know it's an unreasonable counteroffer. The negotiation is still in its early stages. There's a long way to go yet.
Maybe it's not as bad as you think, at least the negotiations haven't broken down and they are still continuing. It's common for negotiations to stall over issues like this. I would think that it'll start again when they've had time to think about it. I negotiated with them 3 years ago and their chief negotiator tried to bluff me, by saying 'This is the price we'll pay. Take it or leave it!'. I told him we would have to leave it, and they changed their mind two days later. It was like a game of poker.'
Geoff:'I hope so. Anyway, I have some good news about Clayton Logistics. It's progressing very well with them. We've reached a compromise on the price and scope of the project. They are very happy with the terms and conditions that we are offering them. In my opinion, I think they are ready to sign. I'm meeting them next week. So, I'll be hopefully bringing back a 4 year deal then.'
Sally:'Excellent. It's a big company and it should be good for a lot of follow on business. Oh, by the way, it looks likely that we'll have to renegotiate the Pemberton Contract. They're currently having a lot of problems because of the crisis and they contacted me about reducing the cost on their existing support contract. So, if you're not busy, I would appreciate if you could take care of it.'
Geoff:'No problem.'
Match the words/phrases in bold from the above text to each of the definitions/descriptions below. Click on the "Check" button at the bottom of the quiz to check your answers.
When the answer is correct, two icons will appear below the answer. The "" icon contains extra information on the word/phrase. In the "" icon, you can listen to the pronunciation of the word/phrase.
Now that you understand the meaning of the words/phrases and when to use them, practise using them by creating your own sentences with them in English. Also click on the "" icon under each correct answer and listen how each is pronounced correctly.
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