In commercial contracting, the best negotiators don’t just craft strategies – they run simulations.
They don’t enter the room with just a wish list of outcomes. They enter knowing how the other side is likely to push back, delay, distract, or concede. Because in high-stakes deals, the battle is often won not with better arguments, but with better anticipation.
Strategy That Only Looks Inward Is Half a Strategy
It’s easy to get laser-focused on your objectives: lower pricing, extended warranties, favorable exit clauses. But without insight into your counterpart’s likely tactics and sequencing, you risk:
- Getting blindsided by well-timed pivots or deflections
- Miscalculating when to concede or stand firm
- Overlooking hidden red lines that seem like flexibility
In other words, you could win some battles and lose the war.
Examples of Tactics to Watch For
Understanding the other party’s likely moves gives you the upper hand. Here are a few tactical maneuvers that a well-prepared negotiation strategy anticipates:
| Likely Tactic | Why It’s Used | How to Counter |
| Anchoring Early | To define the range of acceptable outcomes | Come with your own credible anchor |
| Feigning Scarcity | To create urgency or reduce options | Validate claims and explore alternatives |
| Delaying Tactics | To wear down the other party’s patience | Escalate strategically or set process deadlines |
| Unilateral Concessions | To earn reciprocity or set a trap | Stick to your concession strategy |
| Emotional Appeals | To shift focus from logic to empathy | Re-center on data and contract objectives |
By anticipating these, your strategy becomes proactive – not just reactive.
How to Predict Their Game Plan
- Research Their Business Model
Are they more concerned with cash flow, intellectual property, long-term lock-ins? Their tactics will align with their core drivers. - Study Past Patterns
Review contracts and negotiations with the same party (or industry peers) for recurring behaviors and deal structures. - Assess Their Decision Process
Centralized or fragmented? Procurement-led or technically driven? This affects who says what – and when. - Use Stakeholder Mapping
Understand internal players on their side: who’s protecting margin, who’s pushing for timelines, who’s managing risk?
Strategic Advantage: Planning With Dual Vision
When you embed this level of anticipation into your strategy, your team:
- Knows when resistance is performative vs. genuine
- Avoids being manipulated by false trade-offs
- Times their own offers for maximum effectiveness
- Builds credibility and control through confidence
Bottom Line: Contracts Are as Much About People as Paper
Every contract reflects human intention, and humans have patterns. By building your negotiation strategy on an understanding of not only what you want but also how they’ll try to get what they want, your contracts evolve from reactive documents to precision tools of commercial success.
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