Using “Anchors,” when negotiating, refers to the psychological bias of how negotiators rely heavily on the first piece of information presented to them (the anchor) when making decisions or judgments. This first anchor in any negotiation has a powerful influence on subsequent negotiation discussions and can significantly impact the final deal.

Companies often approach me to “ELAvate” the negotiating skills of their sales people. These are companies that have a sales team in place, done the basic selling skills training a few months or a year or two ago, but they still find their sales productivity lagging behind expectations. A cursory investigation by their sales managers leads them to the conclusion that their sales people are losing sales towards the end of the sales cycle and, therefore, sales negotiating skills are weak.

Many sales managers have approached me over the years to conduct negotiation skill training for their salespeople to be more successful in conducting negotiations with ever more knowledgeable, demanding customers. Based on my experience and on-line research, I have found these are the major reasons for salespeople failing to negotiate successfully