Posts Tagged ‘Improvisation skills for business’

Art & Business

Negotiation – How to Negotiate and Get Paid More…

Negotiation is a fundamental skill and something we do all the time in life, sometimes unconsciously. Even more crucial to negotiate well when you want a pay rise. The key to successful negotiation, regardless of what is at stake is navigating the other person’s emotions. So our old friends active listening, empathy, rapport, behavioral change, mirroring energy….all come in useful here.

Some Don’ts…

  • Don’t be afraid to admit and be explicit about what you want. Too often people feel it’s too aggressive or too forward to state in simple terms what they want.
  • Don’t do all the talking in a negotiation. Ensure it’s a dialogue. Use open ended questions and listen to the answers, regardless of how different they are to the ideal answers you have in your head. Listening and observing as you listen are vital – this keeps you in the moment as opposed to formulating your next statement.
  • Don’t say I love this car and then ask for a discount when they can see you’re already emotionally attached. Instead try “I really like this car but it’s out of my budget. What help are you able to offer?’

Things to Try…

  • Be assertive, not aggressive or passive. Remember that assertiveness equals acknowledging and respecting other people’s rights and feelings whilst maintaining your own.
  •  Know your audience – do your research and homework, then formulate a plan and moderate your behaviour accordingly. Try to tune into their frequency rather than doing what you always do. actors always place their focus on their acting partner in a scene as whatever I do or say next depends on whatever you do or say now. So what are their needs, hopes, fears?
  • Acknowledge any emotion in the room – “I’m hearing that this means a lot to you” or “I see this puts you in a difficult position” type statements go a long way to furthering rapport and building mutual trust during a negotiation.
  • Express what you want in terms of the other person’s needs. eg. rather than say “I want X amount” try ” If I have salary X that will enable me to commit fully to the new project”
  • Have a plan B up your sleeve. Have your ideal outcome in mind and also a scenario that you could live with. This makes getting the ideal “plan A” less desperate, less of an all or nothing mission.
  • Do be prepared to walk away from the negotiation if any deal doesn’t fall between your parameters of acceptability

Be Open and Sincere…

Aim to be open and sincere and never aim to rip anyone off – such gung ho, short-termism is poor negotiation which may come back to haunt you. Remember that building a potentially fruitful long term relationship is far more valuable than getting a one-off good deal.
Sartaj Garewal is the founder of Dynamic Presenting – a creative, leadership development consultancy, adapting theatre training to create leadership programs for business.

Dynamic Presenting – Enabling Powerful Communication

Communication Skills Training

Leadership – 5 Vital Lessons from Actors…

Leadership is tough. Actors by nature, training and practice have to be incredible communicators in rehearsal, on stage and on set. Empathy, perceptiveness and emotional agility are vital skills for any performer – it would be impossible to fathom a Shakespearean monologue otherwise.

Whilst actors could certainly learn a lot from the discipline, organisation and decision making abilities of those in the corporate world, business leaders could also gain valuable insight from the agility of performers.

1. Make Choices & Take Risks

The odds are so stacked against any one actor making a success that by their choice of profession alone, they are extreme risk takers. Also the most magnetic performances require daring, sometimes dangerous choices to be made in terms of character and action. Risk nothing and you will only deliver a mediocre, cliched performance which is easily forgotten. Anyone remember Blockbuster Video..? “The talent is in the choices you make” – Robert De Niro.

2. Improvise

Few can improvise and roll with the punches as well as stage actors. The ability to take on new information quickly (new characters, relationships, scenes, scripts) and roll with the punches has enormous relevance for robotic, process obsessed managers. “Accept and build” is the improviser’s mantra. Accept everything, deny nothing. Since change is inevitable, managers need to understand that everything changes and roll with that fluidly instead of clinging on to old ways of doing things.

3. Understand Behaviour & Empathise

No matter what amazing innovation technology will bring us tomorrow, a true understanding of people’s behaviour, nuances and emotions will always mark out real leaders from middle managers. In fact this should be no hardship or task but borne of a natural curiosity. The skill of feeling a character’s joy and pain are part of the actor’s job description. The leader, if she is to understand an organisation and inspire them must first of all understand them and what moves them.

 4. Build Relationships

Actors regularly have to create close, trusting relationships with their colleagues very quickly – imagine barely knowing somebody yet charged with portraying a loving relationship of say twenty years within a couple of hours of knowing each other. With just four weeks rehearsal before curtain up, there simply isn’t time to take your time. Jump to it, throw yourself in. This of course, takes courage – the courage to surrender ego and trust others.

5. Perform

The presentation, pitch, speech, difficult conversation etc are all moments of theatre and nothing quite expedites a leadership journey like performing with verve in those situations. Foster the storyteller within you and actively seek out every opportunity to showcase these skills.

Sartaj Garewal is the founder of Dynamic Presenting – a creative, leadership development consultancy, adapting theatre training to create leadership programs for business.

Dynamic Presenting – Enabling Powerful Communication

Role play mediation training

Role Play for Effective Mediation Training

Using role play is an innovative means of training in many areas of business and particularly relevant for those interested in mediation.

Dynamic Presenting ran a sell out workshop on improvisation skills for qualified mediators. The event was organised in conjunction with CIArb – Chartered Institute of Arbitrators www.ciarb.org and took place at the offices of magic circle law firm Allen & Overy. Sartaj Garewal MCIArb and elite mediator Amanda Bucklow ran a very interactive, high impact session allowing delegates to experience the value of improvisation when the stakes are high. Role play in other words.

Keynote speakers included The Honourable Mr Justice Ramsey and Karl Mackie. The day involved various break out sessions addressing a wide range of relevant topics from ‘The Myth of Reality Testing’ to ‘Improvisation Skills for Mediators.’

Forum Theatre

The event began with a high impact forum theatre intervention where the audience of 50 or so invited delegates watched actors role playing a typical mediation scenario. The scenario was challenging and realistic and depicted two parties in conflict where the mediator (played by an actor) loses control of initial proceedings and the whole affair turned into a slanging match.

The scene lasted just a few minutes and was then re-run from the top, only this time the watching delegates were instructed to stop the action whenever the actor role playing the mediator character said or did anything they felt could be more effective. The actors would role play moments as advised with new direction and lines from the audience which in turn affected the behaviour and actions of the two parties in conflict, resulting in a completely different and far more effective outcome. All with a good deal of laughing and debating along the way..!

Experiential Training Works…!

With a keen, energetic audience, experiential training interventions such as forum theatre and role play can work wonders and all with absolutely no powerpoint slides or flip charts in sight…!!

Sartaj Garewal is the founder of Dynamic Presenting – a creative, leadership development consultancy, adapting theatre training to create leadership programs for business.

Dynamic Presenting – Enabling Powerful Communication