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Whether it involves hiring and negotiating staff, arranging an event, signing a contract, agreeing to terms, arranging a conference or convention, or negotiating with a hotel or other conference/ convention venue, organizations must follow a professionally designed, organized, well planned, in depth and detailed negotiating strategy. While most larger organizations have far larger and better trained and talented staffs, with generally designated staff members with specific negotiating skills, that is often not the case with smaller and medium sized organizations. Those organizations often end up being poorly represented by unqualified staff, or by a well meaning but untrained volunteer, also lacking expertise. These organizations often confuse experience with expertise, and merely because someone has done it before, they believe he is a negotiator. However, while experience merely means that someone has done something, expertise requires training, knowledge and specific training in an area.

Often, these smaller to medium sized organizations hire an outside company or consultant to negotiate or arrange something in their behalf. As someone who has spent more than three decades negotiating, arranging and coordinating all aspects of events, conferences and conventions, the disconcerting thing is that I have often observed organizations “hurt” by these outside contractors, because they are often not the correct contractor for their needs.

Organizations should carefully understanding what their needs and requirements are, as well as their objectives, prior to hiring an outside contractor. For example, one of the most common errors I have observed is organizations hiring a company that specializes in group hotel room bookings, to arrange the contract for their conference or convention. While these types of companies can be quite useful with small groups using under about fifty rooms per night for their meeting, groups using more than that, especially if for more than three nights, who are also doing events, banquets, etc., at the property, often can do far better by not using that kind of organization. An easy way to understand this is to understand it from the hotel’s perspective. Booking companies are paid a commission (generally 10%) on the room revenue generated, but not on other aspects. While it is usually true that the hotel will not offer a better room rate if booked directly, it will almost always match that rate when a sufficient number of rooms are being booked. However, since the hotel has to pay the commission to the booking company, it reduces the flexibility of the hotel in terms of other concessions, especially regarding Food and Beverage, complimentary meeting rooms, and many other important concessions. An organization should identify all its needs before negotiating with a hotel, and then use a competitive Request for Proposal (RFP) procedure to obtain as many concessions as possible.

The major point is that organizations should understand that the difference between optimum negotiations and adequate representation can represent a sizable amount of money, and when the negotiations are less than adequate, as I have so often observed, the savings is even more than substantial. Organizations need to emphasize negotiations as part of their overall leadership training program.

Let’s say you have a room full of people you are looking to train, or influence. You have a lot of information to convey to this group of people, how should you do it? What is the most cost effective, time appropriate, and let us not forget easiest way to do this? Better yet the most important question to ask one’s self is how can I get this group of people interested, gain their trust and keep it throughout the process.

In either instance, a speech would do, but it may come across as tedious or even worse, boring. If you have information that must be conveyed starting with a “boring” speech type proposal is certainly the quickest way to lose the attention of your audience. Once you lose the attention of your audience, it is gone, working on regaining their attention is also a lost cause, start strong and never lose their attention.

Here is a novel idea make your statement(s) via a presentation. Presentations have the ability to hold the attention of your audience as well as “highlight” or pinpoint any information that must be retained. The intriguing idea behind presentations is that they allow mental stimulation as well as visual stimulation. By combing mental stimulation with audio stimulation, you are entertaining two of the five senses; thus allowing the memory retentive area of your audience’s brain to step in and help the brain “absorb” and process the information provided easier.

Before you start your presentation, there are a two key steps to keep in mind:

1. Know the subject you are trying to convey

Who wants to listen to someone that has no idea what he or she is talking about? If you want someone to listen to you, and find your information valid, make an effort and put in the time dedicated to research your topic(s). If someone asks you a follow-up question or questions the last thing you want to say, “Uh I’m not sure,” all creditability is lost from the time you mutter the word “Uh.” Know your stuff, be able to recite the information in your sleep, and make sure that you are ready for any question or questions that may be thrown at you. Keep in mind that the information you are presenting can only be as credible as the person presenting it, and you will be sure to check and recheck the facts as often as necessary.

2. Know your audience

Who is your audience? Who are the people that you will be presenting to? When making a presentation it is important to keep your audience in mind. They are the people you are looking to “convince”, if you are not able to pinpoint your target audience you are not going to be able to tailor the information accordingly. For instance, a younger audience may do better with an Internet based technology chat, whereas an older audience may get lost in the idea of the Internet. Before presenting any information, make sure you aware of your audience, who they are and the best way to convey your message.

Remember our ultimate goal here is mental stimulation, by stimulating our audience’s brain we can keep them interested, entertained, and help the information “sink” in. By following the guidelines outlined above, we can engage our audience in a presentation that not only teaches them but also allows them the opportunity to advance their knowledge.

Why is it that business people often spend so much money on image only to lose all that wonderful first impression on the fact their car looks terrible? Boy it sure seems like a lot of wasted effort to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a professional website, colorful brochures, hairstyles, attire and a gold Rolex only to ruin it all by driving up in a dirty car. In fact if this scenario were not so common, I seriously doubt I would bother to mention it at all. But it is a fact and indeed I have seen it. How so you ask?

Well, for 27 years I ran a company that franchised mobile car wash units and auto detailing rigs and marketed so many cities. We would constantly see this from our business customers. Their cars looked like crap, of course we saw the people who noticed this problem and did something about it, namely paid us to clean up their messy cars.

Yet by the same token as a Franchisor Founder, we noticed sales people, potential vendors and even business partners attempt to do business with us and they parked their dirty cars in our parking lot. Silly really, as they were selling to a company specializing in cleaning cars.

Nevertheless, it should be noted that your car and its cleanliness will be judged and your automobile is very much a part of your business presentation.