Negotiation Skills for Business, Salary and Debt

How To Power Negotiate Your Next Bonus

A raise in your base salary is a permanent source of increased income. However, to increase your take home pay, you can also negotiate performance bonuses on specific projects, activities, or time frames. In the sales world bonuses are often called commissions. That is, a person is paid a salary plus commission for a certain level of sales. However, even if you are not in sales, you can find ways to earn extra income by negotiating win-win solutions.

It's all about increasing profit for the company or your department. For example, let's say you are part of a project with a $100,000.00 budget and a 10-week timeline. In simple terms, the project average is $10,000.00 per week ($100,000.00 divided by 10 weeks = $10,000.00 per week.) You approach your boss, the project manager, and/or other decision makers with a question such as "How would you feel about setting up a special bonus to encourage excellent performance. Can you think of a workable approach?" Of course, you will have already thought things through and will have a couple approaches of your own.

You might say, "If I can find a way to complete the 10 weeks worth of work in 8 weeks without compromising safety or quality, how would you feel about giving me a 10% bonus on the savings?" Let's do the math: You save 2 weeks off the schedule decreasing the cost by $20,000.00 (2 weeks at $10,000.00 per week.) This saves the company $20,000.00 and all you are asking for is 10% or $2000.00 of the $20,000.00 saved. The company wins and you win. In this case, you earned an extra $2000.00 and the company gained an extra $18,000.00. Don't worry: Once you show a track record of being the kind of person who can create these types of win-win's, the more you can negotiate down the road. Fifty-fifty has a nice ring to it!

Following are some ideas where you might negotiate a bonus scenario in your organization:

-- Special projects

-- Increased efficiency of operations

-- Decreased sick leave

-- Budgetary savings through increased efficiency in purchasing, inventory control, distribution, etc.

-- Decreased turn over of employees, customers, vendors, etc.

-- Training and development savings through leveraging in-house expertise or bringing in outside experts instead of sending people to outside training

-- Researching better rates on telephone services, vendors and suppliers, business materials, capital equipment, etc.

In any organization there is unlimited opportunity to find ways to do things more efficiently and effectively. If you keep your eyes and ears open, you can often find these opportunities and translate them into more money in your pocket.

Dr. Dan Strakal has been an expert on the changing workplace, job transition, and career development for nearly 20 years. He acts as a trusted client advisor and consultant within the corporate sector, government agencies, civic organizations, small businesses, and educational institutions. He also provides business, executive and career consulting, coaching and workshops for individual clients and is the coauthor of and contributor to two books, Better Job Search in 3 Easy Steps and Better Job Skills in 3 Easy Steps. Dan is often called upon by the national and international media as an expert and has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Self Magazine, SmartMoney.com, Computerworld, Diversity Inc. Magazine, Chief Information Officer (Australia's Magazine for Information Executives), the Radio America Program: News You Can Use, KBS Radio Canada and many other media outlets. He is on the Board of Directors of the Career Planning and Adult Development Network and is a Platinum Member of the Career Masters Institute. More info at http://www.capable-consulting.com

MORE ARTICLES:

Essentials of Negotiation - Be A Negotiation Specialist!
Some people make it look really easy - closing deals and winning great transactions without breaking sweat. But do you know that there are ways to become an expert on the essentials of negotiation and getting things done your way? The benefits of knowing the essentials of negotiation are endless!

Negotiations Within Negotiation
If only two persons attend a mediation and they are both have authority to settle, then only three negotiations take place. They are between (1) person 1 and person 2, (2) person 1 and mediator, (3) person 2 and mediator.

Salary Negotiation Tips ? How to Negotiate Your Way to a Higher Salary
?Who needs to know salary negotiation tips?? you might ask. Every deserving employee does! If there comes a point in your career when you feel deprived of the greater opportunities your job has to offer, then you need to know and apply effective salary negotiation tips to stay ahead. When you invest a lot of time, energy and skills into something, it is only fair that you are rewarded the full benefits of your labor.

Sales Negotiation Training - Negotiating Your Way to a Better Deal
It?s a cutthroat commercialist world we?re living in; and in order to survive, sales negotiation training is absolutely essential. Whether it?s a business arrangement or a personal transaction, how well you negotiate can spell the difference between profitable gains and financial disaster. Here are some sales negotiation training guidelines to keep in mind so you?re never at the losing end of a deal.

Negotiation Skills Training: The Sales Multiplier Close
Negotiation skills training:

Negotiating Skills Will Get You Ahead
Negotiating skills can help you manage lots of different kinds of life situations, both at work and in your personal relationships. Here are a few examples of where these skills can help you build an even better life for yourself:1.

Assertion Skills For Women: Using DBT Skills For Better Health
**Please remember that no part of this article is intended to take the place of professional or medical advice This article provides limited information and does not attempt to diagnosis or treat any illnesses or disorder

Get What You Want - Negotiating Skills for the Timid!
OK, I know this title sounds self-serving and hard nosed, but the article isn't! Whether it's buying a car, asking for a pay rise, saying 'no' to a friend or renting an apartment - at some stage in our lives we all are going to need to know how to negotiate. Yet, so few of us know the basic skills before embarking on life changing purchases or decisions!This article is written for those TIMID folk who want to feel more confident in the basic skills of negotiating.

Negotiation Expert Marty Latz Authors New Monthly Negotiation Column for The Arizona Republic and Weekly Negotiation Blog
After ten years as a negotiation columnist for The Business Journal of Phoenix, Marty Latz, author of "Gain the Edge! Negotiating to Get What You Want," will be writing a new monthly negotiation column for the Arizona Republic. In addition, he also publishes the weekly negotiation blog at ExpertNegotiator.

Negotiation Skill Training ? How to Hone Your Negotiation Skills
Everyday we come face to face with situations that test our ability to negotiate. Though you might not give it much thought, a lot of negotiation happens with people we meet and choices we make. Whether it?s over a meal with your hubby, at the supermarket with the saleslady or during a lunch meeting with your boss, we need to grasp the basics of a negotiation skill training to make the most of these everyday deals.

How To Improve Your Negotiating Skills
Negotiation will be an important area for every homebased business owner, especially in lease purchasing. Whether you're dealing with suppliers, employees, or prospective clients, you're negotiating.

Negotiation Techniques - How to Win by Not Negotiating Against Yourself
Negotiation and Negotiating Skills are some of the most sought after sales training courses People seek out negotiation tips, negotiating strategies and scour the web for processes to win against the 'other' person in a negotiation

Negotiating and Sales Skills Are Critical
When I first started getting active in creative real estate, my skill set at negotiating was very weak. I had done the telemarketing thing for American Express as a financial planner and had studied and learned a few techniques.

Negotiating Tactics: Don't Let 'Good Guy – Bad Guy' Control the Sales Negotiation
Counter one of the classic negotiating gambits by addressing it directly.You've assembled a brilliant sales proposal for a new client and when you arrive to the meeting to hammer out the final details, you suddenly find yourself sitting across the table negotiating with two people.