Video Negotiation English: Complete Guide to Proposals, Responses, and Techniques

Hi there. Welcome to our next lesson about the language of negotiating. In this lesson, we'll continue to talk about the negotiating process, but we're going to look more closely at how we make and respond to proposals during negotiations. We'll look at both language and guidelines to help you have a successful negotiation. You'll have a chance to participate in a discussion forum with others taking this course. At the end of this lesson, you'll be able to make a proposal, respond to a proposal, and show that you can use effective negotiating techniques.

In the last lesson, you learned about the preparation and discussion stages in a negotiation. Now, we're ready to focus on the back and forth interaction that takes place in the negotiating stage. A lot of languages involved in reaching an agreement, proposals, explanations, counter-proposals, suggestions, questions, conditions. Let's begin by looking at proposals. A proposal is a plan or a suggestion for others to consider. There are different kinds of proposals. They can be written or spoken. They can be formal or informal.

A written proposal is usually formal and generally very detailed. It includes things like how the job will be done, the timeframe, qualifications of the company, and the costs. Some proposals can be sent through email. These are much shorter than written proposals, and the details are often included in an attachment. Proposals can also be spoken in a formal meeting, an informal meeting, or over the phone. Let's look at a spoken negotiation to start. You'll have a chance to look more closely at negotiating through email in the next lesson.

A proposal is a suggestion. What do you do when someone makes a suggestion? Well, let's imagine your friend says, hey, let's go get pizza. Let's listen to what not to do. Hey, let's go get pizza. I hate pizza. Instead, you would probably say something like this. Hey, let's go get pizza. I just had pizza last night. How about ramen instead? How does that sound? That's a silly example, but we can take a lesson from that for making proposals. First, a proposal is a suggestion, so it needs a response, but saying something rude doesn't help.

When we respond to a suggestion, we can say no, but we usually give a reason and an alternative. Finally, we ask what the other person thinks. Three words are very common in negotiating, propose, suggest, and offer. Let's look at the differences in the way that we use them. Propose is the most formal of three. It's often used to begin a negotiation. You could say, I'd like to propose this, or here's my proposal, and then state your proposal.

Suggest is a very common word, used more frequently in informal negotiations, and you might say that a suggestion is more open for discussion. When you say, let me make a suggestion, you're just throwing out an idea. An offer is a bit different and more limited in use. When you make an offer, it's usually something specific and often related to money, like I'll offer you a thousand dollars, or here's our offer, we'll give you the third one for free.

Here are some more examples of formal proposals with the verb propose. Let me propose this. I propose a revision of the current contract. I propose that we start with a small order to test the market. What we're proposing is that we include a third partner. I'd like to propose a plan that I think will work for both of us. Often we add would to that verb because it sounds a little more indirect. Are you starting to notice how often we suggest this softener?

Here are some examples with suggest. As I said before, it sounds like it's an option to consider, not a final idea. And finally, some examples with offer in a formal proposal. We could offer the lot with two attendance for $1,200. We're prepared to offer $6,000 for the collection. We'd like to make an offer on the property.