Negotiation skills
This lesson is designed to help entry-level sales agents in the residential real estate industry develop key negotiation skills when negotiating a deal between sellers and buyers.
Overview
The goal: Reach a negotiation success rate of 70%, from the current rate of 55%, by EOY by applying Arco's negotiation policy to real estate negotiations.
Target audience: entry-level real estate agents.
Solutions:
- Branching scenario lessons
- Feedback mechanism
- Mentorship program
Tools used: Articulate Storyline, PowerPoint, Miro (for mind maps), Twine
Discovery session: uncovering needs and objectives
The client: a rapidly expanding, medium-size real estate company that sells residential properties in Birmingham, UK, called Arco Real Estate.
Measurement: Negotiation success rate, calculated monthly, has shown a decline by 15% in the last 6 months.
The problem: Arco Real Estates is seeing exponential growth in their agency and is hiring many promising young real estate agents. However, they have realised that their negotiation success rate has been suffering for the last 6 months.
Learner profile: entry level real estate agents, mostly young adults.
Resources: the agency has 12 months before the problem becomes too painful. As a successful and expanding business, budget is not a constraint.
Business objective statement/ goal: reach a negotiation success rate of 70% by EOY by applying Arco’s negotiation policy to real estate negotiations.
Discussion: the declining success rate has been attributed to the inadequate training available to the new hires. Feedback from clients and observation from supervisors and colleagues suggest the new hires make mistakes and are struggling. Interviews with some of the new hires reveals that, although they are aware of the agency’s negotiation policies, they struggle to apply it to their negotiations. Other factors that could be the cause for the problem, like marketing and pricing strategy, have been ruled out because these have been effective in propelling the business forward.
Identifying effective training strategy
I further dissect the overarching goal and list the actions agents need to take, rather than focusing solely on what they need to know, to reach this goal in a mind map.
Using this information, I advise effective strategies to achieve the goal:
Branching scenarios: This is effective in skills-based training. It will allow them to practice their skills in a safe simulated environment, where they will be able to explore and learn from trying different options. The scenarios incorporate expert guidance based on the agency’s negotiation policy.
Feedback mechanism: The consequences of each of their choices are incorporated into the branching scenarios as a form of instant feedback. The agents can also turn to their assigned mentors for additional feedback when required.
Mentorship program: The new agents are grouped and assigned to senior staff members. The mentors can provide guidance and suggestions based on their experience where required.
Gathering information
I meticulously gather information from various sources including the agency’s official negotiation policy document, some senior staff members and the assigned SME. All the information is systematically organised in a mind map to create a branching scenario.
Preliminary draft of storyboard
I create the preliminary story board that contains the main crux of the branching scenarios. This is sent for approval from all stakeholders. I use Miro for this process.
Final storyboard
Once the draft is approved, I chart out a more detailed storyboard that contains all elements that need to go into the final product, including onscreen text, description of images, programming notes, etc.
I create this on Twine. Here is a screenshot of what it look like. You can experience it by clicking here.
Visual mock up
The visual mock up includes the theme colours, fonts, and assets including background image, characters, and buttons. I source these from various online sites and edit them to match the theme. The ones you see in the images are from Freepik.com.
Once approved by the stakeholders, I start working on the final branching scenario.
Full development
Developing the final branching scenario is straightforward after the story boards and visual mock-ups have been approved.
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