Analysis of Negotiation and Pitching Skills for M&S Employees

This report examines negotiation and pitching skills within the context of Mark & Spencer (M&S), focusing on a scenario involving an employee's salary negotiation. It details the negotiation process, key stakeholders such as the departmental head, HR, and the personal assistant, and the benefits of strong negotiation skills for the company, including employee retention and conflict resolution. The report outlines the steps involved in negotiation, from preparation and planning to closure and implementation, and addresses potential issues like conflict and dissatisfaction. It also explains the RFP (Request for Proposal) process, including assessment, policy specification, and response evaluation, and the relevant documentation required. Finally, the report covers the contractual process, emphasizing effective contract management, and ways to handle relevant information.

Pitching and
Negotiation Skills

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
P1. Negotiation and key stakeholders during negation process.............................................1
P2. Key steps and information required for negotiating and generating deals.......................3
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................5
P3. RFP process and relevant type of documentation required..............................................5
P4. Contractual process and ways to manage relevant information.......................................6
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................8
P5. Develop an appropriate pitch applying key principle for achieving competitive edge....8
TASK 4............................................................................................................................................9
P6. Assessment of potential outcome of pitch........................................................................9
P7. Ways in which organisation can fulfil their post-pitch obligations, highlighting potential
issues.....................................................................................................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Negotiation refers to the process in which two parties keeping their view point which are
different in term of their need in order convince one another over their need for wining a deal.
Main aim of both the parties is to decide solution by mutual concern that benefit parties which
are involve in negotiation process (Campbell, 2017). Mark & Spencer is a chain of supermarket
that operates its business throughout the world by offering variety of product categories ranging
from food & grocery to clothing items. Present report is about an employee of M&S which
demanded for its salary hike and negotiation that it had with department head as well as HR unit.
This report includes a description about negotiation and key stakeholders involve along
with its process. It also includes explanation of RFP process along with documentation requires
for this. It further includes explanation of contractual process and method of managing
documentation. Apart from this it includes pitching and key principle to achieve competitive
advantage along with its potential outcome and ways to fulfil post obligations.
TASK 1
P1. Negotiation and key stakeholders during negation process
Negotiation refers to the process in which two or more parties with different goals and
needs discuss their issues and find up a solution with mutual acceptance. In this process, each
party try to persuade one another with an aim to make them agree over his or her point of view.
Main aim of this is to compromise over the agreement before avoiding the dispute as well as
agreement between parties (Faling, Garard and et. al., 2017). Being a department manager,
negotiation is a very essential skill which support a person to deal with both formal as well as
informal transactions which are required in negotiation. Mark & Spencer has to deal with several
issues among clients as well as employees, so in order to resolve them negotiation skills plays a
major role.
Following are benefit Mark & Spencer get by practicing negotiation skills:-
 M&S will be able to retain its employees for longer period of time by keeping them
happy as it happened in case of PA salary increment.
 It will be able to maintain better relationship with its customers by providing benefit to
both the parties through negotiating deals.
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 It also support in avoiding future conflicts among the parties by giving quality solution
over mutual acceptance.
Reasons for negotiation occurrence:-
Negotiation is a most common approach which usually occurs with an aim to manage the
dispute among parties and make up a better decision that provide mutual benefit. Another reason
behind its occurrence is that it is problem solving process which requires participants to identify
issue in which both the parties are differ (Ferrier and Batts, 2016). Then make them realise
about the need and interest of both so that general possible settlement could be made. In context
of M&S, main reason behind occurrence of negotiation was that PA demanded for 10% salary
hike but as per the rule it is 5% per employee. So in order to overcome this issue, negotiation
process was performed between manager and PA that 6% hike will be provided which gradually
rise up to 2-4% as per the performance of new responsibilities.
Key stakeholder in negotiation process:-
Negotiation is performed by individuals who have better knowledge as well as skills of
negotiation in order to reach over a solution which provide appropriate outcome or most
profitable deal. In present case of Mark & Spencer, following stakeholders are involved during
negotiation process: Departmental store head:- They are responsible for formulating action plan and ensuring
that the activities are performed in right direction. Main aim of involving store head in
this negotiation process is that they delegate authority to employees working in store so
their acceptance is essential within this process (otikasthira, Bhutibhunthu and
Chuaychoo, 2016). Human resource department:- This unit is responsible for the management of employees
and their issues at workplace. HR department is involved in this negotiation process
because they are responsible for formulating the policies regarding salary and
compensatory benefit of employees. Manager:- The manager is responsible for managing and guiding all the activities that
are performed within store and ensuring that the issues of its employees must be
communicated to the higher management.
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 Employee(Personal assistant):- The personal assistant of manager is responsible for
assisting them in day to day activities of departmental store and for this performance, PA
is demanding 10% salary hike.
P2. Key steps and information required for negotiating and generating deals
Negotiation refers to an open and long process in which two parties with difference in
their perception as well as need, keep their view point in order convince each other over their
decision (Lo, 2016). This process consists of several steps that are explained below:
Preparation and planning:- This is the first step of negotiation process in which
involved parties will accumulate the information that is necessary for performing effective
negotiation. In this step, manager will provide adequate information to departmental head and
human resource department so that they can prepare pitch of negotiation by creating a report
over current issue. In this, following information will be required:
 Information about the expectation of personal assistant along with overall work
performance.
 Type of outcome that Mark & Spencer want i.e. win-win situation or win-lose situation.
 Information about the other measures that are taken previously in similar situation.
 Salary and compensatory policies followed by Mark & Spencer.
 Information about the other issues that are facing by employee so that alternative solution
could be provided.
 Pitch for the deal and objective of negotiation.
Definition of ground deal:- This is the second phase of negotiation process in which
ground rules will be formed by the planned negotiation (Lemmer, 2016). This includes
information regarding following questions:
 Where negotiation will take place and to what issue negotiation will be limited?
 Will there be any procedure that can be followed to reach up-to required outcome?
 Information related to initial proposal as well as demand would also be exchanged.
Clarification and justification:- Under this stage, negotiation starts where both the
parties will explain and clarify their need or demand as well as justify why their point must be
considered. In this step, personal assistant of M&S department store can perform documentation
related to their salary pay, expenses as well as overall performance till presen in order to
evidence the demand of salary hike.
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Bargaining and problem solving:- Under this stage parties involve in negotiation such
as manager, department head and HR unit will try to bargain with personal assistant in order
achieve win-lose situation (Rybnicek, Gutschelhofer, and et. al., 2017). In this they present
information related to their salary structure and alternative solution like 'time benefit' or others
for convincimg them over management decision. If not succeeded in this then management will
try to focus over achieving win-win solution where both of them get agreed such as salary hike
will be 6% and then gradually increase to 2-4% as per performance.
Closure and implementation:- Once the pitching and negotiation process has been
performed, agreement will be formed as per the mutual decision taken by management and
employee. After development of new agreement, this decision will be implemented over personal
assistant.
Issues that may arise during negotiation :-
There are number of issues that may arise during negotiation process which can be
understood using following point:-
 Conflict:-This negotiation process may also take up the form of conflict if the parties are
keeping their point with aggression or showing some sort of criticism to another party. In
order to resolve this issue a negotiator must be calm and polite while presenting their
point and should be clear with their information.
 Failure to agree:- If the influencer will not be able to pitch its view in front of others
then this may lead to failure of agreement (Schech, Skelton and Mundkur, 2016). So in
order to resolve this issue meeting can be reschedule and at that time a person must be
selected who have best negotiation skills.
 Dissatisfaction:- In order to perform negotiation effectively, both the parties must get
benefited and if any of them faces any loss then it may create dissatisfaction or employee
turnover may also happen. So, in order to overcome this, management must try to form
such decision which provide benefit to both company as well as employee.
TASK 2
P3. RFP process and relevant type of documentation required
RFP stands for Request for Proposal which is a kind of document or formal request that is
posted by a company for eliciting responses from several vendors aiming toward the need as well
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as problem of issuer. This document plays an essential role within the operations performed by a
business organisation (Siebersma, 2019). In request document, specifications are given that
provide solution it is seeking along with evaluation criteria regarding the way in which proposal
will be graded. Following are the steps are involve in request fro proposal document:- Assessment:- The development of RFP begins with in-depth analysis of need which
support in forming project objectives, deficiencies, current system and functional need to
bring new solution. In this stage, higher management of Mark & Spencer will deeply
investigate about the need of executing this request of employee along with their
performance history to determine the validity of demand. It requires documents like,
employee performance sheet, pay specification, task specification etc. Policy specification:- Once the case and reason behind this change has been evaluated
effectively next step is to analyse the formulated policies of organisation before reaching
up to a decision or moving toward negotiation process. Under this step management of
M&S will prepare their pitching in order to convince the employee and negotiate with
them in term of demanded salary. It includes documents like policy document, salary
specification sheet, performance ranking sheet, appraisal specification policy document
etc. Meeting for RFP:- Under this step, a management team meeting will be held in order to
determine several alternatives that can be provided for negotiations. Responses of people
involved in team will be mentioned for further evaluation for final negotiation. In
addition to this, negotiation rule fixed by M&S will also be discussed. Response evaluation:- After having meeting and gathering view regarding the
negotiation of employee salary, next step is to evaluate those alternatives in order to fix
up the most dutiable one that provide win-win solution to both the parties involve
(Swartz, Amatucci and Coleman,2016).
 Selection and negotiation:- Once the pitching points has been decided by the
management of Mark & Spencer, next step is to perform negotiation among both the
parties in order to resolve this issue. Under this step, a detailed discussion will be held
among both the parties where they keep their views and negotiation will be performed
and RPF will be formed. This requires M&S to create Statement of Work document that
describe the way in which employee will work after negotiation agreement.
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P4. Contractual process and ways to manage relevant information
Contractual management is defined as a procedure undertaken by an organisation in order
to manage contract development, its analysis and execution effectively. The main of this process
is to enhance the firm's performance related with finance as well as operations. In order to deal
with the current situation, management of Mark & Spencer are required to follow below given
steps involved within contractual process:-
Select a contract:- This is the first step of contractual process in which an agreement or
contract will be selected by the firm (Teckchandani and Obstfeld, 2017). Under this step, Mark
& Spencer must focuses over analysing the information related to the proposed agreement that
will be formed between employee and management along with articulated reason, ultimate
objective and need of parties involved in contract.
Collecting necessary information:- Under this step information related to the agreement,
reason behind this contract, demand of employees as well as policies regarding this area of
concern must be collected and evaluate in order to form up a contract. In addition to this
information regarding the employee performance and other related behaviour presented by that
employees throughout job will also be articulated in order to provide them with an adequate
solution.
Choosing a negotiator:- In this step, a negotiator will be selected who have the authority
to perform such actions. In present case of Mark & Spencer, human resource manager as well as
department head are selected as negotiator in order to deal with employee. Among them, HR unit
will focus toward negotiating with employee as per the set compensation policies of company
and department head focuses over negotiating by offering employee several authorities. This step
contain a negotiation and pitching process where both the parties will keep their view point and
then final agreement will be formed.
Contract review process:- After performing having pitching and bargaining process
within negotiation process, next process is to review the conditions as well as specifications that
are mentioned within the documents by both the parties. Final discussion would be held among
management of M&S and employee in context of whether something is missing from the
contract or not.
Contract signing:- Once the document has been formed and reviewed, it will then be sent
to higher authority for approving it by signing that contract (Wertheim, 2016). These document
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will then send to the employee for signing as a mark of approval over the negotiation benefit
offered by company i.e. 6% salary hike along with more authorities.
Ways to manage and monitor relevant documentation:-
Management and monitoring of documentation is very crucial for a company like Mark
& Spencer which operate at such a large scale, as proper management of documentation will help
them in performing their operations effectively. With the increase in technological development,
there are numerous of option are present that help a company to manage its documents digitally
that also reduces the risk of misplace or damaging of documentation. So, Mark & Spencer can
manage its documentation in following ways:
 Focuses toward storing their documents digitally along with strategical name.
 Must maintain proper authentication over their documents by maintaining an effective
access control system which restrict unauthorised user to view documents.
 Storing the document using cloud storage which safeguard even they get missed from the
system memory.
Competitive tendering and contracting process:-
Competitive tendering refers to the process of promoting competition by providing
transparency and equal opportunity to parties interested in tender to win over their proposal so
that they will be able to get better value of money (Jeong, 2016). But apart from this benefit, a
tender includes number of limits and condition which outlines the execution of tender that if not
read carefully made lead to heavier loss to company.
Contracting process refers to the set of activities that are performed between two parties
involve in agreement for forming up a contract as an outcome of negotiation. In contract,
revisions or amendments must be performed carefully as avoidance of this may result in future
conflicts.
TASK 3
P5. Develop an appropriate pitch applying key principle for achieving competitive edge
Pitching is a part of negotiation process where parties involved in procedure keep their
point of view for performing negotiation by validating their perception toward their viewpoints.
There are various types of methods that can be used to present pitching which include letter, a
face to face conversation and e-mail. In order to resolve the issue of its employee, management
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of M&S has decided a pitch to represent in front of employee while negotiation process.
Company has decided to offer its employee several benefit such as free health service access,
working hour benefit and delegation of more authority despite of providing 10% salary hike.
These additional benefits will help employee in gaining higher position at workplace with more
authority to take decision over their performance (Maddux, 2016). In addition to this, company
will also get benefited as they will be able to retain such high skilled and talented employee for
longer period of time. Apart from that, these practices will also support them in achieving
competitive advantage as by keeping their employees will help M&S in implementing new
changes much effectively without compromising over performance.
Pitch Canvas
Retain high skilled and valuable employees
Pain (+ Gain)
M&S is solving the issue of its employee by
offer him/her several option which may be a
pain for company as it has to pay extra amount
to retain its employee along with several other
benefit. But von the other side it is also a gain
as it help in retaining that employee for longer
period of time which help company in getting
more revenue through his/ her performance.
Offer
M&S is offering benefits to its employees are :
 Salary hike of 5% instead of 6% by
manipulating their company's policies.
 Benefiting employees over time
reduction by making them an hour
before working hour to resolve traffic
issue.
 Delegation of some more authority
within store.
Future benefit over demo
By providing some more authorities to
personal assistance in form of demo for some
period of time, company will be able to
determine its capability. Excel in performance
will benefit PA with more salary hike up to 2-
4%.
Unique
These offers are unique as it provide both
monetary as well as non monetary benefit to its
employee over the negotiation of salary.
Employee traction
By offering these benefits, M&S will be able to
Business model
These benefits will also present an example in
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keep its employee satisfied as well as happy
with the management which work toward
keeping them motivated and focused toward
performing better and earn additional salary
hike.
front of other employees which work toward
enhancing the motivational factor of other
employees and keeping them indulge with
organisation operations in order to improve
their performance and get similar benefits.
Investment
M&S is investing over its employee by
providing them a monetary benefit in form of
salary hike which is around 6% i.e. 1% more
from the organisational policy.
Team
In order to achieve a win-win situation in this
negotiation a team has been formed which
includes human resource team, departmental
head and store manager.
After pitching higher management will be requested to produce a document for employee
regarding his/her salary hike and authority delegation.
Why You?
This pitching was very essential manager and company as well because that employee is more
skilled and competent which is very essential to retain and keep within the organisation for
longer period of time.
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Following are the principle that can be further followed by M&S to achieve sustainable
competitive advantage:-
Working relationship:- M&S must focuses towards hearing the employees as well as try
to fulfil their expectations in order to retain them for longer period of time. The reason behind
this is that by keeping employees happy, company will be able to perform future negotiation
much effectively and this will indirectly or directly provide competitive advantage to the
company.
Policy update:- In order to achieve sustainable competitive edge, M&S must try to
improve or update its current employee management related policies as per the need and demand
of employees. This help in keeping employees engaged with their responsibility which further
support company to gain competitive advantage for future case of negotiation.
Delegation of authority:- Marks & Spencer must also try to regularly evaluate the
performance of its employees and as per their capability, should delegate more authorities in
order to keep them motivated (Mejía-Arauz and et. al., 2018). This help company in achieving
competitive advantage as by doing so management will be able to develop trust among
employees and they will easily accept the negotiation offer of higher authority.
TASK 4
P6. Assessment of potential outcome of pitch
The presenter such as departmental head and HR manager represent their pitch in front of
employee effectively but the success rate is depend over the skills or capability of management.
Pitching performed by Mark & Spencer can bring three possible outcome that are mentioned
below: Acceptance:- It is very essential for M&S to influence personal assistant of store
manager because the acceptance of their demand can create conflict among other
employee as they may also come up with these kinds of demands in future. So, it is very
essential for top management to present their pitch to influence its employee and for this
company can also use elevator pitch method. In this, management will be able to present
the benefit of their negotiation in more effective and precise manner so that they will
accept the proposal (Moore, 2014). This will only happen when management will be able
to make its employee happy with the help of their offers.
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 Rejection:- This one is a very rare case when employee can say no to the negotiation
offer. The reason behind this is that M&S is providing more benefit in exchange of
negotiation over salary hike. In addition to this, it is also promising for future increment
over performance basis. But if employee say no to this then it may be due to ineffective
communication and lack of knowledge regarding negotiation skill. In order to deal with
this, company can rearrange meeting with more skilled negotiator.
 No response:- This is one of the most common outcome where employee may provide no
response to management. This situation is generally occur when the employee has kept
their point but management is not accepting and instead they are providing more
alternative option. At such situation employee end up with no response to management
this may result in employee dissatisfaction that lead to poor performance or turnover. So
to overcome this M&S can again schedule negotiation process with more benefits to
retain its employee.
P7. Ways in which organisation can fulfil their post-pitch obligations, highlighting potential
issues.
Pitching plays an essential role during negotiation process as the result of this procedure
is dependent upon the way in which pitch has been presented in order to influence other party. In
context of M&S, after performing pitching and negotiation process, it is very essential for the
management to fulfil their post pitching obligation for minimising the chance of future dispute
(Rakin, 2017). These obligations can be fulfilled by sending follow up through email for
ensuring the acceptance of another party over negotiation. In addition to this, it can also be
performed by keeping pitching open ended where employee can again have conversation
regarding any issue they are facing.
Apart from this, there are certain issues that may be faced by Mark & Spencer while
pitching process, these issues are explained below:
 Failing to address concern:- It is very essential for management to involve main
concern of negotiation while pitching in order to achieve desire result otherwise it may
result in rejection of negotiation from employee.
 Projecting wrong image of business:- This can also be a major issue if pitching is not
presented effectively that is it may happen when management may started convincing
employee without listening to them (Mejía-Arauz and et. al., 2018). This may present
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wrong image of company that management not concern about the employee need and
demand.
Critical evaluation of pitch and post pitch outcome to determine risk management:-
It is very essential for M&S to develop counter strategy so that it will be able to mange
risk effectively. During and after pitching, there are number of risk factor that may affect the
negotiation agreement. So in order to manage, them following things can be consider:
Outcomes Pitch Post pitch
Accept During pitch, when the offer of
management get accepted by
employee then they must try to
make them more motivated
toward company's decision by
keeping positive side of
negotiation acceptance.
After greeting acceptance,
management must try to take
follow up in order to analyse
risk if any involve in this so
that proper measures can be
taken.
Reject While pitching, when employee
reject the offer then management
must try to add more beneficial
alternative in order to convince
them.
In case of reject, management
must rearrange the meeting for
analysing the risk involved in
term of bad performance or
turnover as a result of
dissatisfaction so that it can be
managed by retaining them.
No response During pitching, when employee
doesn't respond to offer of
company then it must analyse the
reaction of employee and try to
improve their pitching statement
in a way that benefit both parties.
In this, management can send
mail or recall employee for
keeping their point or asking
them about the negotiation so
that risk of employee
dissatisfaction can be
managed.
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CONCLUSION
From the above given report, it can be summarised that negotiation and pitching skills
plays an essential role that help an organisation to deal with several issue that may affect their
performance. In order to perform negotiation effectively, a company must consider key
stakeholder involved and their need for creating a win-win situation along with information
required for getting favourable outcome from deal. In addition to this, a company must also
focus toward using RFP process to keeping their request in front of parties and forming up
pitching which support them in wining a deal. An effective pitching development will help
company to achieve competitive advantage and deal with potential risk that may arise during
negotiation process.
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