5 Planning Power Mistakes That Undermine Negotiation Success

You can lose deals well before you ever start conversations. 

How? 

You didn’t plan strategically. 

It’s a familiar scenario. A negotiation starts with optimism and energy, but somewhere along the way, momentum stalls, value is left on the table, or worse, the deal collapses entirely. The culprit? Poor planning. Not because the team didn’t prepare, but because they didn’t properly wield the full scope of their planning power.

When done well, planning power creates clarity, confidence, and control. When done poorly—or skipped altogether—it leads to reactive behavior, internal misalignment, and missed opportunities.

In this article, we’re unpacking five big planning power mistakes that sales and procurement teams make. Each one is fixable, but only if you catch it before you enter the room.

Let’s get into it.

Key Takeaways:

• Strategic planning—not just preparation—is essential for negotiation success.
• High aspirations backed by data expand the range of possible outcomes.
• Counter-positioning analysis prevents reactive, defensive negotiation.
• Power must be understood, planned, and activated deliberately.
• Style alignment is critical to communication success at the table.

Mistake #1: Setting Aspirations That Are Safe, Not Strategic

It’s one of the most common (and costly) mistakes in negotiation planning: setting goals that feel realistic rather than ambitious.

Why does this happen? Many teams confuse being collaborative with being cautious. They aim for what the other side might accept, rather than what they actually want to achieve. As a result, they walk into negotiations anchored to history—last year’s price, legacy terms, or internal comfort zones.

But RED BEAR teaches that high aspirations are not just bold—they’re strategic. They shape the entire range of what’s possible.

Our Negotiation Planner helps teams ask the right strategic question first:

“What do we want?”

Not, “What’s fair?” Not, “What did we get last time?” But what strategic business objective are we trying to achieve—and how high can we set our sights while still remaining credible?

To get to your answer:

• Use internal benchmarks and business metrics to justify your target.
• Prepare anchoring data points that align with value, not just cost.
• Anticipate your counterpart’s likely range and start at the upper boundary of reason.

When aspiration setting is treated as strategy—not speculation—teams gain negotiating room, reframe value, and often capture more favorable terms than they initially thought possible.

Safe targets might keep things friendly. Strategic ones move the business forward.

Mistake #2: Skipping Counter-Positioning Analysis

Most negotiators spend the majority of their prep time perfecting their own case—refining talking points, listing benefits, and aligning with internal goals. But they miss a critical step: thinking just as deeply about the other party’s likely position.

This is a dangerous blind spot. Because if you don’t proactively consider how the other side will frame the negotiation, you’ll walk straight into their narrative. 

That puts you on the defensive—reacting to their anchors, justifying your ask, and ceding control early.

We call this step Counter-Positioning Analysis—and it’s built directly into our Negotiation Planner for a reason. When a negotiator asks, “What is their likely counter-position?”, it forces a shift in perspective from self-focus to strategic empathy.

A few key questions RED BEAR-trained teams ask in this step:

• What alternatives do they have to working with us?
• What constraints or risks are they managing?
• What kind of power do they believe they hold?
• How might they try to frame value or cost to their advantage?

This is where RED BEAR’s “Thinking Competitive” lens is essential. It means planning as if you’re the other party—anticipating how they’ll anchor, what information they’ll try to get from you, and where they might try to steer the discussion.

This kind of planning doesn’t just help you prepare rebuttals—it helps you frame your own position more effectively, build stronger anchors, and avoid getting pulled into a narrative that works against your goals.

If you don’t plan for their position, they’ll plan yours for you.

Mistake #3: Forgetting to Plan For Your Power

It’s not enough to know you have power—you need to know how to use it. If your team hasn’t planned how to use it, you might as well not have it at all.

Too often, negotiation teams rely on a vague sense of leverage: “We’re the bigger customer,” or “They need the deal more than we do.” 

But these assumptions rarely hold up without a strategic plan to back them. Worse, they lead to overconfidence, poor preparation, and costly missteps.

At RED BEAR, we teach that power is situational. It depends on timing, perception, framing, and the specific information you hold (or withhold). That’s why the Negotiation Planner doesn’t just ask, “What are your sources of power?”—it forces teams to inventory those sources and think through how they’ll be used.

Here are a few examples:

• Situational Power: Market dynamics, deadlines, supply constraints
• Informational Power: Cost breakdowns, benchmarks, internal data the other side lacks
• Relationship Power: Long-term business ties, exclusivity, access to future deals
• Skill-Based Power: Superior planning, questioning, and concession strategies

The critical planning question is not just “Do we have power?” but:

“What type of power do we have, how will we activate it in this negotiation, and how might it shift based on how the conversation unfolds?”

For example, your informational power might depend on not revealing a budget cap too early. Your relationship power might rest on referencing shared goals or mutual long-term wins. Your situational power might come from being the only vendor offering regional fulfillment or ESG compliance.

Without a power plan, teams often default to pressure or bluffing—both of which erode trust and damage credibility. With one, they become strategic, adaptive, and far more persuasive.

Power isn’t a label. It’s a lever. Plan how to pull it.

Mistake #4: Planning Concessions Without Strategic Sequencing

Many teams believe they’ve “planned” their concessions simply by listing what they’re willing to give. But if you haven’t decided when, why, and in what order you’ll give them—you haven’t actually planned at all.

This mistake leads to dangerous patterns: making unreciprocated offers, conceding too early to build goodwill, or giving up valuable terms in the wrong sequence. All of it weakens your position and shrinks your leverage.

RED BEAR’s approach is different. We teach that concessions are not giveaways—they’re currency. And just like currency, their value depends on context, timing, and exchange.

That’s why our Negotiation Planner includes a specific prompt:

"What is your concession plan?”

Not just what you're willing to trade—but how you will structure your movement to drive maximum return.

We also work with a visual tool that helps negotiators visualize and map: value to them (High/Low) vs Cost to us (Low/High).

This matrix helps teams prioritize low-cost, high-value trades and avoid high-cost moves unless there’s a strategic return. For example:

• Offering flexible delivery windows (low cost to you, high value to them)
• Bundling services or add-ons that support your strategic positioning
• Delaying payment terms only in exchange for volume commitments
  
  

But planning also means sequencing. A strong concession plan might:

1. Open with a no-cost gesture to establish goodwill
2. Withhold key negotiables until a major ask is agreed upon
3. Use each movement to extract reciprocal movement—or at least information

And, critically, RED BEAR teaches to signal intention without finality. Language like “We’d be open to…” or “If we were to consider X, what might you do in return?” keeps control while probing flexibility.

When you sequence concessions strategically, you reinforce your value, protect your position, and move the deal forward without losing leverage.

Every move you make teaches the other party how to negotiate with you. Make sure you’re teaching the right lesson.

Mistake #5: Ignoring Communication Styles and Preferences in the Planning Phase

You’ve planned your arguments, your power plays, your concession strategy. 

But what about the way the other party communicates? If your style doesn’t match theirs—or worse, directly clashes—you’re already on the back foot before the conversation even starts.

This mistake is especially common among technical, procurement, or sales teams who focus heavily on logic, data, and offers. This can lead to misread signals, awkward tension, or complete message breakdown.

RED BEAR’s methodology trains teams to factor in communication style as a critical part of the planning process. Every negotiator brings a style that leans either toward relationship or self-interest. And each of these orientations drives behaviors like tone, pace, and questioning techniques.

Our negotiators ask:

• Does this party tend to make decisions collaboratively or independently?
• Do they value rapport and relationship continuity, or just outcomes?
• Are they comfortable with direct, assertive talk, or do they prefer subtler framing?
• What behaviors might put them on edge, or open them up?

Ignoring these factors often leads to mismatched messaging. For instance, pushing hard on timelines with a relationship-oriented counterpart may feel like disrespect. Conversely, too much small talk with a results-driven negotiator could damage credibility.

Knowing how to do this well prevents unforced errors—like misreading silence as disinterest, or interpreting a slow response as indecision.

By making style a deliberate part of your planning, you create better alignment, reduce friction, and increase your chance of being heard and understood.

Negotiation isn’t just what you say—it’s how you say it, when you say it, and to whom.

Plan With Power or Get Outplayed

Planning power isn’t about checking boxes or showing up with a script. It’s about entering every negotiation with the strategic clarity, internal alignment, and adaptive thinking needed to drive results.

The most successful sales and procurement teams don’t just plan what to say. They plan:

• How high they’ll aim—and why it matters to the business
• What the other side is likely to argue—and how to stay ahead of it
• Where their power comes from—and how to activate it effectively
• Which concessions to offer—and in what order
• How to communicate—in a way that resonates, not repels

When these elements are missing, even the strongest deal logic can fall flat. But when they’re present, negotiation becomes not just a tactical task, but a strategic advantage.

Ready to start planning like a winner?

Contact RED BEAR to empower your team with the system, process, and tools that turn uncertainty into opportunity.