Positive Negotiating Tactics

There are many times that we, as people have to negotiate with another party to come to a mutual agreement on something that will benefit both parties. When negotiating sometimes we don’t come out with exactly what we want as an individual or company but most times you can agree with your opponent on something that will benefit both parties, or at least be fair. There are many techniques that you can use to help you get through a negotiation faster and sometimes in favoring your needs and wants. I interviewed an old teacher of mines, George Harnish, on Wednesday, May 15, 2013 at around 7:30pm over the phone.

Interviewing George Harnish, a Rockford Public Schools theater and TV production teacher, I find out that he negotiates all the time. Harnish was my teacher all the way through high school teaching many students the background of how to produce news television shows, and also producing many theater plays. I found out that he has to negotiate many things all the time in his field of work to get things done. Harnish tells me that most of his negotiations usually come from getting sponsors on different shows, and for the school wide news show that he produces on a daily basis.

Harnish and I talk about different techniques that he uses to get through negotiations appropriately and fast. We first go over mutual benefit, which he tells me that he usually starts by explaining how the opponent will benefit from the agreement. He tells me this usually works just because he makes sure he puts the other opponent first, which makes them feel like he cares more about what he can do for them. He also goes in and tells me that sometimes the opponent can easily try and get over on you and try to add a bunch of extra to the deal that would only benefit them. He always keeps and opened mind to things; but also he has to keep in mind “good thought, bad idea,” which is a saying that he still uses to this day. He says that usually when people randomly think of things that sound good but thinking more into it, may not come out well, and that’s what the opponent does sometimes to add to their benefiting end of the deal. Finally we go over the routine of using objective criteria, which is grabbing industry trends and facts that you can use to your advantage. He always uses objective criteria for everything, because “if you can’t prove anything, you have no backbone, no purpose, and no outcome.” Many times he can cut out so many extra things that come up, with having the facts already presented.

When negotiating we usually come to agreements, and with using some simple techniques you can get there easier, faster and with more of an advantage over your opponent.

10 Tips for Staying on Budget...

Staying on a budget to save money is one of the biggest things that we as people have so many problems with. Hearing most excuses like, it’s too hard; I don’t make enough to save money, I have nothing to save for, and the biggest one of all is when you hear there is no reason too, life is too short to save money. We all have something that we look forward to doing or buying, and usually if we didn’t buy that item when we first noticed it, it’s because we didn’t have the money at the time of purchase. And those are the reasons why we save money, even if we don’t have anything we are looking forward to, we can always start early because things come up. Here are ten tips from HowStuffWorks, focused on staying on a budget with a future purchase in mind. This can help us all raise money for the unpredictable future.

The first tip would be to stay focused on saving. Determine an amount that you want to save for the month and create a budget including your income and expenses for the month. This can also be done in companies, many times when I am budgeting for a film and I have a certain budget I try and save a decent portion for emergencies. So first thing I do is budget everything out.

Secondly they say to use cash, cash helps because you can easily discipline yourself to only take out a certain amont and that is all you have for the week in a personal situation. I do this also; take out 25 dollars and that is my personal money for the week. Using cash helps with being able to see everything in your hand and not just using a card, which with a card its easier to swipe that to count actual paper dollars. In business this may be harder to carry around cash all day, usually everyone prefers cards anyhow.

Cut those bad habits out or at least cut down on them. HowStuffWorks says whether its alcohol or tobacco, if you cut back on it that’s just even more in your savings account. Most say that you cannot stop smoking overnight. Ok, Fine. Make a pack last longer than usual. In business we can do this by just cutting back on unnecessary things like meeting at a restaurant, do a meeting over Skype; its free, saves gas and dinner prices.

Four, you want to make sure that your not the only one focused on budgeting, if you have a spouse they have to be focused also. It doesn’t make sense to save if someone else is going to go back and spend it. In a company it is easy, come together with management and go over the budget with everyone explaining that things will have to be cut back on to save finances.

If you have credit cards start paying down the debt, chose the card with the highest interest rate and pay that one off first, if you have any others pay the minimum each month until the first one is paid off, then do the same to the next. And of course for a company it is the exact same way.

Number six and seven can be fit together, keep your receipts and balance your checkbook. Many times if we look over the receipts that we acquired over the month we can see exactly were all of our money goes. It can get depressing once you realize that a good portion goes to those bad habits, fast food, and just stuff that shouldn’t even been bought. Once we see the damage for the month its easier to cut back and really focus on necessary items. Also balancing your checkbook with those receipts and maybe your bank statement for that month will also allow you to see all expenses. This also gets you in the habit of keeping a balanced checkbook, which is a good habit.

With those receipts, look to find something to cut out, something that isn’t needed, even look at bills and find ways to cut those down. Maybe open windows during the day with a blowing, instead of turning on the AC. Going grocery shopping one every two weeks instead of going every time you think of something to eat. Planning trips, like going to get groceries, go pay this bill, go to class, and then come home. Instead most of us find ourselves coming home and leaving back out because you forgot something. Going to the grocery store with out a list, this wastes time, makes us pick up random groceries (making us go back later), go home to see that we bought doubles of things and nothing makes a complete meal.

Number Nine from HowStuffWorks says to have a special account, a bank account. “If you find that you keep reaching into your savings, set up a CD or other acc­ount with early withdrawal penalties. Banks and other institutions pay more interest if you'll agree to let them use your money for a longer amount of time. Putting your savings into a yearly CD will yield more than a three-month note would.”

Finally number ten, encourages you to be flexible, most budgets have to be flexible because we don’t know what tomorrow entails. So having an extra little money to the side for those sorrow Saturdays, and Sunday fun days’ aren’t that bad but use them for what they are their for. Being able to adjust your budget for need instead of wants is okay.

Find more info on the ten steps on their website and use their budget calculator, or read further to find out about how to savemoney at the grocery store.

Don’t Like Keeping A Bank Ledger?

We all have flaws, and when going into business we all have to keep in mind of the flaws that we have. Some of us don’t like to keep track of paperwork, moving through projects with everything in their head. Some of us move projects way too fast and don’t do their best on it, and then it ends up biting them later on. Some of us just simply cannot keep track of where funds are going, and when going into business this can really hurt us.

Many of us in business have these portable devices called smartphones. Many of us have these things on our smartphones called apps. One app that I have came to find out that really helps with budgeting and keeping track of every transaction on all my accounts, and it’s called Mint, free right from Intuit. Mint automatically organizes your spending into categories like rent, gas, clothes, lattes, and shows you where your
money goes in easy-to-understand charts. Mint also provides you with the options of creating budgets and showing you ways to stay within them, and of course how to stay under budget. Allowing you to create goals to have a certain amount in a certain account at a certain date or any type of financial goal, Mint can help. Just imagine what you want to accomplish with your money. Mint
gives you the simple steps for meeting you goals, along with free advice, 
gentle reminders, and encouragement. Keep track of all cash, credit cards, loans, investments, and property, all with one free membership.

Mint is not only an app, you can experience Mint on the computer as well, just log into Mint, and sign into all of your accounts and, boom, there you go, your on mint. Retracing some old transactions so that they can initially advise you on where to go from signing up. Intuit has really done it now. Allow Mint to send you updates on all your accounts and that’ll really help stay within a budget.

American Advertising Federation (AAF)

AAF, the American Advertising Federation, is the oldest national advertising trade association, that represents every different avenue of the advertising industry, and they act as the “Unifying Voice for Advertising.” AAF’s membership is composed of about 100 blue chip corporate members, including the nations leading advertisers. They stretch their memberships all the way from the corporate ladder all the way down to education, where which they have college chapters. Having over 200 college chapters so far, which include over 6,500 student members. AAF operates and hosts the Advertising Hall of Fame, the ADDY Awards, and many more, some just involving school chapters, and some for everyone. With a membership you receive valuable information for future clients and others that is doing that same thing in the industry, which you can use for your entrepreneurial needs. The mission statement for AAF is “The American Advertising Federation protects and promotes the well-being of advertising. We accomplish this through a unique, nationally coordinated grassroots network of advertisers, agencies, media companies, local advertising clubs and college chapters.”

AAF does way too much not to enjoy their services. They educate members on the latest trends in technology, creativity and marketing. They promote diversity in advertising by encouraging the recruitment of people of diverse cultures. Providing programs to assist local association volunteer leadership. They also protect and promote advertising at all levels of government through grassroots activities.

As I begin to establish NuProdigy Media and myself into the industry more, I will be obtaining a membership with AAF, its very beneficial so why not. Their corporate membership is what I will be pushing for which it includes corporate member networking events, sponsorship opportunities, and recruitment opportunities of the nation's top advertising and marketing students. As a community in the advertising industry need to be more attached to each other in a sense, and this is a good step one.

Do Something About It!

There has been many times where we sat and thank of these amazing ideas, but then never did anything about it. Many times where we knew there was a problem, and either procrastinated about the solution or never even thought twice about fixing it. Times where we wanted to fix something but was to lazy for the first steps so you waited for someone else to do it, then joined in.

Well that wasn’t the case when it came to Ron Finley, and his hometown South Central LA. During Ron’s TED talk (TED: Ideas Worth Spreading) he began explaining how its all low income and how the obesity rate is 5 times higher than any city in the surrounding areas. He goes on telling us how the main food option is fast food, like most low income city’s, and how he notices that Dialysis Centers started popping up like Starbucks. Yet still how the system doesn’t help with providing more healthy food, they focus on getting more money flow with the fast food companies.

Ron Finley made a change to the negativity he seen with the system. He says, “Food is the problem, and food is the solution.” He came to the solution of planting a food forest right in front of his house. The food forest was on city ground but he just had to maintain it and he would be fine. Ron went on to create a organization called LA Green Grounds which helped plant more and more gardens around the city. Running into a couple problems with the city because they figured it would hurt their side of things tried to come down on him with citations, but he fought them with petitions with more than 900 people following him, and of course succeeded.

He is now still covering more grounds with gardens and making a difference in his city. You should watch his TED Talk called Ron Finley:A Guerilla Gardener in South Central LA. He has inspired many to get up and do something about issues that we see going on right in front of us. This can be used in any situation personal lives, political, and even business. Lately I’ve been really thinking of some easy ways to get my business off the ground, and sometimes the answer is not always what you want it to be; but in business we have to do what’s best for the company.

My main thing that I like to do as a filmmaker would be to produce commercials. Trying to get a paying client right off the bat maybe a little harder than what you think. So what I’ve done was focus on photography. Orlando is filled with tourist so if I can do photography for them at these attractions and then sell them their photography to them online; I could make tons of profit. Right now its still in process of getting off the ground, an idea. Now I have to actually do it. Make it happen, like Ron was telling us all.