Negotiations and negotiating techniques for the upstream oil and gas industry
Course Code: OG26
Course Objective
- This course provides upstream industry insight to negotiations by combining detailed knowledge of the varied negotiating situations that commonly arise in dealing with government and industry stakeholders, suppliers, service companies, joint venture partners and work force.
- Will learn about the most effective negotiating techniques, strategies and tactics to apply in particular situations.
- will learn practical negotiating skills and gain insight to the specific negotiating requirements of the upstream oil and gas industry.
Target Audience
- This course is designed for a multi-disciplined audience from all sectors of the oil and gas industry, including both professional and support staff. Individuals from diverse commercial, technical, marketing, corporate, operations, human resources, labour, community relations, HSE, planning, financial, legal and risk management backgrounds could benefit from the content.
- professionals and support staff working with or negotiating contracts and agreements or working in project teams from across the industry.
Course Outline
- The negotiating process and key skills
- Negotiations in the context of the oil and gas industry
- The need for structured planning and clear communications
- Exercise: bargaining and compromise in securing drilling resources
- Harnessing cooperative, adversarial and competitive approaches
- Game theory –– its relevance to some oil and gas negotiations
- Exercise: prisoners’ dilemma game
- Empathising with positions of other parties
- Setting objectives and agendas
- The importance of listening and questioning
- Exercise: negotiating commercial terms of an upstream permit
- Negotiating mergers, acquisition and divestments
- Researching the other parties – identifying their preferences
- Pitching the first offer or proposal
- Exercise: Qualities required to be a good negotiator
- Strategic approaches and innovative solutions
- Tried and tested negotiating strategies and tactics and responses to them
- Negotiations with communities; case studies Niger Delta and Queensland
- Lessons to be learned from Machiavelli’s “The Prince”
- Broadening the solution and enlarging the rewards
- Exercise: negotiating with a disgruntled community
- Negotiating strategies to achieve workable and lasting deals
- Win-win solutions versus zero-sum outcomes
- Zones of possible agreement (ZOPA) and bottom lines
- Negotiating joint-venture operating agreements
- Exercise: competitive bidding and EPC contract terms
- Sole risk and non-consent options and dispute resolution
- Procurement and tendering negotiation issues
- Exercise: negotiating terms for a farmout deal
- Negotiating power and perceptions of it
- Negotiating with financial institutions to secure debt
- Culture and ritual impact negotiating tactics and outcomes
- Team versus individual approaches and closing deals
- Team negotiations, team roles and interpersonal behaviour
- Personality types and psychology can guide tactics
- Communicating and understanding signals
- Using body language and other non-verbal indicators
- Exercise: identifying body language combinations
- Posturing, manipulation and diverting attention from key issues
- Exercise: negotiations in a labour dispute (management versus workforce)
- Dealing with late stage surprises
- Recognising and exploiting time pressure
- Dealing with deadlock or threats of it
- Exercise: negotiating access to midstream infrastructure
- Dealing with impromptu and telephone negotiations
- Closing deals and recognising how and when to do so
- Exercise: negotiations between LNG supplier and buyer
- Documenting and learning from previous negotiations
- Benchmarking and improving performance in negotiations
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