L'Oreal Negotiation Competition: Negotiator's Level "Financier"

ManGO! Games team held a negotiation competition for L'Oreal. During the event, participants learned how to calculate financial indicators and gained the missing confidence in financial negotiation.

Mission. Improve participants' financial literacy and negotiation skills.

Background. The primary goal L'Oreal has set before us was to improve their employees' negotiation skills.

As they work with networks and distributors in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Belarus, the representatives face certain negotiation difficulties.

While having a good command of negotiation theory and knowledge of negotiation techniques, they are not sufficiently fluent in the financial terms used by their opponents. Thus, whenever a counterparty begins to discuss money matters, they are sometimes not quick enough to grasp the subject of the conversation.

All that led to the idea of arranging a finance training session for the employees.

Solution. Deliver an online negotiation skills and financial literacy program followed by a negotiation competition to practice the knowledge and skills acquired.

The training program we came up with comprised the following phases:

• Orientation session.
• Warm-up assignment.
• Four synchronous online sessions on finance and negotiation theory and practice for Key Account Managers and Area Sales Managers.
• Four-round negotiation competition.

The training provided the participants with a very fascinating experience. Through playing one of ManGO!'s most popular negotiation games, the Parking, they studied such topics as a company's financial model, its profit and loss statement, to later make a comprehensive analysis of L'Oreal's own P&L. L'Oreal's transparent business policy made it possible to assess its actual financial data. Having learned to interpret a variety of business indicators, the participants had the chance to analyze their own company and draw conclusions as real financial analysts.

After the training, the participants are expected to become proficient at communication with their colleagues, even the ones from financial units.

The participants learned how to evaluate financial performance and gained the missing confidence in negotiations on financial matters. The training has increased their desire for self-development and strengthened their positive attitude and determination towards the result.

The next step is for them to finally apply the financial knowledge they learned so easily thanks to the fun, engaging, and dynamic format.

One important thing our participants learned is that knowledge of the subject under discussion greatly increases negotiation power.

It is the tight connection between theory and practice, as well as the understanding of ways for the new knowledge to be applied, that ensures high motivation and engagement. L'Oreal's competition engagement rate, for instance, exceeded 97%.