The Contract Negotiation Plan can help organize all of the issues surrounding vendor contract negotiations. You will need to document the answers to the following key points for each issue under negotiation:
- How important is the issue under negotiation to the overall success of the acquisition and/or your enterprise as a whole?
- What would be the impact of failure or non-delivery of the item by the vendor, and how likely are these problems to occur?
- What position best describes the ideal outcome for your enterprise?
- What best alternative to a negotiated agreement (BATNA), describes your worst-case outcome, beyond which you'll walk away from the negotiation?
Use this comprehensive plan to set a strategy before entering into vendor contract negotiations.