Walk into the negotiation with a plan.
Your walk-away and target, the concession ladder, their likely asks, and the holds that protect price and terms.
Inside: The walk-away and target, the concession ladder, and the price and term holds.
Install it in one line, or paste it in.
~/.claude/skills/ and runs automatically when it is relevant.Connect your context. Set it to your motion.
it reads the deal size, stage, close date, and history automatically, so the ladder is anchored to the real opportunity.
pulls what the buyer actually said they cared about, so their likely asks are grounded, not guessed.
anchors the walk-away to your real discount floor, not a round number.
This was built for a B2B SaaS org selling annual contracts. Set these to your stack:
Your floor and your levers are yours. The skill plans the trades; it does not set your price.
| Set this | What it is | Default / Example |
|---|---|---|
| DEAL fields | size, stage, close date | Opportunity.AmountStageNameCloseDate |
| PRICE_FLOOR | the discount you will not cross | 15% off list (set yours) |
| TARGET | the outcome you are steering to | list price12-month term |
| TRADE_LEVERS | what you can give that costs you little | term lengthstart datecase studylogo rights |
| ASK_FOR | what you request in return each time | signature datemulti-yearexec sponsor |
| WALK_AWAY | the point past which you stop | below floor and no term concession |
Everything the skill does, in full.
Turns a looming price conversation into a plan you can run. It fixes your target and your walk-away before the pressure sets in, lays out the order you trade concessions and what you ask for in return each time, predicts what the other side will push on, and gives you the words to hold the line. You leave knowing the floor you will not cross and the moves you will make above it.
- 1Walk-away and target (set both first)
Two positions before anything else. The TARGET is what you are steering to. The WALK_AWAY is the point past which the deal costs more than it earns. Everything in between is where you negotiate. Name both before the conversation so no in-room pressure quietly moves them.
- 2The concession ladder (trade, never give)
List what you can concede in order of least painful to most. For each rung, name what you ask for in return. Nothing moves for free. A discount buys a signature date. A longer term buys a better rate. If you cannot name what a concession buys you, it is not on the ladder yet.
- 3Their likely asks (anticipate, then answer)
Map what the other side will push on: price, payment terms, scope, timing, an exit clause. For each, draft the response that holds. The goal is that nothing they ask catches you deciding on the spot.
- 4Protect price and terms (the holds)
For the two or three things you will not move, write the sentence that holds them without ending the conversation. "I can't move the rate, but here is what I can do on the start date." A hold with an alternative is a hold that survives.
- 5Sequence and room (who, in what order)
Note who is in the room and who is not. Plan what you open with, what you hold back, and what you never put on the table unless asked. The first number anchors the range, so decide it on purpose.
- No concession on the ladder without a named thing it buys you.
- Walk-away is set before the plan is built, never adjusted mid-plan to make a deal fit.
- Their likely asks are grounded in what they actually said where that is available, and flagged as assumption where it is not.
- Any number carried from the deal is shown with its source, never invented to look precise.
NEGOTIATION PLAN · Acme Corp · $60K on the table (illustrative) Target: list price, 12-month term, signature by month-end Walk-away: below 15% off OR no term commitment Concession ladder (trade, do not give): 1. Flexible start date -> ask: signature this week 2. 10% off list -> ask: 24-month term 3. Add onboarding credit -> ask: reference logo + case study (floor: 15% off, and only with a multi-year term) They will likely ask: "Can you do 20% off?" -> Hold. Offer the term-for-rate trade instead. "Net-60 payment" -> Give, in exchange for the signature date. "Month-to-month" -> Hold hard. This breaks the model. Open with: list price, framed on the outcome, not the number.
Where an operator takes this next.
The plan is step one. Here is where an operator takes it once the manual version proves out.
You built the ladder once, now the next deal starts from what actually happened, not a blank page.
Pull closed-won discount data from Salesforce so the walk-away reflects what actually got approved on similar deals, not a round number.
Run the likely-asks list through a scheduled Claude task that role-plays the buyer's pushback, so the responses are practiced, not improvised live.
After the call, write the real concession ladder used back to the opportunity record, so the next negotiation prep learns from what worked, not just what was planned.
One skill is the on-ramp.
A single skill does one job. Chained into a playbook, or run as a full build, it becomes a system. Here is where this one plugs in.