You will practise recognising and responding to tactics under mild pressure.
Knowing the right response to a tactic and producing it under pressure are different skills. When someone flinches at your number in real life, your heart rate goes up, your face gets warm and the reply you wrote in lesson 6.2 disappears from your head. The only reliable fix is to have felt that moment a few times already, somewhere safe.
This drill gives you that. It takes about 20 minutes with a partner, and it works best if your partner is willing to be a little more difficult than they'd normally be.
Choose one simple scenario that both of you can picture and keep it for every round, so the facts stay fixed and all your attention goes to the tactics. Two that work well:
You're renewing a phone plan. Your current plan costs S$40 a month, and a competitor offers similar data for S$30. You want the retention team to match it. Your partner plays the telco's retention agent.
You're buying a second-hand bicycle listed online for S$600, when similar bikes are listed between S$450 and S$550, and your partner plays the seller.
These figures are made up for the drill. Next, write six tactics from lesson 6.1, The pressure tactics you will meet, on slips of paper or in a numbered list on your partner's phone: the exploding deadline, take it or leave it, the higher authority, the flinch, the nibble and the long silence. Good cop bad cop needs two people on one side, so leave it out unless a third person can join.
Each round lasts about two minutes. You open with your request and a reason, the way module 4 taught. Your partner picks a tactic at random, by drawing a slip or rolling a die, and uses it on you at some point in the round without announcing which one it is.
Your job is to name the tactic silently to yourself, then respond using the approaches from this module. Name it neutrally and ask a question. Ask who decides. Go back to interests and criteria. Wait out a silence. Treat a nibble as a new trade. Ask for time instead of deciding under pressure.
For example, in the phone plan scenario, your partner might use the exploding deadline: "I can do S$32, but only if you confirm on this call. Once you hang up, the offer's gone." A good response: "It sounds like the offer is time-limited. I'd like to compare it properly first. If I call back tomorrow, what would the best price be?" Then stop and wait.
In the bicycle scenario, your partner might use the flinch: "S$480? Wah, that's very low." A good response is to say nothing about the flinch at all, and continue: "Similar bikes are listed between S$450 and S$550, and this one needs new brake pads. S$480 is fair for that."
After each round, your partner tells you which tactic they used, and you say whether you spotted it. Spend thirty seconds on what you'd say differently.
After five rounds, swap. Now you use the tactics on your partner.
This half matters as much as the first. Using a tactic shows you how it works from the inside: how much pressure a simple silence creates, and how easily a pleasant voice turns "I'll need to check with my manager" into a wall. You'll also notice how quickly a calm response takes the force out of a tactic, which makes it easier to trust those responses when you're on the receiving end.
Many people find using the tactics uncomfortable, which is useful to notice too. Lesson 6.3, Where hard bargaining becomes dishonest, asked you to draw your own line. Notice which tactics felt like fair play and which felt close to that line.
When both of you have finished, look back at your rounds and pick the tactic you found hardest to answer. Most people have one that gets under their skin, whether it's a silence they can't bear, a flinch that makes them feel greedy or a take-it-or-leave-it that makes them feel trapped.
Write a fuller response to that one, covering what you'll do if your first line doesn't work. For the long silence, it might be: wait at least ten seconds; if nothing, ask "what are your thoughts?"; if still nothing, say "Take your time, I'm happy to wait."
Add all your lines to a single card, on paper or in your phone notes, with one line for each of the six tactics and your own rules from lesson 6.3 at the bottom, and you have the tactic response card this module builds towards.
The activity asks you to complete the five rounds in each role and then write out your prepared response for the tactic you found hardest.
Complete five rounds in each role and write a prepared response for the tactic you found hardest.
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