We built an app to prepare your negotiation and practice it

Dear Negotiation Explorer,

We are finally live with the NegoAI app. For now, it covers the buying side.

At the start of this twelve-week build, I said I would share the work as it happened, including the decisions and the things that went wrong. This week, I can show you the app itself and explain why we put it together this way.

Brama, my partner in Claude Code, built the app, with Codex reviewing the work alongside him. We worked through the screens together, changing the layout before building the version you see here.

We are in the testing phase.

The home screen starts with the side you are on. Buying is the first version. Selling and M&A (mergers and acquisitions) are shown as coming later.

Then you choose between a complete preparation and a conversation with one expert. I wanted that choice before anything starts running. If you bring a contract question, you should be able to go straight to the agent that handles contracts.

For the complete preparation, you describe what you are buying and what you want from the negotiation. Attach the documents you have, such as the supplier's proposal and your contract. There is also a place for the profile of the person you will meet.

The app accepts Word documents, PDFs and text files for the case.

Kraljic is the buyer expert. He examines the purchase and the supplier relationship: how dependent you are on this supplier, what alternatives you have and what buying strategy makes sense.

Kahneman is the behavioral expert. He reads the counterpart's LinkedIn profile and gives guidance on how to communicate with that person and handle disagreement. He treats his conclusions as estimates and explains how certain he is. If you do not provide a profile, the preparation continues without his analysis.

Those two start together.

Deepak is the negotiation expert. He uses their analyses to prepare the negotiation, including possible explanations of what the other side wants. He works through your alternatives and the terms you could trade, then develops the opening and the limits you need to keep in mind.

The Compiler turns what the three produce into one report. It includes a summary and a short reference sheet for the meeting.

On the screen, you can see how their work connects. Selecting an agent shows what it receives, what it produces and whether it is waiting, working or finished. We chose this layout because I wanted the work of each agent to be visible.

The preparation ends with the Compiler's report. You can read it in the app and download it. You can also open a conversation with an individual expert about the case.

Von Neumann is the agent you practice against. He plays your counterpart and gives you a debrief afterwards, explaining what worked and what you could change.

I wanted him outside the preparation process, because you decide whether you want to rehearse.

The best way to use him is to give him that report. He then has the preparation in front of him when he plays the other side. You can choose how hard he pushes, from cooperative to firm and impatient.

You can also start with Von Neumann directly. Tell him about the negotiation and the person you will face, and attach the documents you have.

We added voice because I want this to be a conversation you can practice out loud. You can dictate your replies, and Von Neumann speaks his. You can stop for a debrief when you want to discuss what happened.

Porter and Macneil have their own pages alongside the preparation agents.

Porter helps with the buying work that starts before you have a negotiation to prepare. You may need to find suppliers, check whether they can do the work or compare quotations that include different things. Give him your specifications and the information you already have. He can help prepare the buying documents and examine the full cost of a proposed change of supplier.

Macneil helps with contract terms. You can bring him a draft and ask which terms need attention, why they matter for your business and what wording you could propose instead. His work also covers questions after signing, such as a change in scope, a missed obligation or a renewal. You decide whether to follow the advice and when to involve legal.

Kraljic, Kahneman and Deepak can also be used individually.

Kahneman needs the content of the person's profile in a file he can read. Giving him a LinkedIn address is not enough.

We tried ways of saving profiles and found missing material. One left out the headline and posts; another lost parts of the career and recommendations. So we adapted an existing open-source tool and added a profile saver to the app.

You add the "Save for NegoAI" bookmark to your browser once. Then you open the person's LinkedIn profile while signed in, click the bookmark and download the file. Attach it to Kahneman's page, or to the profile field when you start a complete preparation. There is also a browser extension if you prefer that.

The saver collects the profile sections and recent posts. Reposts are marked separately so another person's words do not become evidence about your counterpart. A panel shows which sections it is reading.

I asked for completeness because the advice depends on what Kahneman receives. The person's career, how they describe their work and what others write about them give him more to consider than a job title.

You can return to saved cases, ask follow-up questions and dictate instead of typing. The other agents' answers have a Listen button, so you can hear them too.

Individual answers in a conversation can be saved as Word or PDF. We made the answers wider on the page so the longer explanations and tables are easier to read. There is a light mode and a dark mode.

You can use this approach without NegoAI. Before asking a colleague or an AI to play your counterpart, give them your preparation and explain who you expect to face. Ask them to respond from that person's position.

Afterwards, look at where your preparation failed to give you an answer. Change that part and practice the conversation again.

On Thursday, October 8, at 18:30 Rome time (12:30 New York / 22:00 Mumbai), I am teaching Practice your negotiation against an AI counterpart.

We will look at how to practice against an AI counterpart built from your own preparation, behaving like the person you are about to face. You can run the same negotiation as many times as you want, with a scored debrief on each. The session is free and lasts 45 minutes.

Register for the October 8 lesson.

Think of a negotiation you have coming up. Which part would you bring to one of these agents first?

Just hit reply and tell me. I read and answer every one.

#Negotiation #NegotiationSkills #NegoAI #AI #AIAgents #AugmentedNegotiator