How to Win a Three-Way Partnership Negotiation When Everyone Has a Side Deal
Richard Okonkwo suggested meeting bilaterally before tomorrow's three-way call, and you said yes because refusing would have been suspicious. But now you are staring at the real landscape: Richard has already had a side conversation with TechForge, the third party in this alliance, and TechForge offered him a 45% revenue split to go direct — cutting you out entirely, using their own inferior inventory tool. Richard prefers your product. He told a colleague as much over drinks last week. But Richard is the kind of negotiator who keeps all options warm until the last possible second. Tomorrow, three parties sit down to divide $15M in year-one revenue, decide who owns the customer relationship, and set exclusivity windows. If you and Richard cannot align tonight, TechForge will walk into that meeting with a bilateral proposal that sidelines your platform. The three-way call collapses. You lose $15M. And TechForge — with a product half as good as yours — wins because they moved faster on the politics.
Why This Conversation Goes Wrong
You treat this as a bilateral negotiation and ignore the absent third party. Negotiating with Richard as if TechForge does not exist leaves you vulnerable to whatever side deal they have already discussed. The entire point of this meeting is to build a coalition that controls the three-way conversation tomorrow. Ignoring the triangle makes you a point, not a player.
You open by proposing your ideal revenue split. Leading with "we want 50/30/20" before understanding Richard's real priorities turns the conversation into arithmetic. Richard has 2,000 retail partners and a CEO to report to. He does not care about your spreadsheet — he cares about control, timing, and a story to tell his board.
You badmouth TechForge to win Richard over. Saying "their product is inferior" sounds desperate. Richard already knows their product is weaker — he said so privately. What he needs is not trash talk. He needs a reason to choose the harder deal. Criticizing the absent party makes you look insecure, not strategic.
The Coalition Forge
Multi-party negotiations are won before the full room convenes. The Coalition Forge method is built for bilateral pre-meetings where the goal is not to finalize terms but to build enough alignment that you enter the main negotiation as an allied bloc rather than three competing interests.
Map the triangle before you propose anything
Ask Richard about his conversation with TechForge — not accusingly, but strategically. "You mentioned you had an interesting conversation with them. Where is their head at on the structure?" This tells you what you are competing against and signals that you understand the full board.
Find Richard's real non-negotiable
Revenue split is what Richard talks about. Customer ownership and a launch exclusivity window are what Richard actually cares about. "If we solve the customer relationship question and the timing of the launch, does the revenue math become more flexible?" You are trading his stated position for his real priority.
Design the coalition offer
Propose terms that give Richard his non-negotiables in exchange for your economics. "Apex owns the customer relationship. You get a 90-day exclusive launch window. In exchange, the revenue split is 45/35/20 — product, distribution, integration." Richard gets control and first-mover advantage; you get the economics that sustain the platform.
Build the joint presentation for tomorrow
Do not leave this meeting with a handshake. Draft the bullet points you will present jointly to TechForge. "If we walk in aligned, TechForge has two choices: join the structure or watch us find another integrator." Shared documentation of tonight's terms makes the coalition real, not theoretical.
Give Richard a reason to close the door on TechForge's side deal
Richard needs to believe your coalition is more valuable than TechForge's offer. "With our platform, your retailers get genuine AI-powered inventory management that sells itself. With TechForge's tool, you are deploying something you will spend the next year apologizing for." This is not trash talk — it is a business case for product quality.
The moment that changes everything
Richard is not choosing between two deals. He is choosing which partner he trusts to protect him.
Richard plays both sides because his CRO career has taught him that alliances are fragile and partners are replaceable. The TechForge side deal is not a preference — it is an insurance policy. When Richard says "they have options for us," he is not threatening you. He is telling you he needs a reason to stop hedging. The reason is not a better revenue split. The reason is trust that you will not commoditize his distribution network once the alliance is live. Every partnership Richard has seen collapse did so because the product company eventually said "we do not need distribution anymore." If you proactively offer contractual protections — a minimum term, a revenue floor, a commitment to never go direct in his territory — you are addressing the fear he has never articulated. Richard will stop playing both sides when one side makes it clear they understand why he was playing in the first place.
What to Say (and What Not To)
Instead of
"We bring the technology, so we deserve the largest share."
Try this
"Apex brings 2,000 partners. That distribution reach is why this deal gets to $15M. The split should reflect that — and also reflect who built the product those partners will depend on."
Instead of
"What did TechForge offer you?"
Try this
"You had a conversation with TechForge. Where is their thinking on deal structure? I want to understand the full picture before we propose anything."
Instead of
"Their product is not as good as ours."
Try this
"The question for your retailers is whether they are deploying best-in-class inventory intelligence or a checkbox integration that generates support tickets."
Instead of
"Let's figure out the split and we can discuss the rest later."
Try this
"Before we touch the numbers, I want to make sure we solve for customer ownership and launch timing. If those are right, the economics will follow."
Instead of
"I think we can work something out."
Try this
"Here is what I want to present jointly to TechForge tomorrow. Can we draft the bullets now?"
The Bigger Picture
Research from INSEAD on multi-party negotiations shows that parties who secure bilateral alignment before multilateral meetings achieve outcomes 37% closer to their ideal terms. Pre-meeting coalitions do not guarantee results, but they dramatically narrow the range of acceptable outcomes in the full room.
A Boston Consulting Group study of 500 technology alliance deals found that the number-one cause of alliance failure within 18 months was not economics but unresolved disagreement about customer ownership. Companies that explicitly defined customer relationship governance at formation had 2.4x the survival rate of those that left it ambiguous.
Practice This Conversation
12 minutes · AI voice roleplay with Richard Okonkwo
Reading about this is step one. Practicing it changes everything. Sonitura lets you rehearse this exact conversation with Richard Okonkwo, a realistic AI chief revenue officer at apex distribution network, a global b2b distribution company with 2,000+ retail partners who reacts to your words in real time. It takes 12 minutes. Tomorrow's three-way call does not have to be a free-for-all. Walk in with a coalition already built.
Practice This Scenario Free →