For more than 2,500 years, Sun Tzu’s Art of War has guided generals, statesmen and — more recently — boardrooms across the world. Its enduring insight is deceptively simple: the greatest victories are won not through brute confrontation, but through superior preparation, positioning and the wisdom to know when and how to engage. Nowhere is this more relevant than at the modern negotiation table, where the most important moves are made long before anyone says a word.

This intensive one-day workshop translates Sun Tzu’s timeless strategy into a practical, repeatable negotiation system for today’s business professional. Participants learn to read the negotiation “terrain,” assess both themselves and their counterparts with disciplined clarity, shape conditions in their favour, and reach durable agreements that protect both outcomes and relationships — whether closing external commercial deals or navigating internal stakeholder dynamics. Led by a trainer with over two decades of real-world deal-making across Asia, the programme moves well beyond theory into application, equipping participants to negotiate with the calm confidence of a strategist rather than the anxiety of a combatant.

Objective

By the end of this workshop, learners will be able to:

1. Translate Sun Tzu’s core strategic principles into a clear, practical framework they can apply to any negotiation.
2. Conduct disciplined pre-negotiation assessment — knowing their counterpart, themselves and the terrain — to enter every negotiation from a position of strength.
3. Apply strategic positioning, timing and information management to shape outcomes before and during the negotiation.
4. Deploy value-creating, “win-without-fighting” tactics that secure strong agreements while preserving long-term relationships.
5. Adapt their negotiation strategy to different counterparts, power dynamics, internal stakeholders and cross-cultural contexts.

Outline

Opening – The Negotiator as Strategist
Welcome, course objectives and a negotiation self-diagnostic to surface each participant’s default style.
“Now the general who wins a battle makes many calculations in his temple ere the battle is fought. The general who loses a battle makes but few calculations beforehand. Thus do many calculations lead to victory, and few calculations to defeat: how much more no calculation at all! It is by attention to this point that I can foresee who is likely to win or lose.” (未战而庙算胜者，得算多也；未战而庙算不胜者，得算少也。多算胜，少算不胜，而况于无算乎！吾以此观之，胜负见矣)

Module 1 – The Strategic Mindset
Why most deals are won or lost before anyone speaks. Shifting from positional combat to strategic advantage, and the core philosophy of winning without fighting.
“Supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.” (不战而屈人之兵，善之善者也)

Module 2 – Know the Other Side, Know Yourself
The Five Factors assessment applied to negotiation: mapping interests, alternatives (BATNA), leverage and constraints; gathering and reading pre-negotiation intelligence.
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.” (知彼知己，百战不殆)

Module 3 – Shaping the Terrain
Positioning, timing and framing; creating and using leverage; managing information; controlling tempo and seizing the initiative at the table.
“Thus, it is that in war the victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won, whereas he who is destined to defeat first fights and afterwards looks for victory.” (是故胜兵先胜而后求战，败兵先战而后求胜)

Module 4 – Winning Without Fighting
Value-creating moves and disciplined concession strategy; protecting the relationship; adapting tactics for external commercial deals versus internal stakeholders, including cross-cultural dynamics.
“Therefore, just as water retains no constant shape, so in warfare there are no constant conditions. He who can modify his tactics in relation to his opponent and thereby succeed in winning, may be called a heaven-born captain.” (故兵无常势，水无常形，能因敌变化而取胜者，谓之神)

Module 5 – Integration & Capstone
A capstone negotiation simulation drawing on the full framework, structured debrief, and a personal 90-day negotiation action plan.

Who should attend

This workshop is designed for professionals who negotiate as a core part of their role and want a strategic edge:

• Corporate executives responsible for high-stakes deals and partnerships
• Middle managers who negotiate budgets, resources and cross-functional priorities
• Supervisors and team leaders managing day-to-day agreements and stakeholder expectations
• Entrepreneurs and business owners negotiating with clients, suppliers, investors and partners

Methodology

The programme is highly interactive and experiential, blending classical insight with immediate, real-world application:

• Concise teaching of selected Art of War principles, each paired with a modern negotiation application
• Real deal stories and case studies drawn from the trainer’s 20+ years of cross-border business across Asia
• Self-assessment diagnostics to reveal each participant’s negotiation style and blind spots
• Role-plays and practice rounds covering both external commercial and internal stakeholder scenarios
• Facilitated group discussion and peer learning
• A capstone negotiation simulation with structured debrief
• A personal action plan to embed the learning back in the workplace

Lee Chee Ngai's Profile

Lee Chee Ngai is an ACLP-certified corporate bilingual (English and Chinese) trainer with more than 20 years of leadership and business management experience spanning multinational corporations, entrepreneurship and the media industry. He brings a rare combination to this course: the discipline of a strategist and the hard-won instincts of a practitioner who has negotiated real deals across some of Asia’s most demanding markets.

As General Manager of two Tier-1 automotive manufacturing plants in China, Chee Ngai led operations, sales development and cross-cultural teams in high-stakes commercial environments. As Head of Business Development for a global filtration-technology MNC, he forged strategic partnerships and expanded market presence across Southeast Asia. His years managing cross-border trading between Singapore and China sharpened a practical mastery of the very dynamics this workshop addresses — leverage, timing, information, relationships and the cultural nuance that decides whether a deal closes or collapses.

Chee Ngai specialises in leadership development, business communication, negotiation and organisational effectiveness. He is recognised for his signature programmes applying the strategic wisdom of Sun Tzu’s Art of War and The Romance of the Three Kingdoms to modern business challenges — training he has delivered for organisations including government departments, AIA, Marina Bay Sands and the Chinese Development Assistance Council. His teaching integrates real-world case studies, practical frameworks and interactive learning, enabling participants to apply concepts directly to their own negotiations.

He currently partners with tertiary institutions, business associations and adult education providers to deliver professional development programmes for executives, managers and working professionals, and designs customised training for both public- and private-sector clients.