Recently, I was invited to speak in Europe.

My main expenses would be paid, but there would be no honorarium, no fee for researching, developing, and delivering the talk.

What is in such a deal for me, apart from investing about a week of my time in preparing, traveling and performing?

Nothing tangible. The rationale provided me was that I would gain exposure to about 100 senior managers that could hire me as a customer service consultant. And I suppose there would be some publicity supporting the event, and I would earn the bragging rights of adding yet another international event to my professional speaking portfolio.

Repeatedly, across my career, I have declined similar invitations on purely financial grounds. While my colleagues were talking their heads off in Kuala Lumpur and other locales, I was tending to the home fires and serving more rewarding clients.

No regrets about that.

But after spending several years in the negotiation field, and having taught "Best Practices in Negotiation" at major institutions such as UC Berkeley and UCLA Extension, I believe there is a way to make any deal work.

There are some important provisos. The parties must be patient, and they must be open to creative solutions. Plus, they need to be flexible enough and senior enough in their power structures to cut deals without stifling scrutiny from above.

In the speaking scenario, there are numerous ways to be "paid":

(1) I can be spiffed through the travel budget. Instead of flying economy class, I can be authorized to fly in business or first.

(2) I can be given a certain share of the paid "gate," a portion of the revenues from paying attendees.

(3) I can be prepaid for supplying my audiovisual training programs to the sponsor for sale before the program, at the site, and on the web.

(4) A separate admission fee can be charged to those that want to participate with me in a small group breakout session, and I would receive the lion's share of these added revenues.

(5) A professional team can be brought in at the sponsor's expense to record my presentation on video and audio for at-event and post-event marketing. In this way, I would have new copyrights and an ongoing income stream from my performance.

(6) The sponsor could provide me with an ongoing testimonial and reference that would eventuate in multiple, paying clients.

(7) The sponsor could celebrate my presence by giving me an award in recognition for my many conspicuous and groundbreaking contributions to customer service.

I have just named seven ways, some or all of which could be combined to return value for the value I tender by preparing and delivering a professional speech at a distant location.

But again, to make such agreements, the parties must be patient in exploring alternatives, creative, empowered, and above all, not seeking one-sided, win-lose outcomes.