Sublime

The more you know and understand this person, the better your chances are of a successful negotiated outcome.

Identify your counterpart’s negotiating style. Once you know whether they are Accommodator, Assertive, or Analyst, you’ll know the correct way to approach them. Prepare, prepare, prepare. When the pressure is on, you don’t rise to the occasion; you fall to your highest level of preparation. So design an ambitious but legitimate goal and then game o

The goal is to identify what your counterparts actually need (monetarily, emotionally, or otherwise) and get them feeling safe enough to talk and talk and talk some more about what they want.

There are fill-in-the-blank labels that can be used in nearly every situation to extract information from your counterpart, or defuse an accusation: It seems like _________ is valuable to you. It seems like you don’t like _________. It seems like you value __________. It seems like _________ makes it easier. It seems like you’re reluctant to ______

What are your goals? Who is the decision maker?

To combat an adversary become their friend.

Break the habit of attempting to get people to say “yes.” Being pushed for “yes” makes people defensive. Our love of hearing “yes” makes us blind to the defensiveness we ourselves feel when someone is pushing us to say it. “No” is not a failure. We have learned that “No” is the anti “Yes” and therefore a word to be avoided at all costs. But it real

It is not enough to be smart and well-researched, or to be right—even when you have the evidence to prove it. You have to earn the right to be right. Others will listen to you and be open to your advice, your point of view, and your perspective once they feel they have been fully heard and understood by you.