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The Negotiation Book: Your Definitive Guide To Successful Negotiating
Negotiation is one of the most important skills in business. Fact. No other skill will give you a better chance of optimising your success and your organisation’s success. Every time you negotiate, you are looking for an increased advantage. This book delivers it. From planning, dynamics and strategies, to psychology, tactics and behaviours, nothing will put you in a stronger position to build capability, build negotiation strategies and facilitate negotiations through to successful conclusions. Chapters The Negotiation Book is your competitive advantage. That’s something everyone can agree on.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published December 1, 2010
103 people are currently reading
469 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
June 25, 2011
If you're one of those "nice" people that keeps getting fucked over in business, read this, I think I laughed out loud a few times at how accurately it described my problems.
August 10, 2022
Fantastic, comprehensive book on corporate negotiation. Looking forward to using the techniques in this coupled with those from Never Split The Difference.
January 2, 2020
The Negotiation Book: Your Definitive Guide to Successful Negotiating by Steve Gates
A comprehensive yet slightly dry book about negotiation. For simple negotiations such as when purchasing things it is possible to comprehensively break the transaction down into variables such as quantity purchased, delivery time and quality. Seller and buyer may place different importance on each aspect so the optimum transaction for both sides can be generated.
If you are thinking of closing a significant negotiation early be aware you may pay extra (i.e. suboptimal negotiation outcome) for the comfort of certainty. It may be best to take a step back and take time to think about your options and consider the optimum path forward.
Preparation is the key thing to be successful at winning more value in a negotiation. Map out the variables and relative importance of these from the point of view of each party, seek to establish ways in which you can generate value rather than trying to only take value.
Be cautious of the apparent 50 : 50 fair deal, usually if you suggest this or agree to this you could have achieved more.
Power in negotiations is key, deduce who holds this. Clearly it is hard to know the exact lowest price someone would settle for so you may need to use the art of listening to ascertain this.
Promotes a template for negotiation with different aspects on a clock face, not all of these categories are important for each negotiation.
The template includes the following, furth down the list the more complex this aspect is:
Bartering
Haggling / bidding
Hard bargaining
Dealing
Concession and trading
Win win
Partnership/joint problem solving
Relationship building
Experienced negotiators can be better to negotiate with than novice ones, as they are less likely to be completely unreasonable. Novice negotiators may adopy unreasonable in an attempt to prove their individual worth.
Time and circumstances are important in the negotiations, if timing is in your favour move forward. Ideally strategically map your negotiation process before starting.
A comprehensive yet slightly dry book about negotiation. For simple negotiations such as when purchasing things it is possible to comprehensively break the transaction down into variables such as quantity purchased, delivery time and quality. Seller and buyer may place different importance on each aspect so the optimum transaction for both sides can be generated.
If you are thinking of closing a significant negotiation early be aware you may pay extra (i.e. suboptimal negotiation outcome) for the comfort of certainty. It may be best to take a step back and take time to think about your options and consider the optimum path forward.
Preparation is the key thing to be successful at winning more value in a negotiation. Map out the variables and relative importance of these from the point of view of each party, seek to establish ways in which you can generate value rather than trying to only take value.
Be cautious of the apparent 50 : 50 fair deal, usually if you suggest this or agree to this you could have achieved more.
Power in negotiations is key, deduce who holds this. Clearly it is hard to know the exact lowest price someone would settle for so you may need to use the art of listening to ascertain this.
Promotes a template for negotiation with different aspects on a clock face, not all of these categories are important for each negotiation.
The template includes the following, furth down the list the more complex this aspect is:
Bartering
Haggling / bidding
Hard bargaining
Dealing
Concession and trading
Win win
Partnership/joint problem solving
Relationship building
Experienced negotiators can be better to negotiate with than novice ones, as they are less likely to be completely unreasonable. Novice negotiators may adopy unreasonable in an attempt to prove their individual worth.
Time and circumstances are important in the negotiations, if timing is in your favour move forward. Ideally strategically map your negotiation process before starting.
June 19, 2018
The review on “The Negotiation Book: Your Definitive Guide to Successful Negotiating” by Steve Gates.
The book purpose: to provide you with the best manual has been ever written for gaining more value during every negotiation you involve in.
The main idea: negotiating agreements is not about competing or winning, it is about securing the best value, and first challenge is you, your self-motivation for change and being “inside” the other’s party head; to achieve it you have to (1) work with your mindset to develop self-awareness and being proactive (say hello Steven Covey again:-), get used to feel comfortable being in uncomfortable situation (e.g. starting with challenging position for another party), be ready to change the way you think about negotiations and yourself; and also you need (2) to sharp your skills such as planning, getting information, trading-off variables, handling with tactics.
Credentials: the book contains complete description of negotiation’s strategies, the wonderful preparation tool, much better in comparison with tools from Gavin Kennedy and William Ury (Harvard negotiation program), the exhaustive tactic’s guide with a power and relationship analysis. The book’s author is a founder of the GAP partnership, specialising exclusively in negotiation and working over 500 blue chip organisations around the world. According my opinion, the GAP delivers the best negotiation training course in Russia.
The application area: must have been read book for everyone who is involved in professional negotiations of agreements (executives, procurement/legal teams, sales etc.)
The book purpose: to provide you with the best manual has been ever written for gaining more value during every negotiation you involve in.
The main idea: negotiating agreements is not about competing or winning, it is about securing the best value, and first challenge is you, your self-motivation for change and being “inside” the other’s party head; to achieve it you have to (1) work with your mindset to develop self-awareness and being proactive (say hello Steven Covey again:-), get used to feel comfortable being in uncomfortable situation (e.g. starting with challenging position for another party), be ready to change the way you think about negotiations and yourself; and also you need (2) to sharp your skills such as planning, getting information, trading-off variables, handling with tactics.
Credentials: the book contains complete description of negotiation’s strategies, the wonderful preparation tool, much better in comparison with tools from Gavin Kennedy and William Ury (Harvard negotiation program), the exhaustive tactic’s guide with a power and relationship analysis. The book’s author is a founder of the GAP partnership, specialising exclusively in negotiation and working over 500 blue chip organisations around the world. According my opinion, the GAP delivers the best negotiation training course in Russia.
The application area: must have been read book for everyone who is involved in professional negotiations of agreements (executives, procurement/legal teams, sales etc.)
December 20, 2020
This is the 4th book of read on the topic of negotiation. It’s not the best, but here’s a few things that differentiate it.
1.) There’s a large focus on trading concessions. If you’re giving something up, ask for something in return... and it doesn’t always have to be price.
2.) Fairness and ethics were talked about the least. Which I kind of appreciated. Negotiation is about accomplishing your objectives. If your objectives include fairness, great, but not everyone will value fairness the same.
3.) There’s a large list of tactics that people use. It’s pretty exhaustive and there’s a short paragraph on each. Be aware of them, and also use them at your own risk. Tactics are dangerous in that the relationship could be jeopardized if they know what your doing.
Worth the read. It’s a good book for corporate negotiations.
1.) There’s a large focus on trading concessions. If you’re giving something up, ask for something in return... and it doesn’t always have to be price.
2.) Fairness and ethics were talked about the least. Which I kind of appreciated. Negotiation is about accomplishing your objectives. If your objectives include fairness, great, but not everyone will value fairness the same.
3.) There’s a large list of tactics that people use. It’s pretty exhaustive and there’s a short paragraph on each. Be aware of them, and also use them at your own risk. Tactics are dangerous in that the relationship could be jeopardized if they know what your doing.
Worth the read. It’s a good book for corporate negotiations.
June 3, 2020
Enjoyed every minute reading this book. Highly recommended for Entrepreneurs, Sales People and anyone looking to either Revise or Revitalize his Negotiation Skills. One point that really is So true is when its mentioned that you can choose only 2 from those 3 when it comes to Deliverable's 1) Quick 2) Good 3) Cheap.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 1, 2021
The book gives a good overview of common negotiation tactics as well as keys to success. The art of negotiation can only truly be learned through practice, so don't expect to read this book and be a master. All in all, I would recommend this book to anyone that uses negotiation as part of their job or wants to know more about how to become a better negotiator.
January 5, 2020
I found this to be an informative overview of what it takes to be an effective negotiator. The way case studies were littered throughout the book helped me to see how the concepts applied in real life.
As a novice to negotiation, this was a very insightful read.
As a novice to negotiation, this was a very insightful read.
December 29, 2016
Mostly a tired rehash of classic negotiation techniques, with a few fresh ideas thrown in. Some editing errors and typos were distracting (and too frequent), but overall a decent book.
April 29, 2019
Good overview of considerations & tactics of deal making
June 30, 2023
this book has nothing new, nothing groundbreaking, nothing I never heard before I mean it was a good reminder but that's it I couldn't say I learned anything from it
Read
June 17, 2025enfin
October 26, 2016
I think the book brought up some good points concerning how to conduct yourself during negotiations and also highlighted common mistakes. It also provided some framework for strategizing. The downside I think it could have been more concise and structured more friendly. Was quite a dry read with too much repetition. The wording was sometimes convoluted and there were more typos than you should see in a publishing. Nevertheless have some good takeaways.
August 22, 2015
This book is not going to get you anywhere except to dreamland because it is extremely dull. It is also full of clichés, amateur psychology, and compares clients to children throwing tantrums... I'd be embarrassed if clients knew I read this before starting a negotiation with them. If you have a wobbly table I'd recommend this book to stabilize the legs.
July 23, 2018
Very good book. Sometimes get's a bit too theoretical but then knocks you out with chapter 8 and real practical examples of how to negotiate... or rather 'how to defend yourself against common negotiation tactics'!
May 11, 2021
Great conocepts
Currently reading
February 23, 2023pulled from MELCAT library
good points
see research notes
good points
see research notes
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews