Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement without Giving In

by Roger Fisher

Different forecasts?

Differences in aversion to risk?

Look for items that are of low cost to you and high benefit to them, and vice versa. Differences in interests, priorities, beliefs, forecasts, and attitudes toward risk all make dovetailing possible.

Requesting the other side to be “more forthcoming” will probably not produce a decision you want.

It is usually easier, for example, to refrain from doing something not being done than to stop action already underway. And it is easier to cease doing something than to undertake an entirely new course of action.

Few things facilitate a decision as much as precedent.

Concentrate both on making them aware of the consequences they can expect if they do decide as you wish and on improving those consequences from their point of view.

Write out a sentence or two illustrating what the other side’s most powerful critic might say about the decision you are thinking of asking for.

A final test of an option is to write it out in the form of a “yesable proposition.” Try to draft a proposal to which their responding with the single word “yes” would be sufficient, realistic, and operational.

the approach is to commit yourself to reaching a solution based on principle, not pressure. Concentrate on the merits of the problem, not the mettle of the parties. Be open to reason, but closed to threats.

Independent standards are even more important to efficiency when more parties are involved. In such cases positional bargaining is difficult at best.

There are three basic points to remember: Frame each issue as a joint search for objective criteria. Reason and be open to reason as to which standards are most appropriate and how they should be applied. Never yield to pressure, only to principle.

Ask “What’s your theory?” If the seller starts by giving you a position,

Agree first on principles.

Pressure can take many forms: a bribe, a threat, a manipulative appeal to trust, or a simple refusal to budge. In all these cases, the principled response is the same: invite them to state their reasoning, suggest objective criteria you think apply, and refuse to budge except on this basis. Never yield to pressure, only to principle.

If the other side truly will not budge and will not advance a persuasive basis for their position, then there is no further negotiation. You now have a choice like the one you face when you walk into a store that has a fixed, nonnegotiable price on what you want to buy. You can take it or leave it. Before leaving it you should see if you have overlooked some objective standard that makes their offer a fair one.

6. What If They Are More Powerful? (Develop Your BATNA—Best Alternative To a Negotiated Agreement) 7. What If They Won’t Play? (Use Negotiation Jujitsu) 8. What If They Use Dirty Tricks? (Taming the Hard Bargainer)

(Develop Your BATNA—Best Alternative To a Negotiated Agreement)

the most any method of negotiation can do is to meet two objectives: first, to protect you against making an agreement you should reject and second, to help you make the most of the assets you do have so that any agreement you reach will satisfy your interests as well as possible.

Negotiators commonly try to protect themselves against such an outcome by establishing in advance the worst acceptable outcome—their “bottom line.”

A bottom line—by its very nature rigid—is almost certain to be too rigid.

What is your BATNA—your Best Alternative To a Negotiated Agreement? That is the standard against which any proposed agreement should be measured. That is the only standard that can protect you both from accepting terms that are too unfavorable and from rejecting terms it would be in your interest to accept.

the greater danger is that you are too committed to reaching agreement. Not having developed any alternative to a negotiated solution, you are unduly pessimistic about what would happen if negotiations broke off.

Generating possible BATNAs requires three distinct operations: (1) inventing a list of actions you might conceivably take if no agreement is reached; (2) improving some of the more promising ideas and converting them into practical alternatives; and (3) selecting, tentatively, the one alternative that seems best.

The first operation is inventing.

The second stage is to improve the best of your ideas and turn the most promising into real alternatives.

The final step in developing a BATNA is selecting the best among the alternatives.

if your best alternative to a negotiated agreement is worse for you than they think, disclosing it will weaken rather than strengthen your hand.

To the extent that they have muscle and you have principle, the larger a role you can establish for principle the better off you are.

The first centers on what you can do. You yourself can concentrate on the merits, rather than on positions.

you can resort to a second strategy that focuses on what they may do.

The third approach focuses on what a third party can do. If neither principled negotiation nor negotiation jujitsu gets them to play, consider including a third party trained to focus the discussion on interests, options, and criteria.

When they assert their positions, do not reject them. When they attack your ideas, don’t defend them. When they attack you, don’t counterattack. Break the vicious cycle by refusing to react. Instead of pushing back, sidestep their attack and deflect it against the problem.

Typically their “attack” will consist of three maneuvers: asserting their position forcefully, attacking your ideas, and attacking you.

Don’t attack their position, look behind it. When the other side sets forth their position, neither reject it nor accept it. Treat it as one possible option. Look for the interests behind it, seek out the principles that it reflects, and think about ways to improve it.

Don’t defend your ideas, invite criticism and advice. A lot of time in negotiation is spent criticizing. Rather than resisting the other side’s criticism, invite it. Instead of asking them to accept or reject an idea, ask them what’s wrong with it.

Another way to channel criticism in a constructive direction is to turn the situation around and ask for their advice. Ask them what they would do if they were in your position.

sit back and allow them to let off steam. Listen to them, show you understand what they are saying, and when they have finished, recast their attack on you as an attack on the problem.

Ask questions and pause. Those engaged in negotiation jujitsu use two key tools. The first is to use questions instead of statements. Statements generate resistance, whereas questions generate answers.

Questions allow the other side to get their points across and let you understand them. They pose challenges and can be used to lead the other side to confront the problem. Questions offer them no target to strike at, no position to attack. Questions do not criticize, they educate.

Silence is one of your best weapons. Use it. If they have made an unreasonable proposal or an attack you regard as unjustified, the best thing to do may be to sit there and not say a word.

The architect makes clear he is not asking either spouse to give up a position. Rather, he is exploring the possibility that he might be able to make a recommendation to them—but even that is uncertain. At this stage he is just trying to learn all he can about their needs and interests.

The United States listened to both sides, prepared a draft to which no one was committed, asked for criticism, and improved the draft again and again until the mediators felt they could improve it no further. After thirteen days and some twenty-three drafts, the United States had a text it was prepared to recommend. When President Jimmy Carter finally did recommend it, Israel and Egypt accepted. As a mechanical technique for limiting the number of decisions, reducing the uncertainty of each decision, and preventing the parties from getting increasingly locked into their positions, it worked remarkably well.

“Please correct me if I’m wrong”

Analysis. Giving personal support to the person on the other side is crucial to disentangling the people from the problem—separating relationship issues from the substantive merits.

A principled negotiator neither accepts nor rejects the other side’s positions. To keep the dialogue focused on the merits, Turnbull questions Mrs. Jones about the reasons for her position.

(Taming the Hard Bargainer)

There are three steps in negotiating the rules of the negotiating game where the other side seems to be using a tricky tactic: recognize the tactic, raise the issue explicitly, and question the tactic’s legitimacy and desirability—negotiate over it.

After recognizing the tactic, consider bringing it up with the other side.

The most important purpose of bringing the tactic up explicitly, however, is to give you an opportunity to negotiate about the rules of the game. This is the third step.