Negotiation Columns & Blogs
Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It: Lessons from an FBI Hostage Negotiator
Law school helped teach me that rational, logical, analytical, fact and evidence-based propositions can be powerful ways to achieve success in legal environments, especially in written motions to judges and presentations in complex cases to juries. This approach can...
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Clothes Envy Makes a Difference in Deal Making
Are you dressing for success? A recent study reveals how clothing can be a big deal in deal making, but probably not in the way you suspect. My 13-year-old son recently joined me at a conference that included leading figures from a wide variety of fields – the common...
read moreGolden Rule Five: Control the Agenda
Agenda control constitutes a critical element in all negotiations. If, when and how we address issues affects our results. So does setting the appropriate atmosphere in which to most effectively explore the substantive issues. Learn how to set up your agenda to get the results you seek.
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Learning Negotiating Skills as Kids Will Pay Off for a Lifetime
Negotiation is a fundamental life skill and core competency in almost everything we do. Kids who learn negotiation early, will benefit from it for a lifetime.
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Latz’s Lessons: Best of 2018
Latz’s Lessons: Best of 2018 Last year I shared the inaugural Latz’s Lessons - a compilation of the crucial lessons from my 2017 monthly columns. Here’s the 2018 edition, with a few extras from previous years included too. And in case you missed my inaugural...
read moreGolden Rule Four: Design an Offer-Concession Strategy
The most common question raised in my negotiation seminars is “When, if ever, should I make the first offer?” The second most common question is “How far should I move for my next concession?” This Golden Rule takes the guesswork out of...
read moreGolden Rule Three: Employ “Fair” Objective Criteria
“I just want what’s fair and reasonable,” a friend said in the midst of his divorce. “That’s not too much to ask, is it?” “Of course not,” I replied. “The key here, though, is how to determine what’s fair and reasonable. I suspect you have...
read moreGolden Rule One: Information Is Power – So Get It
The first Golden Rule is essential to success in any negotiation: Information Is Power—So Get It! It’s critical to ask questions and get as much relevant information as you can throughout the negotiation process. You need...
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What Is Leverage? 14 Rules for Using it Well
What Is Leverage? 14 Rules for Using it WellWhat is Leverage? What most consider to be negotiation power — leverage — actually relates to two factors: how much each party needs that deal relative to the other, and the relative value of each party’s best alternative to...
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Price Not Always The Best Way to Lead Off Negotiations
“Why waste time dealing with those other issues if we can’t even agree on price? Let’s just start with price and, if we can reach agreement on it, then we can address the rest.” This not-uncommon approach appears to make intuitive sense. After all, no one disputes the...
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Know the Value of Your Product to Your Customer
Thomas Edison added up the time and killing pace he had put into inventing the “Universal” stock ticker, a device later used by brokerage houses, and decided he was entitled to $5,000 for it. Ultimately, he figured he’d accept $3,000. So when General Lefferts, the...
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Don’t Cut to the Chase
Don’t Cut to the Chase — Prepare for Your Negotiations A small business owner with a huge potential opportunity in a negotiation with a large company contacted me recently and asked how to respond to the company's request that he make them an...
read moreThe Five Golden Rules of Negotiation for Lawyers
Let’s say you’re sitting at your desk Monday morning, your telephone rings, and it’s Jane, opposing counsel in one of your cases, calling to see if you might be interested in discussing the offer she e-mailed you last week. Because you’re mostly up-to-speed on it, you...
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Tips for Negotiating with Conflict Avoiders
In our last two posts, we discussed tips for negotiating with accommodative counterparts and tips for negotiating with competitive counterparts. To bring this series to a conclusion, here are three negotiation strategies to consider when your counterpart is a conflict...
read moreConfidence and Success Come From Knowledge and Practice
Confidence and Success Come From Knowledge and Practice “I hate to negotiate,” some of my seminar participants tell me. “It makes me anxious, and I just don’t like horse-trading. What can I do?” “Treat it like a game,” I tell them. “Don’t take it personally. And study...
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