How good are you at arriving at win/win agreements?
Building agreement lies at the heart of human interaction. You might call it communication or relationship building or negotiation. However, in essence we all busy in building agreement during most of our interactions with others.
The Harvard Negotiation Project
Prof Roger Fisher of the Harvard Negotiation Project built himself a high standing as an academic who coached world leaders in negotiation and in arriving at agreements. He coached South African leaders in the mid 80s. He and William Ury wrote the now classic Getting to Yes in 1981.
They outlined seven steps:
1. Relationship
How do we and they see the existing relationship? Adversarial or are you colleagues? How would we and they like it to be? What steps can we take to build a better relationship?
2. Communication
Are we listening? For what should we be listening? What points do we wish to communicate?
3. Interests
What - in order of importance - are our interests? What do we think are their primary interests? Which of our interests could be made compatible? What interests might necessarily be in conflict?
4. Options
What possible points of agreement might be acceptable to both sides?
5. Criteria of fairness
What precedents or other standards of legitimacy might be persuasive to both sides?
6. BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement)
If we fail to reach an agreement, what are we going to do? If they should walk away without reaching an agreement, what good walk-away alternative do they have?
7. Commitments
What are some good commitments from the other side that we may realistically try for? What commitments are we prepared to make in order to reach agreement? Try drafting some potential commitments for each side.
Building Agreement
Getting to Yes covered process, substance and to a lesser degree, emotion. In 2000 Roger Fisher and Daniel Shapiro, a clinical psychologist, started analyzing the emotional aspects of building agreement. The result was Building Agreement - Using Emotions as You Negotiate which appeared in 2005.
The authors point out that emotions are always present when parties "negotiate". However, it is not possible during every discussion or negotiation to focus on the substance and analyse every possible emotion. Rather focus on five core concerns which generate emotions.
Core Concerns
- Appreciation: Express genuine appreciation for what others think, feel or do
- Affiliation: Build affiliation or connectedness; turn an adversary into a colleague
- Autonomy: Respect the autonomy in others and gain autonomy for yourself
- Status: Acknowledge status and establish your own
- Role: Choose a fulfilling role during every negotiation
These concerns are important to every individual.
Business Environment
We found that these core concerns are very applicable to companies when contemplating approaching investors or in merger situations.
Apply these principles in any a situation with clients and especially with owners or senior individuals with decision-making powers.
Heeding the five concerns are equally important in everyday human interactions in the working place. Especially the first concern. People simply have a deep-seated need to be appreciated. And most people seldom experience genuine appreciation.
We adopted the core concerns framework and have integrated these principles in full into our approach. Depending on the needs of our clients, we lead various types of discussions about especially the five core concerns.
This approach covers part of the skills which leaders and managers should have when dealing with people.
Please also see scorecard intangibles and emotional intelligence.
Also go to worth reading for details about "Getting to Yes" by Roger Fisher and William Ury, and "Building Agreement - Using Emotions as You Negotiate" by Roger Fisher and Daniel Shapiro. Both publications are really essential reading.
Last modified: 14-08-2009