Introduction
by Nigel Nicholson

Negotiation might seem, on the face of it, a specialist topic. It might be for professional negotiators, but it is actually a very general activity within management and the professions - a powerful force for change, effectiveness and value capture in organisations.

In everyday life, in and out of work, negotiation is something we do constantly. It is not always about doing deals over money or resources, it not always a matter of dispute, and it is not solely the province of salespeople, trade union and management representatives, politicians and peacemakers.

Often the currency is such soft stuff as feelings, obligations, promises and favours; the parties are husbands and wives, parents and children, friends and neighbours; and the outcomes are not just win/lose but various kinds of change. Negotiation is in fact any dialogue where parties aim to reach agreement where interests are divided, actually or potentially.

This is the universal process of negotiation - it is intrinsic to social intercourse.

Social life is full of small unwritten contracts that are forged between people who need to get along. In fact, society couldn't function without them. The core social unit of all cultures is the family. In the circles of kinship people will do favours without expecting return, for the sake of blood ties, but even here brothers and sisters, parents and children are apt to bargain over shares and duties.

Husbands and wives, who mostly have no blood tie to fall back on, have to learn to accommodate each other in everyday divisions of labour and mutual supports, emotional and material. Negotiation is one of the pillars of marriage.

Outside the circle of the family, negotiation becomes even more essential. Our ancestors were faced with the problem: how are you going to deal with the stranger who walks into your camp? The time-honoured human response is to fight or trade. Trading usually makes most sense - see what the other has to offer, and then do a deal.

From these deals come the novel syntheses that build complex societies. True, there are losers, but as this book explains, the best negotiations are those where not only are both parties happy with the deal, but both managed to gain something without evident loss.

We shall be looking at all varieties - lose/lose, win/win and win/lose - and what makes some of them collapse and others yield great results for one or both parties. Effective negotiations are not those that result in the destruction of all opposition, but the ones that achieve outcomes that are more than sum of their inputs.

The greatest organisational achievements are built on the efforts of people coming together and merging interests that looked at first as if they were incompatible. Mergers, major sales, project launches and teambuilding all owe much to inspired negotiation by one or more parties.

But there are some blocks and traps on the way to these outcomes. Among these is the awkward fact that people differ not just in their material interests but also in their style of bargaining. Some people are very hard to do deals with!

First, one has to find a common language. The difficulties can be a matter of culture as much as personality - dialogues of the deaf are liable to occur when people don't take the time and trouble to get on to the same wavelength at the outset.

A key skill here is what I call 'decentring' - the ability to figure out what the world must look like from behind the eyes of the other party. This art is often a key element in a winning negotiation. By helping you to understand how other people negotiate, this book will give you practical power in doing deals.

Reading character and culture is part of this, but also it is important to understand the pressures and demands that your counterpart is subject to. At this point, you might get a nasty shock and discover that the person you are dealing with would really be quite happy to destroy you and take all as the winner, and that she or he is prepared to play dirty to do so. This is where negotiation becomes a contest. Yet even here you can maintain your principles while fending off attacks and getting your own strikes home.

At one level, negotiation is a game. And as in any game, to win you need to make smart moves, anticipate your opponent, know when to play rough and when to make a judicious sacrifice. You need to know when to unleash your killer instinct and when to bow out gracefully, accept defeat and swallow your losses.

Although negotiation is commonplace, strong negotiation skills are not. To negotiate in business, you need to switch into the frame of mind that comprehends the process and its biases. It is not smart just to drift into deal making on a wing and a prayer, relying on your wits to improvise the best outcome. Your counterparts are likely to be smarter than that. Do likewise. Prepare. Think about your strategy. Consider the opposition and what they might possibly want. Intuitions and spontaneous insights are all very well, but they are no substitute for analytical smartness and thinking in advance.

One cause of difficulty in business is that specific individuals are designated as negotiators, seeming to absolve the rest of us from the need to understand the art of bargaining. 'Every manager a negotiator' should be the motto of the aspiring business. We return to this theme towards the end of this book.

Leaders, line managers and service-providing professionals are all frequently locked into negotiations, whether they recognise them or not. Our view in this book is that they would be much better off if they did recognise them, and did more to prepare for them. No one is more likely to cut a worse deal than the unaware negotiator.

With sound theory and insights from the business world and beyond, this book is here to help you prepare for and approach negotiation in a smarter way, for real business benefit.

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