What if we entered negotiations with the goal of benefitting both sides, not just ours?

For many, the word negotiation conjures up images of a heated exchange, of master manipulators, expert wordsmiths, and of winners and losers. Victors earn the spoils by outsmarting opponents and preying on their weaknesses. It’s a daunting picture.

But Brian Gunia, author of the book, The Bartering Mindset: A Mostly Forgotten Framework for Mastering Your Next Negotiation, shows that this mindset is not only short-sighted, but can also be ineffective. He argues that we’d be much more successful – and enjoy the negotiation process more – if we spent as much time thinking of the other person’s needs as our own. He encourages us to “…think about negotiations not as opportunities to fight with the other side about one fixed outcome, like money, but as the opportunity to find issues to trade things with the other side that benefit both of us at the same time.”

Brian is an Associate Professor at Johns Hopkins University’s Carey Business School. His research has been featured in publications like Fast Company, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The New Yorker. In this interview, he shares his five-step process for applying a bartering mindset to our next negotiation and explains why it works: “…negotiators who spend more time and make more of an effort to figure out what’s going on in the other side’s head, tend to do a lot better.”

The Host

You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net.

Episode Links

@briangunia

Mindwise by Nicholas Epley

Distributive versus integrative negotiation

Double coincidence of wants

Multiple equivalent simultaneous offers (MESOs) and their benefits

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