3-d Negotiation: Powerful Tools to Change the Game in Your Most Important Deals,   ISBN:9781591397991

Customer Rating: 

Think value creation first, second and then worry about claiming the value. Think of treating people across the table as partners and problem as the enemy instead of reverse. Think of longer term mutually beneficial outcome instead of tricks to outsmart others. Think of what you can do before and outside the negotiating table and do it improve your chances. Think of what you want to achieve and not what you want to avoid... May be a checklist will help here. All good advice, with use cases and studies you can relate to.

Customer Rating: 

If you have read a few books on negotiation, you will find much in this book familiar. If you're serious about the subject, however, reading it will amply reward your curiosity. Many of its negotiating techniques and approaches are familiar because the authors, David A. Lax and James K. Sebenius, reviewed and tested the existing literature on the subject. They put the best current suggestions into a larger conceptual frame that can help negotiators make better deals. This book is approachable for beginners and useful for experienced negotiators, so getAbstract recommends it to both types of readers, even if it isn't perfect. In some parts of the book, the authors highlight negotiating issues that parties must face without giving practical guidance on how to handle them. On the whole, though, this is a useful, methodical and realistic treatment of negotiation.

Customer Rating: 

This is a text book of modern negotiation. A great place to start your studies for the classic ideas, or a great place to go for the expert looking for fresh ideas. This book is worth while because the method works! Basically, the authors use the most advanced problem solving approaches and apply them to the study and practice of negotiation. Nice work!

Customer Rating: 

Most books on negotiation combine the hardball win-lose tactics with the more effective win-win approach. 3-D Negotiation is different: it adds a new third dimension to negotiation, mainly the need for developing a dynamic strategy on how to set up and shape the optimum situation and overall conditions for negotiations (away from the table), and well before negotiations start. Of course, the authors believe that negotiators must employ all three dimensions as needed during most negotiations.

This new third dimension includes, among other things, "acting to ensure the right parties have been involved, in the right sequence, to deal with the right issues that engage the right set of interests, at the right tables, at the right time, under the right expectations, and facing the right consequences of walking away if there is no deal."

Here is real-world example of acting to ensure the right parties and the right sequence: A US firm was looking to establish a joint venture in Mexico and had identified three potential partners (one excellent, one good, and one that barely meets the set criteria). Should this firm start negotiations with the best prospect, and if those negotiations fail, then move to the next, and so on? Or wouldn't it be far better if this US firm makes it known in the industry (in Mexico) that they are looking for a joint venture partner, and induce these three prospects to come to the US firm? Negotiating simultaneously with the three potential partners was indeed better, especially that the US firm set up the negotiation conditions whereby the three Mexican prospects were rushing to compete for the joint venture!

Although this book introduces a third dimension to negotiation, the other two dimensions are also well covered by the authors, with a large number of real-world examples. The second dimension covers designing value-creating deals, including the traditional concept of enlarging the pie, and how to make lasting deals. The first dimension focuses on the tactics at the negotiation table, including problem-solving tactics such as shaping perceptions, setting ambitious target prices, interpersonal skills, cultural empathy, and many other tactics familiar to those who have read traditional negotiation books.

In short, 3-D Negotiation is a welcomed addition to the topic of negotiation, especially due to its strategic approach to negotiations. I particularly like the idea of backward mapping the negotiation process, starting with the desired target or outcome, then mapping all the parties, their interests, no-deal options. I was also intrigued by the authors' philosophy and the 3-D strategy of: "Let them have your way", as well as their concept of "Zone of Possible Agreement".

Although this excellent book is written with important and complex deals in mind, the 3-D approach can be indeed applied to simpler deals and negotiations. In fact, the reader will find a large number of examples of negotiations ranging from the simple ones such as buying a car or a house, to the more complex ones such as negotiations between countries, or among large international organizations.

Customer Rating: 

Most books on negotiating fall into the win-win or win-loose categories, or some hybrid, but all of these focus primarily on the face-to-face tactics at the negotiating table. This book distinguishes itself by focusing not only on at-the-table tactics, but also on two other critical dimensions: 1. deal design, concerning value, substance, outcomes, and occurring "on the drawing board" and 2. setup, concerning architecture, and happens away from the table.

The authors delve into each of these three dimensions (tactics, deal design, and setup) in great depth, providing a powerful analytical framework, cases, and numerous guidelines and creative insights. This is a an outstanding and substantive book!