Never Split the Difference: Negotiating as if Your Life Depended on It

feel this work was promised to you from the beginning,”
Mark said. They trained in front of an observer, honing their
pacing; deciding at what point they would label each fear;
and planning when to include meaningful pauses. It was
theater.
When the day of the meeting arrived, Anna opened by
acknowledging ABC’s biggest gripes. “We understand that
we brought you on board with the shared goal of having
you lead this work,” she said. “You may feel like we have
treated you unfairly, and that we changed the deal
significantly since then. We acknowledge that you believe
you were promised this work.”
This received an emphatic nod from the ABC
representatives, so Anna continued by outlining the situation
in a way that encouraged the ABC reps to see the firms as
teammates, peppering her statements with open-ended
questions that showed she was listening: “What else is there
you feel is important to add to this?”
By labeling the fears and asking for input, Anna was
able to elicit an important fact about ABC’s fears, namely
that ABC was expecting this to be a high-profit contract
because it thought Anna’s firm was doing quite well from
the deal.
This provided an entry point for Mark, who explained
that the client’s new demands had turned his firm’s profits
into losses, meaning that he and Anna needed to cut ABC’s
pay further, to three people. Angela, one of ABC’s
representatives, gasped.