Getting to Yes

by

Roger Fisher, William L. Ury, and Bruce Patton

Getting to Yes: Chapter 3 Summary & Analysis

Summary
Analysis
The authors begin with a parable about two men in a library fighting about the window. One man wants it open for fresh air, but the other does not want to feel a draft. So the librarian goes to the next room and opens the window there. Under the heading “For a wise solution reconcile interests, not positions,” the authors note that failed negotiations often take this form: people focus on positions rather than interests. The librarian’s solution works because she cares about the parties’ interests—meaning their “needs, desires, concerns, and fears”—which are really the core issue in any dispute.
This parable succinctly illustrates the principal issue with positional bargaining: it immediately forces people into an artificial choice among competing proposals, rather than letting them join forces to find a solution that works for all of them. Caught up on the difference between their positions, the two men start arguing pointlessly—it takes the neutral librarian to point out that their fundamental “needs, desires, concerns, and fears” are not opposed, even if their positions are.
Themes
Effective Negotiation Theme Icon
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
Quotes
One example of why interests are fundamentally more important than positions is the 1978 Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel, which had been occupying Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula for more than a decade. Both sides had clear, incompatible positions: Israel insisted on keeping some of the territory, but Egypt wanted all of it. But their interests were actually compatible: Israel worried that Egypt would build up troops in the Sinai, and Egypt wanted sovereignty back over its territory. So  Israel agreed to return the Sinai to Egypt, as long as it would remain a demilitarized zone.
Like in the parable about the library, the conflict between Egypt and Israel was purely about positions and not at all about interests. Once their talks turned to concrete interests, it became possible to reach a solution that satisfied both sides. Crucially, this position was not a middle ground between the two sides’ proposals—rather, it was a completely new plan created specifically to fulfill their compatible interests.
Themes
Effective Negotiation Theme Icon
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
Because the same interests can usually be satisfied in many ways, it is always better to focus on interests than positions. Similarly, even negotiators with opposed positions often have compatible interests. For instance, a landlord and a tenant both want to maintain the apartment and have a good relationship. The landlord might want some things that the tenant does not care about, and vice versa. Their opposed interest—the cost of rent—is only one among many important factors in their relationship. Sometimes, opposed interests are the source of a wise agreement—like when a shoe-seller wants money and a buyer wants shoes.
Debating positions is counterproductive because each side crafts its position with only its own interests, not the other side’s, in mind. Accordingly, initial positions are unlikely to seem reasonable to the other side. They provide a deceptively narrow image of the range of possible agreements that can be reached, and they tend to hone in on points of conflict while forgetting numerous points of agreement (like the tenant and the landlord’s shared interest in maintenance).
Themes
Effective Negotiation Theme Icon
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
Quotes
The authors then ask, “How do you identify interests?” People are often explicit about their positions, but their interests can be harder to discern. Negotiators should first ask why the other party is taking whatever position they have chosen, and why they have not already agreed to one’s requests. The authors look at the Iranian hostage crisis and note that it was in the hostage-takers’ best interests to keep the hostages as long as possible.
Since negotiations are always really about satisfying interests, the best way to start one is by figuring out what everyone’s interests are. But since people can often be unforthcoming or unclear about their true motives and desires, getting to their interests can require careful digging and analysis.
Themes
Effective Negotiation Theme Icon
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
Get the entire Getting to Yes LitChart as a printable PDF.
Getting to Yes PDF
Negotiators should think through the decisions facing the other side and the consequences of deciding each way. For instance, the other side’s popularity or political support might be affected, they might want to maintain certain principles, or their actions might have consequences for people who rely on them and the options available to future decision-makers.
When it comes to understanding the other side’s interests, as with their emotions, empathy is a negotiator’s most powerful tool. Getting a holistic picture of the situation from the other side’s perspective can also show negotiators why certain elements of their proposals might seem patently unacceptable to the other side.
Themes
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
The Value of Working Relationships Theme Icon
Negotiators almost always have multiple interests—including an interest in actually reaching an agreement. And negotiators frequently forget that the other side can be made of different competing groups with different interests—like when Lyndon Johnson foolishly referred to all Vietnamese people as “the enemy” during the Vietnam War. By imagining negotiations as two-sided exchanges in which each side has agreed-upon, definite interests, negotiators can also forget that there are usually competing groups with complex interests on each side.
While it is easy to wrongly settle on an oversimplified vision of the other side, the authors believe that it’s nearly impossible to be too empathetic or perceptive about the other side’s interests. So it is essential not to confuse the first acceptable theory of the other side’s motives with the other side’s actual interests, nor to assume that those interests will be absolutely consistent or cut-and-dry. For instance, Johnson was bound to misunderstand the interests of “the enemy” if he lumped the two warring halves of Vietnam together.
Themes
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
The authors note that people’s interests are most often grounded in powerful basic needs like security, belonging, recognition, and autonomy. Even when negotiations are explicitly about money, these basic needs often dictate parties’ demands. For instance, when Mexico was planning to sell natural gas to the United States, it was important for them to be respected and get a fair price, rather than just sell as much as possible. In such situations, it is helpful to explicitly write out a list of each side’s interests.
The natural gas deal between Mexico and the United States illustrates how, even though people often negotiate over money, they are seldom really negotiating about money. There are usually deeper, more fundamental interests at stake, as in all negotiations. Identifying these interests (like the Mexican government and industry’s interest in being taken seriously as an equal partner) allows negotiators to consider alternative ways of meeting them.
Themes
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
In order to actually fulfill their interests, negotiators must identify them and clearly communicate them to the other side. Including specific details is very important because it allows a negotiator to paint a more vivid picture of the problem. And by showing that they legitimately understand the other side’s interests, negotiators can convince the other side to take their interests seriously too. Negotiators should communicate problems before solutions—rather than telling the other side what to do and then explaining why, they should explain the interests at stake before proposing how to resolve them.
The authors’ advice about discussing interests is similar to their recommendations for discussing emotions: it should be done specifically, nonjudgmentally, and with an open mind. They also propose explicitly separating conversations about interests from discussions about solutions, which prevents negotiators from defending their proposals instead of developing solutions to satisfy their interests.
Themes
Effective Negotiation Theme Icon
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
People often argue for argument’s sake—to score points rather than to reach an agreement. If asked why they are arguing, people often “identify a cause, not a purpose.” It should be the other way around: people should not argue because of something undesirable in the past (a cause) but because of a desirable outcome they want to achieve in the future (a purpose). The question “why?” is ambiguous—people can always explain their behavior in terms of either causes or purposes, but in a negotiation, focusing on the future is always a better way to satisfy one’s interests.
These two approaches to explaining “why?” reflect the fundamental difference between positional bargaining and principled negotiation: while positional bargaining has each side separately assess the causes of their dissatisfaction and propose undoing them, principled negotiation focuses on future actions that can be taken to improve a situation. While it can sometimes be useful to “identify a cause,” a negotiation’s true goal is to decide on a common purpose and implement actions in the future, and this can sometimes be done without fully agreeing upon what caused the problem in the first place.
Themes
Effective Negotiation Theme Icon
Quotes
Negotiators should “be concrete but flexible,” meaning they should enter a negotiation with a plan but always be interested in accommodating new ideas. They should think of multiple specific plans to fulfill their interests, but they should keep these plans flexible. This is a better alternative to positional bargaining: negotiators should offer illustrative but specific proposals.
While the authors emphasize that positional bargaining is an ineffective strategy, this doesn’t mean that people should enter a negotiation with no plans at all. Rather, while positional bargainers bitterly defend a single idea, effective negotiators are “concrete but flexible,” prepared with several possible ideas but open-minded and not overly committed to any of them.
Themes
Preparation and Flexibility Theme Icon
Quotes
In conclusion, people should take a hard negotiating stance toward their interests but not toward their positions. Wise agreements often require both sides to advocate hard for their interests, but doing this effectively requires addressing the problem without attacking the people with whom one is negotiating. Actually, it is best to actively support the people on the other side. In fact, principled negotiation is effective because it relies on the contradiction between supporting the people and attacking the problem: to resolve this contradiction, negotiators team up and attack the problem together. They should be firm about their interests but open to varied proposals for achieving them.
Principled negotiation can combine the advantages of hard negotiation (on substantive questions) and soft negotiation (on personal questions) only because it insists on separating people from substance in the first place. Its strategy for dealing with people is always the same: to forge the best possible relationship, both in order to improve the rest of the negotiation and in order to establish an ongoing working relationship.
Themes
Effective Negotiation Theme Icon
Negotiation as the Pursuit of Interests Theme Icon
The Value of Working Relationships Theme Icon