The Harvard Principles of Negotiation

Summary

The Harvard model of negotiation emphasizes four key principles to foster cooperation and avoid competition. These principles include separating the person from the issue, focusing on interests rather than positions, developing criteria for a satisfactory solution, and creating multiple options to choose from. By adhering to these principles, negotiators can achieve win-win outcomes, ensuring that relationships are not compromised and interests are effectively addressed.

Takeaways

• 📚 The Harvard model of negotiation is based on principles rather than rules to allow for more organic and creative negotiation processes.
• 🤝 The first principle emphasizes the importance of separating the person from the issue to maintain a positive relationship while negotiating hard.
• 🎯 The second principle advocates for interest-oriented negotiation rather than position-focused negotiation to find win-win solutions.
• 🔍 The third principle suggests developing criteria that a good solution must meet before creating a solution, which opens up more options for negotiation.
• 📋 The fourth principle is about creating multiple options to choose from, evaluated against the agreed criteria, to increase the likelihood of a sustainable and accepted solution.
• 👥 It's crucial to understand that the other party is not an enemy but a partner in the negotiation process, which is key to achieving mutual interests.
• 🚫 Avoiding the tendency to give in or be overly accommodating in negotiations with likable counterparts to maintain fairness and balance.
• 🚀 The Harvard model promotes the idea that negotiation should be about cooperation and avoiding competition, which can lead to more effective outcomes.
• 🧐 The transcript illustrates the importance of asking the right questions to uncover the interests of the parties involved in the negotiation.
• 🍽️ An example is given about choosing a restaurant, where establishing criteria for a 'good restaurant' can lead to multiple options that satisfy everyone's preferences.
• 🛑 The transcript warns against rushing into solutions and emphasizes the need for thorough exploration of interests and criteria before settling on a solution.

Q & A

What is the Harvard model of negotiation based on?

The Harvard model of negotiation is based on four principles that emphasize a cooperative approach to negotiation rather than a competitive one.

Why did the Harvard model choose to use principles instead of rules?

Principles offer more flexibility and creativity compared to rules, which can be too linear and strict, potentially stifling the organic nature of cooperation in negotiations.

What is the first principle of the Harvard model of negotiation?

The first principle is to separate the person from the issue, meaning to negotiate hard on the issues without being unfriendly towards the other party.

Why is it important to separate the person from the issue in negotiations?

It is important to maintain a positive relationship and to understand the interests of the other party, as they are not the enemy but a partner in reaching a mutually beneficial agreement.

What is the second principle of the Harvard model?

The second principle is to negotiate interest-oriented rather than position-focused, which helps in finding win-win solutions by understanding the underlying interests of all parties involved.

Can you provide an example to illustrate the principle of interest-oriented negotiation?

In the pumpkin example, three people wanted the same pumpkin for different reasons. By focusing on their interests (shell for a mask, soup, or seeds) rather than their positions, a win-win solution was found where everyone got what they needed.

What is the third principle of the Harvard model?

The third principle is to develop criteria that a good solution must fulfill before creating a solution. This helps in broadening the options and finding a solution that meets the interests of all parties.

Why should we agree on criteria before creating a solution in negotiations?

Agreeing on criteria ensures that any solution proposed meets the necessary conditions for acceptance by all parties, thus increasing the likelihood of a win-win outcome.

What is the fourth principle of the Harvard model?

The fourth principle is to develop several options to choose from, rather than focusing on a single solution, which allows for a more sustainable agreement as parties feel they had a choice.

How does offering multiple options contribute to the sustainability of a negotiated solution?

Offering multiple options allows parties to evaluate and choose the best one based on agreed-upon criteria, leading to a greater sense of ownership and satisfaction with the final agreement.

How does the Harvard model of negotiation aim to avoid competition and promote cooperation?

By following the four principles—separating the person from the issue, negotiating interest-oriented, developing criteria for solutions, and creating multiple options—negotiations are more likely to result in cooperative outcomes that avoid competitive, win-lose scenarios.

Outlines

00:00

🤝 Principles of the Harvard Negotiation Model

The Harvard model of negotiation is founded on four key principles, emphasizing the importance of principles over rules to foster organic and creative cooperation. The first principle is to separate the person from the issue, advocating for hard negotiation without personal animosity. The second principle promotes interest-oriented negotiation over position-focused negotiation, illustrated by a win-win solution to a pumpkin-sharing scenario. The third principle encourages establishing criteria that any acceptable solution must meet before proposing solutions, thereby broadening the range of options. The speaker promises to guide the audience through applying these principles in the next chapter to navigate conflicts effectively.

05:01

🍽 Developing Criteria and Multiple Options for Negotiation

This paragraph delves into the third and fourth principles of the Harvard negotiation model. The third principle involves creating criteria that any acceptable solution must satisfy, using the example of choosing a restaurant based on certain conditions like menu size and lighting. The fourth principle stresses the importance of generating multiple options, rather than a single solution, to increase the likelihood of a sustainable and agreeable outcome. The Harvard model suggests evaluating these options against the established criteria to find the best fit, thus empowering parties with a sense of choice and contributing to a more robust negotiation process.

Keywords

💡Harvard Model of Negotiation

The Harvard Model of Negotiation is a method based on principles rather than strict rules, allowing for more organic and creative solutions in negotiations. It emphasizes cooperation and understanding the interests of all parties involved.

💡Principles vs. Rules

The video contrasts principles with rules, highlighting that principles allow for flexibility and creativity in negotiations, whereas rules can be too rigid and linear. Principles provide a framework that can be adapted to different situations.

💡Separate the Person from the Issue

This principle advises negotiators to distinguish the personal relationship from the negotiation issue. By treating the other party as a partner rather than an enemy, negotiators can maintain a cooperative atmosphere and focus on mutual interests.

💡Interest-Oriented Negotiation

This approach focuses on the underlying interests of the parties rather than their positions. By understanding what each party truly wants, negotiators can find solutions that satisfy everyone, as illustrated by the pumpkin example in the video.

💡Criteria for Solutions

Before proposing solutions, the Harvard Model suggests establishing criteria that any acceptable solution must meet. This helps ensure that solutions are evaluated based on their ability to satisfy these criteria, leading to more effective and agreeable outcomes.

💡Multiple Options

Developing several potential solutions before choosing the best one helps ensure that all criteria are met and provides a sense of choice for the parties involved. This principle aims to enhance the sustainability and acceptance of the final solution.

💡Win-Win Solution

A win-win solution is an outcome where all parties feel that their interests have been satisfied. The Harvard Model promotes this by focusing on interests, establishing criteria, and considering multiple options.

💡Positions vs. Interests

Positions are the specific outcomes each party wants, while interests are the underlying reasons behind those positions. Negotiating based on interests rather than positions leads to more flexible and mutually beneficial solutions.

💡Quality of Relationship

The video emphasizes the importance of maintaining a good relationship between negotiators. A positive relationship can facilitate better understanding and cooperation, ultimately leading to more successful negotiations.

💡Flexibility and Creativity in Negotiation

The Harvard Model's emphasis on principles allows negotiators to be flexible and creative in finding solutions. This approach acknowledges that there are many ways to achieve mutually satisfying outcomes, unlike rigid rule-based systems.

Highlights

The Harvard model of negotiation is built on four principles rather than rules, promoting flexibility and creativity in the negotiation process.

Principles are chosen over rules to avoid the rigidity that can come with in-law-like rules, which may not accommodate the organic nature of cooperation.

The first principle emphasizes the importance of separating the person from the issue to maintain a cooperative relationship despite hard negotiations.

The second principle advocates for interest-oriented negotiation rather than position-focused negotiation, allowing for win-win solutions.

The pumpkin example illustrates how focusing on interests rather than positions can lead to a mutually beneficial outcome.

The third principle suggests developing criteria before creating a solution to ensure that all parties' interests are met.

Criteria help broaden the range of options in a negotiation, moving beyond a single position to multiple potential solutions.

The fourth principle is based on the idea that people prefer to have a choice, recommending the development of multiple options for evaluation.

Having multiple options and evaluating them against established criteria leads to a more sustainable solution that parties feel they have chosen.

The Harvard model aims to promote cooperation over competition by following these four principles, which can lead to more effective negotiations.

The transcript discusses the potential for the quality of the relationship to interfere with interests in the issue, which the first principle seeks to mitigate.

The transcript provides a pathway for applying these principles in real-life negotiations to avoid common pitfalls such as accommodation or win-lose scenarios.

The Harvard model's approach to negotiation is contrasted with traditional methods, highlighting its innovative and practical applications.

The transcript emphasizes the importance of understanding the interests of the other party, as they are not the enemy but a partner in achieving mutual goals.

The transcript suggests that by separating the person from the issue, negotiators can maintain a positive relationship while pursuing their interests.

The transcript explains that negotiating based on interests rather than positions can lead to creative solutions that satisfy all parties involved.

The transcript provides a practical example of how to elicit criteria from a party to ensure a solution meets their needs, illustrating the third principle in action.

The transcript concludes with guidance on how to apply these principles to navigate conflicts effectively, offering a structured approach to negotiation.

Transcripts

[Music]

as I said before this Harvard model of

negotiation is is based on four

principles before we go into these

principles we might want to reflect for

a second

why principles why not rules and that's

quite interesting that the Harvard

people choose to go for principles and

not for rules because if you have rules

like in-laws chances are very high that

that is too linear and too strict and

that people simply think if they follow

these kind of rules everything will be

fine whereas if you have principles it

is much more organic it's much more

wider because you have lots of ways how

to fulfill those principles so it is

important to realize that the Harvard

people choose principle for cooperation

and not rules so that because

cooperation needs the freedom and the

creativity so let's go for these four

principles the if you remember we we

talked about when we talked about the

five ways of how to deal in a

negotiation that we said okay we do have

these high interest

or low interest in relationship and we

have the high interest or low interest

into the issue you want to have and

let's assume for a second you're

negotiating with somebody you like and

you find very sympathetic then it could

be that you have a tendency to give in

and to accommodate to the other person

so that you are have a tendency to play

lose win for on the other extreme you do

actually don't like the other person you

might even hate the other person and

then it is possible that you have a

tendency to play when loose because you

don't like the person you don't care for

the relationship so the Harvard people

said okay in order to avoid these risks

that

quality of relationship interferes with

your interest in the issue you should

separate them at all so the first

principle is and that's easy set and

hard to achieve separate the person from

the issue in real life that would mean

you can negotiate very hard but you

should never be hard on the person

unfriendly and so on and so forth

because it is in your own interest to

understand the interests of the other

people and therefore the other partner

is not your enemy it's actually your

partner otherwise you don't get what you

want and because otherwise if you could

simply order what you want you wouldn't

negotiate so the other party is your

partner so the first principle is

separate the person from the issue easy

set heart actually to live

the second principle we already heard

when we illustrated with the pumpkin

example if you remember three people had

a position they all wanted the pumpkin

since there was only one pumpkin it was

not possible to give everybody the

pumpkin there was two limited resources

the solution that was found was not

found based on the position and focused

on the position but oriented on the

interests of the people you remember one

wanted the shell for for a Halloween

mask the other one wanted the soup so he

needed to meet and the third person as

simply the seats so the interest on the

on the level of interest it was possible

to find a solution that everybody made

happy so a win-win solution so the

second principles of the Harvard people

for cooperation is you should not

negotiate position focused but interest

oriented and later when we come to the

you model I will show you what kind of

questions you have to ask in order to

examine the interest of people who are

negotiating

the third principle now is that and that

is if you're actually looking for a

trick for win-win you might find it here

the Harvard people found out that

sometimes cooperation is not possible

because people who are negotiating are

going too fast too quick into solutions

you hear a problem and you immediately

suggest a solution and if all parties

are doing this chances are very high

that you then only negotiate these kind

of positions and you end up with a

compromise in the best of all words in

order to get through the win-win

they suggest now a different approach

they said based on the interest you

should first develop criterias that must

be fulfilled by a solution that you

could say yes to or in other words what

conditions must a good solution that you

could say yes to fulfill just to

illustrate this principle a little bit

just assume you want to invite somebody

out for dinner for restaurant and you

want to make sure actually that the

person you invite to actually likes the

restaurant so you could ask this other

person how would you realize that the

restaurant is a good restaurant for you

and then immediately the person would

tell you some conditions that must be

fulfilled by a good restaurant for

example a small menu because a small

menu for this person suggests that it is

actually fresh cooked or it might say a

certain quality of light so and then you

could elaborate a little bit more what

kind of light the person means like

candle lights or whatever or that a

there's a certain quality of hygiene or

and so on and so forth music and so on

so you would get a whole set of

criterias that must be fulfilled and the

interesting thing about the criteria is

there are much more restaurants than

only one restaurant that would fulfill

the criteria so working with criterias

kinds opens a world of of lots of

options

and whereas positions is only it must be

we go to Chez Felix for example yeah so

the third principle is before creating a

solution agree on certain principles

that must be fulfilled by a solution

that you could say yes to and so at that

stage of the negotiation we would have a

set of criterias for poly a and we would

have a set of criterias for party B and

you will find a win-win solution in that

moment where you find one option that

fulfills all cry tears of party a and or

criterias of party B win-win so this is

how we get win-win solution and the

force a principle is and this is based

on the research that people like to

choose so the Harvard people suggest

before you actually choose a solution

you should have different options to

choose from

so they suggest don't develop only one

option that then is the best solution

but maybe to three or four options and

then take the criterias and evaluate

your options by the criterias to find

the best option so that and by doing so

the the solution that was found by the

parties will be much more sustainable

because they also have the sense that

actually had a choice so just to repeat

these four principles of the Harvard

model of negotiation it is separate the

person from the issue negotiate not

position focus but interest oriented

develop first criterias that a good

solution must fulfill and divert develop

several options to choose from so if you

follow these four principles chances are

very high that that you actually go for

cooperation and that you avoid

competition and in the next chapter I

will then guide you through a pathway

through conflicts how actually to do

this and how to apply these kind of

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