Chapter Five

Get All the Interests Right

GETTING THE SETUP RIGHT means getting the interests right. Let’s simply define interest as whatever you care about that is potentially at stake in the negotiation. Your interests are why you’re involved in this negotiation in the first place. The same holds true for those people on the other side of the table. Without a clear and accurate assessment of interests, you will fly blind in your deal making.

In chapter 2, we described the concept of a “3-D audit” of existing barriers to agreement and gave several examples of cases where one side’s inability to figure out the full set of the other side’s interests got in the way of a successful deal. Recall the story about Fluffy’s grave holding up the construction ...

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