Chapter Eight
Negotiation
Negotiation is a basic life skill that we use every day in many ways. We use it in making business arrangements, family decisions, plans with friends, and commercial transactions. When we work out special arrangements about bedtimes and chores with our children, we are negotiating. When we decide which movie or restaurant we will go to with our spouse, we are negotiating. When we agree on a division of work responsibilities with our colleagues, we are also negotiating. Why is it, then, that when we think of an interaction as a negotiation it can suddenly seem tense, challenging, or tricky? Labeling an interchange as a negotiation seems to take it beyond the everyday kind of transaction we are used to and at which we ...
