We tend to forget—at our peril—that not everyone at the bargaining table wants to close a deal and may be bargaining in bad faith.
… Read More 
Discover step-by-step techniques for avoiding common business negotiation pitfalls when you download a copy of the FREE special report, Business Negotiation Strategies: How to Negotiate Better Business Deals, from the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School.
leadership
The following items are tagged leadership:
Harvard Mediation Intensive June 2026
Led by mediation experts Audrey Lee and Alain Lempereur, the Harvard Mediation Intensive delves into mediation principles and processes through interactive presentations and hands-on exercises. From employment and business disagreements to public and international conflicts, you will discover effective ways to enable parties to settle their differences across a variety of contexts.
… Read Harvard Mediation Intensive June 2026
Negotiation Master Class Spring 2026 Program Guide
Over the years thousands of professionals have participated in negotiation programs at the Program on Negotiation (PON) at Harvard Law School. And after a few months or years of putting their negotiation skills and techniques to work, participants inevitably ask us, what’s next?
… Read More
Win-Win Negotiation: How to Keep Your Bargaining Partner Satisfied
As the following points of win-win negotiation will demonstrate, ensuring that your counterpart is satisfied with a particular deal requires you to manage several aspects of the negotiation process, including his outcome expectations, his perceptions of your outcome, the comparisons he makes with others, and his overall negotiation experience itself.
… Read More
Negotiation and Leadership: Dealing with Difficult People and Problems
Negotiation and Leadership: Dealing with Difficult People and Problems THREE-DAY PROGRAM | June 8-10, 2026
At Negotiation and Leadership, you will test your beliefs and assumptions, overcome emotional and rational biases, examine complex negotiation scenarios, and discover a range of competitive and cooperative negotiation strategies. In this acclaimed program, we compress 40 years of groundbreaking research into … Read More
Negotiation and Leadership Spring 2026 Program Guide
It’s often said that great leaders are great negotiators. But how does one become an effective negotiator? On-the-job experience certainly plays a role, but for most executives, taking their negotiation skills to the next level requires outside training.
… Read More
Major Negotiations in History: In Paris Climate Talks, Planning Was Key
Among major negotiations in history, the 2015 Paris climate change talks stood out for their size and complexity. With the United States having exited the Paris Accord—and soon to reenter it—we look at how the facilitators organized chaos.
… Read More
Negotiation and Leadership: Dealing with Difficult People and Problems
Negotiation and Leadership: Dealing with Difficult People and Problems THREE-DAY PROGRAM | May 11–13, 2026
At Negotiation and Leadership, you will test your beliefs and assumptions, overcome emotional and rational biases, examine complex negotiation scenarios, and discover a range of competitive and cooperative negotiation strategies. In this acclaimed program, we compress 40 years of groundbreaking research into … Read More
Negotiation Strategies for Women: Secrets to Success
Whether you’re a woman or a man, you’ve probably seen gender gaps in the workplace and wondered how to overcome them. In Negotiation Strategies for Women: Secrets to Success, you’ll find critical ways to help women negotiators advance.
… Read More
In Salary Negotiations, Women Do Ask
In a reversal of past findings, women with MBA’s are now more likely to ask for higher pay in salary negotiations than their male peers, a new study shows. So why does the gender pay gap persist?
… Read In Salary Negotiations, Women Do Ask
Negotiation and Leadership: Dealing with Difficult People and Problems
Negotiation and Leadership: Dealing with Difficult People and Problems THREE-DAY PROGRAM | March 23–25, 2026
At Negotiation and Leadership, you will test your beliefs and assumptions, overcome emotional and rational biases, examine complex negotiation scenarios, and discover a range of competitive and cooperative negotiation strategies. In this acclaimed program, we compress 40 years of groundbreaking research into … Read More
What Is the Difference Between Leadership and Management?: Successful Leadership Strategies From Harvard’s Program on Negotiation
In this FREE special report, we offer advice to help you improve your leadership and negotiation skills.
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How to Handle Conflict in Teams: Lessons from Scientific Collaborations
How to handle conflict in teams? Most advice centers on eliminating conflict. But an expert on helping scientific collaborators work together fruitfully recommends finding ways to live with productive disagreement.
… Read More
Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most
Bonus day for March Negotiation and Leadership program.
Gain the strategies, tools, and frameworks you need to manage difficult conversations effectively in this program led by negotiation experts Sheila Heen and Douglas Stone.
… Read More
Teach Your Students to Negotiate a Management Crisis
How do you negotiate an internal management conflict in the face of looming crisis and a deep loss of trust? In Discord at the Daily Herald, a new simulation from the Teaching Negotiation Resource Center (TNRC), the co-owners of the Daily Herald must grapple with these issues or face the complete dissolution of their partnership … Read More
The Contingency Theory of Leadership: A Focus on Fit
When choosing our personal leadership style, we have many different models to choose from, including participative leadership, charismatic leadership, directive leadership, authoritarian leadership, paternalistic leadership, and servant leadership theory. Each leadership theory promotes a particular approach to running organizations, from involving employees fully in decisions to handing down directives. By contrast, the contingency theory of … Read More
The Trait Theory of Leadership
Are great leaders born or made? The question has fascinated scholars for nearly two centuries and spawned many theories.
The trait theory of leadership, which dates to the mid-1800s, originally proposed that only certain people possessed the personality traits required of effective leaders. Although that view has been widely rebutted, management scholars have continued to try … Read The Trait Theory of Leadership
Servant Leadership Theory
When considering various leadership models to emulate, leaders have a wide variety to choose from, including participative leadership, charismatic leadership, directive leadership, authoritarian leadership, and paternalistic leadership. In this article, we take a closer look at servant leadership theory, an aspirational but somewhat understudied model of leadership rooted in lofty goals.
… Read Servant Leadership Theory
Program on Negotiation Establishes New Fund for Foreign Affairs Studies
The Program on Negotiation (PON) at Harvard Law School is proud to announce the creation of the Professor Jeswald W. Salacuse JD’63 Fund, which will support students working on issues related to foreign affairs at the program. The endowed fund was made possible by a gift from the family of the late Professor Salacuse.
… Read More
Trust and Honesty in Negotiations: Dealing with Dishonest Negotiators
Negotiating opportunities sometimes come from challenging sources: a family member who has been unreliable in the past but promises to make a change; a business competitor that approaches you about a joint venture; a difficult boss with whom you would like to work out a better relationship.
… Read More
Best Negotiation Books: A Negotiation Reading List
Whether you are facing negotiations with Congress, colleagues, customers, or family members, the following negotiation books, published in recent years by experts from the Program on Negotiation, offer new perspectives on common negotiating dilemmas.
… Read More
AI in Negotiation: Seven Lessons
The use of AI in negotiation is ramping up, with intriguing results. MIT professor Jared R. Curhan shares seven lessons that have emerged in practice, education, and research.
… Read AI in Negotiation: Seven Lessons
How to Negotiate a Higher Salary
When considering how to negotiate a higher salary, job candidates often focus on back-and-forth haggling strategies. But it’s at least as important to think about our broader goals, the type of organization we’d be joining, and the best way to frame an offer. The following advice on how to bargain salary should set you up … Read How to Negotiate a Higher Salary
Participative Leadership: What It Can Do for Organizations
Today more than ever, employees want a say in the decisions that affect them. Workers are increasingly demanding input into where and when they work, what they do, whom they work with, and other issues. Democratic leadership styles, such as collective leadership and participative leadership, may prove to be particularly suited to improving job satisfaction … Read More
Union Strikes and Dispute Resolution Strategies
When a conflict looms, it can be tempting for each side to try to make unilateral decisions on key issues because of the belief that negotiations with the other side will be a dead end. This dispute resolution strategy may pay off in the short term, but it’s important to factor in the long-term costs … Read Union Strikes and Dispute Resolution Strategies
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo Calls for U.S. Global Leadership
During a recent talk co-sponsored by the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo warned that democracy could suffer from U.S. disengagement in global politics.
… Read More
10 Negotiation Training Skills Every Organization Needs
How can managers and their organizations increase the odds that negotiation training will lead to beneficial long-term results? Here are several pieces of advice, drawn from experts at the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School.
… Read More
Dealmaking Secrets from Henry Kissinger
More than 1,600 international relations experts from across the political spectrum overwhelmingly rate Henry Kissinger, who served under former presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, the most effective secretary of state of the last half-century. In their book, Kissinger the Negotiator: Lessons from Dealmaking at the Highest Level (Harper, 2018), James K. Sebenius, R. Nicholas … Read Dealmaking Secrets from Henry Kissinger
Role Negotiation for Leadership Positions
Role negotiation is at least as important as negotiating your pay and benefits for a new job. Here’s how to effectively negotiate your next leadership role.
… Read Role Negotiation for Leadership Positions
Relationship-Building in Negotiation
Forging close bonds often helps negotiators reach better deals, collaborate more effectively over time, and manage conflict when it arises. Yet negotiators frequently rush through—or overlook—the relationship-building phase of negotiation. Here’s some advice on how to approach this critical aspect of negotiation in a more deliberate and systematic way.
Overcome Partisan Perceptions
An unconscious bias often gets … Read Relationship-Building in Negotiation
What Hostage Negotiations Can Teach Business Negotiators
Hostage negotiations might seem to have little in common with the typical business negotiation. But, in fact, there is much we can learn from them, according to former hostage negotiator George A. Kohlrieser.
… Read More
What Is Facilitative Leadership?
These days, work can often feel chaotic and unfocused. Leaders and followers alike struggle to keep complex group projects moving forward in the face of seemingly insurmountable economic, technological, and logistical challenges. One tool that can help is facilitative leadership—a management strategy that empowers employees to make decisions, address conflict, and take on greater responsibility.
… Read What Is Facilitative Leadership?
The Two Koreas Practice Conflict Management
Learn conflict management lessons from the 2015 Korea crisis, including face-saving tactics, escalation risks, and diplomatic compromise.
… Read The Two Koreas Practice Conflict Management
The Best Negotiation Exercises, Simulations and Videos
Have you planned your curriculum and purchased your teaching material for next semester? We’re here to help you to find the best negotiation exercises and teaching aids for your negotiation classes.
… Read More
In the Negotiation Planning Process, to Capture the Force, be Patient
Sometimes the negotiation planning process will take longer than expected to get the best results. The negotiation planning process behind Disney’s acquisition of Lucasfilm suggest the value of long-term planning, trust building, and careful deliberation.
… Read More
Elements of Negotiation Style: Angela Merkel
What is your negotiation style? Some negotiators command attention with bold opening statements and polished, persuasive presentations. Others prefer to watch carefully, listen closely, and gather information before making decisive moves. Angela Merkel, who chose not to run for reelection in 2021 after nearly 16 years as Germany’s chancellor, exemplified the latter approach: a negotiation … Read Elements of Negotiation Style: Angela Merkel
Ethical Leadership: The Hidden Risks of Tolerance Standards
In 2022, auditing firm Ernst & Young (now EY) agreed to pay a $100 million penalty imposed by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission after a significant number of its audit professionals were caught cheating on their CPA exams. Two years later, the Netherlands division of one of the other “Big Four” U.S. auditing firms, … Read More
Leading vs. Managing: What’s the Difference?
Are you a manager or a leader? Many people would say they are a bit of both. Indeed, the overlap between the two roles can be confusing. Here, we take a look at the difference between leading vs. managing and consider when each role is called for in organizations.
… Read Leading vs. Managing: What’s the Difference?
Negotiating Change During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Many actions that could help alleviate the Covid-19 pandemic require us to change our behavior on a personal level, such as staying home from work and wearing a mask in public places. Others, such as making coronavirus-related research more widely available, require more organizational and systemic change.
… Read Negotiating Change During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Ripeness Theory in Dispute Resolution: Seizing the Day
The longer a dispute drags on, the less likely a collaborative solution often appears to be. But that view may be pessimistic: At a certain point, the time will be ripe for agreement. A labor dispute between the Minnesota Orchestra’s musicians and management highlights negotiation mistakes that can drive us apart—and ripeness theory suggests how … Read More
Lessons from an M&A Negotiation: Amazon and Whole Foods
The 2017 M&A negotiation between the grocer and the online retailer illustrates the pitfalls of focusing more on dealmaking than implementation.
… Read More
Learning from Ethical Leadership Failures at Boeing
Ethical leadership has proven to be elusive at Boeing, but why? Recent analyses have uncovered common psychological biases that can keep leaders—and all of us—from meeting our own high moral standards.
… Read More
Teaching Critical Leadership Skills
Running a multinational corporation, starting a small business, or leading a diplomatic mission all require critical leadership skills. Being an effective leader necessitates negotiating both within your organization and with external partners. In Real Leaders Negotiate, author Jeswald Salacuse explains that leaders can increase their effectiveness by using negotiation in each of the three phases … Read Teaching Critical Leadership Skills
Moral Leadership: Do Women Negotiate More Ethically than Men?
A key component of moral leadership is motivating others to live up to their personal ethical standards and those of your organization, even in the face of temptations to behave unethically.
… Read More
Labor Relations: Negotiating Collective Bargaining Agreements
Contract bargaining in labor relations is one of the most complex areas of negotiation and dispute resolution. There are rarely clear cut or mutually agreed upon notions of what a fair salary and benefits package would be, so employers and workers, either individually or collectively, often find themselves at odds. Furthermore, contract bargaining in a … Read More
AI Negotiation in the News
OpenAI’s unveiling of its ChatGPT software in late 2022 has led to some notable conflicts and negotiations, in addition to new applications of AI to negotiation and conflict resolution. Here’s a roundup of recent AI negotiation stories in the news.
… Read AI Negotiation in the News
Are Salary Negotiation Skills Different for Men and Women?
Most negotiators don’t engage in the kinds of high-stakes bargaining we read about in publications such as The Wall Street Journal and The Financial Times, but almost every negotiator will need advanced salary negotiation skills during the course of her career to deal with a scenario that is, in many ways, the definition of a … Read More
Should Women “Lean In” to Create More Value in Negotiations?
Back in early 2008, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg began thinking about hiring Sheryl Sandberg, a vice president at Google and a former chief of staff for the U.S. Department of the Treasury, as the social-media company’s new chief operating officer. The two met several nights a week for almost two months to discuss … Read More
Cole Cannon Esq. Shares His Negotiation and Leadership Experience
While some are born with the ability to negotiate, most leaders hone their negotiation skills over time, through on-the-job experience. At the Program on Negotiation, we accelerate that process and focus on techniques that work in the corner office and at the bargaining table.
… Read More
Great Women Leaders Negotiate
Great women leaders are no different than great male leaders—except that they may have faced more discrimination, lower expectations, and stronger resistance along the way. When women in leadership succeed, they often do so by cultivating successful negotiating skills. Here, we examine strategies that three top women in negotiation employed to become great women leaders. … Read Great Women Leaders Negotiate
Directive Leadership: When It Does—and Doesn’t—Work
These days, directive leadership tends to be out of fashion, with many experts promoting a more egalitarian management style. Yet directive leadership has its time and place, according to research dating back decades.
… Read More
Paternalistic Leadership: Beyond Authoritarianism
What’s your first reaction to the concept of paternalistic leadership? If you’re new to the concept and from an individualistic culture, such as the United States, Canada, Australia, or many European nations, you might dismiss the idea out of hand. After all, paternalism connotes top-down leadership, an outdated and exclusionary male-centered viewpoint, and strict authoritarianism. … Read Paternalistic Leadership: Beyond Authoritarianism
Strategies to Resolve Conflict over Deeply Held Values
In negotiation, when deeply held beliefs and principles are at stake, typical strategies to resolve conflict may fail, whether in family conflict scenarios or in business. These three tailored strategies to resolve conflict over core values can help.
… Read More
Leadership and Decision-Making: Empowering Better Decisions
What is the role of leadership in an organization? Contrary to the traditional image of a sole individual steering the ship, leaders have an obligation to empower everyone in their organization to make sound and ethical decisions in negotiations and other contexts.
… Read More
Charismatic Leadership: Weighing the Pros and Cons
Jack Welch. Lee Iacocca. Ronald Reagan. Steve Jobs. Sam Walton. These prominent leaders from the 1980s embodied a leadership style held up at the time as highly desirable and effective: charismatic leadership. Leadership trends wax and wane, and charismatic leadership has taken a back seat to less hierarchical and paternalistic leadership styles, such as participative … Read More
Principled Negotiation: Focus on Interests to Create Value
Learn the 4 elements of principled negotiation from Getting to Yes—and how focusing on interests, options, and BATNA leads to better deals.
… Read More
Advantages and Disadvantages of Leadership Styles: Uncovering Bias and Generating Mutual Gains
The persistence of the so-called “glass ceiling” and salary gap between men and women is often chalked up to the fact that men historically have been more assertive about negotiating for higher salaries, promotions, and other contributors to career success..
… Read More
Servant Leadership and Warren Buffett’s Giving Pledge
Discover how Warren Buffett used servant leadership and negotiation strategy to build the Giving Pledge and mobilize global philanthropy.
… Read More
Confronting Implicit Biases That Hinder Diversity and Inclusion
Implicit biases systematically hold back African Americans from leadership positions, research shows. A leadership and negotiation expert offers advice on how to improve diversity and inclusion.
… Read More
Gender and Negotiation: New Research Findings
Our assumptions about gender and negotiation are often based on outmoded, inaccurate stereotypes. Recent research reveals how our thinking fails us—and how we might do better.
… Read Gender and Negotiation: New Research Findings
3 Types of Conflict and How to Address Them
In the workplace, it sometimes seems as if conflict is always with us. Miss a deadline, and you are likely to face conflict with your boss. Lash out at a colleague who you feel continually undermines you, and you’ll end up in conflict. And if you disagree with a fellow manager about whether to represent … Read 3 Types of Conflict and How to Address Them
How an Authoritarian Leadership Style Blocks Effective Negotiation
Those who favor an authoritarian leadership style, also known as an autocratic leadership style, tend to believe their approach to management is more efficient and decisive than a more collaborative leadership style. But because a top-down approach can heighten the power differential between leaders and those who report to them, it often backfires, generating resentment … Read More
For NFL Players, a Win-Win Negotiation Contract Only in Retrospect?
How did the NFL Players association and team owners come to an eventual win-win negotiated agreement? In this article we explore the strategies each side used to get to an integrative solution even if that was not the ultimate goal.
… Read More
The Best New Simulations
Looking to update your curriculum with innovative new simulations? Check out these new simulations from the Teaching Negotiation Resource Center (TNRC).
Discord at the Daily Herald – New Simulation
This two-party, three-hour, multi-issue negotiation is between the co-owners of the Daily Herald newspaper over how to resolve ongoing management issues and implement structural reforms in the face … Read The Best New Simulations
Negotiation Analysis: The US, Taliban, and the Bergdahl Exchange
The exchange between the United States and the Taliban of Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl for five Taliban leaders held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, represented the first public prisoner exchange of a US soldier in the thirteen year US involvement in Afghanistan. The background of the deal including how Private First Class Bergdahl (promoted twice to Sergeant … Read More
Notable Business Negotiations of 2024
Notable business negotiations and conflict resolution efforts of 2024 include both failed and successful mergers, labor strikes, and AI investments. The Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School takes a closer look at some of most interesting business negotiations of the year.
… Read Notable Business Negotiations of 2024
Navigating Family Business Negotiation
In 2023, a long-simmering feud among Rupert Murdoch’s four oldest children exploded into a public battle. Two years later, a seemingly simple family business negotiation resolved the conflict. Why was agreement so hard to reach?
… Read Navigating Family Business Negotiation
What Is Collective Leadership?
When we think of successful leaders, we typically envision a solitary person—a president, CEO, or entrepreneur—drawing on their vision, charisma, and drive to inspire and direct others. As our world grows increasingly more connected and complex, however, this top-down approach to leadership is becoming increasingly outdated.
… Read What Is Collective Leadership?
Employment Negotiations: To Poach or Not to Poach?
To build his ambitious new AI lab, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg raided his competitors’ research teams. Will his aggressive employment negotiation strategy pay off or backfire?
… Read More
NEW! from the Negotiation Journal: Special Issue, “Why It Worked”
This special issue of the Negotiation Journal presents global research on why certain peace efforts succeed. Drawing from five universities, it explores identity, leadership, environment, informal talks, and negotiation processes in long-term conflicts.
… Read More
Career Negotiations and the Pay Gap
While salary negotiations may play a role in the persistent gender wage gap, differences in men’s and women’s career paths have a larger effect. Harvard Kennedy School professor Hannah Riley Bowles explains why.
… Read Career Negotiations and the Pay Gap
PON Appoints Two New Members to the PON Executive Committee
The Program on Negotiation (PON) at Harvard Law School, is pleased to announce the appointment of two new members to its Executive Committee: Dr. Julia Minson and Dr. Daniel Shapiro.
… Read More
Pope Francis and the Benefits of Servant Leadership in Negotiations
Progress on global climate change accords has been incremental at best and nonexistent at worst. As in any negotiation, it is important to get the issues right and make sure all the relevant parties are at the table, but this is often easier said than done. Good leadership can help you ensure that both happen, … Read More
The Collective Leadership Approach to Negotiating Climate Action
Former UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres received the Program on Negotiation’s 2022 Great Negotiator Award.
On April 14, 2022, the Program on Negotiation (PON) presented its Great Negotiator Award to Christiana Figueres, formerly the Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and one of the architects of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement. … Read More
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Articles & Insights
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- Business Negotiations
- Conflict Resolution
- Advanced Negotiation Strategies and Concepts: Hostage Negotiation Tips for Business Negotiators
- How to Handle Conflict in Teams: Lessons from Scientific Collaborations
- MESO: Make Multiple Equivalent Simultaneous Offers to Create Value in Dealmaking Table
- 5 Conflict Resolution Strategies That Actually Work
- Pros and Cons of Email Communication
- Crisis Negotiations
- Dealing with Difficult People
- Dealmaking
- Lessons for Business Negotiators: Negotiation Techniques from International Diplomacy
- The Mutually Beneficial Agreement Behind the Hit Film Sinners
- Negotiation Skills: 5 Proven Ways to Build Trust at the Bargaining Table
- Negotiation Logistics: Best Practices for Better Deals
- How Does Mediation Work in a Lawsuit?
- Dispute Resolution
- Three Questions to Ask About the Dispute Resolution Process
- Top 10 Dispute Resolution Skills
- To Break Impasse, Move Beyond Concerns about Fairness in Negotiation
- Dear Negotiation Coach: Responding (Or Not) to an Ultimatum in Negotiation
- Emotional Triggers: How Emotions Affect Your Negotiating Ability
- International Negotiation
- A Top International Negotiation Case Study in Business: The Microsoft-Nokia Deal
- Famous Negotiators: Angela Merkel and Vladimir Putin
- Overcoming Cultural Barriers in Negotiations and the Importance of Communication in International Business Deals
- Political Negotiation: Negotiating with Bureaucrats
- The Negotiation Process in China
- Leadership Skills
- Mediation
- Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) Training: Mediation Curriculum
- Mediation Training: What Can You Expect?
- Mediation Process and Business Negotiations: How Does Mediation Work in a Lawsuit?
- Negotiations and Logrolling: Discover Opportunities to Generate Mutual Gains
- AI Mediation: Using AI to Help Mediate Disputes
- Negotiation Skills
- Negotiation Training
- Ethics and Negotiation: 5 Principles of Negotiation to Boost Your Bargaining Skills in Business Situations
- Relationships in Negotiation: The Advantages of Rapport Building
- Best Negotiation Books: A Negotiation Reading List
- 10 Negotiation Training Skills Every Organization Needs
- New Negotiation Books Offer In-Depth Solutions to Practical Challenges
- Salary Negotiations
- Teaching Negotiation
- Teach Your Students to Negotiate a Management Crisis
- Teach Your Students How to Have Difficult Conversations Over Email
- Redevelopment Negotiation: The Challenges of Rebuilding the World Trade Center
- Asynchronous Learning: Negotiation Exercises to Keep Students Engaged Outside the Classroom
- Teach by Example with These Negotiation Case Studies
- Win-Win Negotiations