On December 7, the news broke that Pierre Korkie, a South African who had been held hostage in Yemen by Al Qaeda, was killed by his guards just hours before his scheduled release due to a botched U.S. attempt to free another hostage. The tragedy suggests the dangers not only of refusing to engage in … Read The Risks of Taking Dealmaking Off the Table

If you are a star athlete, an up-and-coming author, or a Hollywood actor, then you might not think twice about enlisting an agent to help you negotiate your next payment contract. If you are a professional in most other fields, however, you get by on your wits, thorough research, and negotiation skills and experience.

The … Read More

When disputes flare up in business relationships, a failure to thoroughly anticipate and prepare for the future is often to blame. Consider a dispute that has arisen surrounding the estate of Maurice Sendak, the acclaimed children’s book author and illustrator of dozens of books, including the masterpiece Where the Wild Things Are. As Randy Kennedy … Read More

The issue of bidder collusion raises a larger question for negotiators: What ethical responsibility do we have to those who aren’t seated at the table with us?
Harvard Business School professor Max H. Bazerman uses the term “parasitic value creation” to describe the common tendency of negotiators to focus so narrowly on identifying benefits for … Read More

This past June, a long-standing family feud erupted in public when Arthur S. Demoulas, an owner of the New England low-price grocery chain Market Basket, fired his cousin Arthur T. Demoulas, also an owner, from his position as the company’s CEO. Many of the company’s 25,000 employees, who had received good wages, bonuses, and profit … Read When a private dispute goes public

To reach agreement, negotiators sometimes postpone the resolution of certain issues until a later date. We look at how this practice plays out in the real world. Remember the federal debt ceiling talks? In mid-2011, congressional Republicans insisted on significant spending reductions from their Democratic counterparts in exchange for voting to raise the nation’s debt … Read More

The average college­-educated woman earns $713,000 less over the course of her working life than her male counterpart, according to the Coalition of Labor Union Women. What explains this persistent gender gap? Women employees’ awareness that they could be penalized for negotiating assertively on their own behalf is one factor, according to new research from … Read More

About 15 months after becoming the largest U.S. city to file for bankruptcy, Detroit is on track to begin rebuilding and growing stronger. On November 7, a federal judge approved a plan aimed at ridding the city of its $7 billion in debt and investing about $1.7 billion in city services, the New York Times … Read More

When financial disputes arise between longstanding partners, both insiders and outsiders often note, “It’s not about the money.” Simmering resentment, mutual blame for ongoing problems, poor communication, and other deep issues often underlie arguments over money and make conflict management all the more difficult. Parties may reach agreement on monetary issues, but if they fail … Read More

The Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School and
the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies are pleased to co-present:

A Perspective on the Colombian Peace Process
  with
 

Dr. Alejandro Ordóñez Maldonado
Inspector General of Colombia
Procurador General  de la Nación
 
Friday, December 5th
12:00 – 1:00 PM
Milstein East, Wasserstein Hall
Harvard Law School Campus
 Free and open to the public.   Please bring your … Read A Perspective on the Colombian Peace Process

Help your agreement go the distance If your deal doesn’t work in the real world, it’s not worth the paper it’s printed on. Here’s expert advice on increasing the odds of successful implementation. … Read More