Faculty: Francesca Gino

How many among of us have carefully planned for a negotiation, only to end up with a very different outcome because we got caught up in the “heat of the moment”?

In this one-day program, Harvard Business School professor Francesca Gino shares her research findings into what causes us to become sidetracked in negotiations—and provides a proven framework for effective decision-making. You’ll learn how to:

• Manage the influences that might derail you in a negotiation
• Overcome the anxiety that you sometimes feel at the bargaining table
• Assess how incidental anger can impact your negotiation
• Predict how your counterpart will react to concessions during a negotiation
• Frame a task, message, or point of view that improves your own decisions and the decisions of others

In addition, you’ll examine the three sets of forces that influence decisions in ways we often fail to anticipate:

1. Forces within ourselves: These include our beliefs about our competencies and abilities; the effects of emotions on unrelated decisions; and the consequences of having an overly narrow focus when evaluating information and making decisions.

2. Forces from our relationships with others: These include our inability to put ourselves in others’ shoes; how sharing superficial features with someone (such as having the same first name) colors our viewpoint and decisions; and how we are affected by comparing ourselves to others.

3. Forces from the outside world: These include the effects of irrelevant information on our decisions; why subtle differences in the way a question is framed can lead to different solutions; and how the structure of our environment can cause us to veer off track.

Through a combination of self-assessments, case studies, mini-lectures, and quick, in-class-exercises, you’ll identify the tools and techniques for effective decision-making, and learn how to maximize your negotiation and persuasion skills to obtain your desired outcome.