Learn how to negotiate like a diplomat, think on your feet like an improv performer, and master job offer negotiation like a professional athlete when you download a copy of our FREE special report, Negotiation Skills: Negotiation Strategies and Negotiation Techniques to Help You Become a Better Negotiator, from the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School.

negotiation dynamics

What are Negotiation Dynamics?

Negotiation dynamics can play a huge role in the outcome of your personal, business, and international negotiations.

Negotiators typically assume that their interests are diametrically opposed. This is especially true in cases where negotiation dynamics, whether in the form of power dynamics or interpersonal chemistry, feed into the idea of conflict. At the same time, it’s unreasonable to think that we don’t occasionally go into a negotiation with a stronger or weaker party.

It’s important to point out, however, that power is in the eye of the beholder, especially when it comes to negotiation dynamics.

For example, resources are often the most obvious source of power, but maintaining good relationships, being viewed as an expert, and constructing mutually beneficial agreements also add to one’s power base.

Additionally, your best alternative to a negotiated agreement, or BATNA, is often your best source of bargaining power. By cultivating a strong outside alternative, you gain the power you need to walk away from an unappealing deal.

If that’s not an option, negotiators in a weak bargaining position can often gain power by teaming up with others in their situation and negotiating collectively. However, if your needs and wants don’t match those of the majority, you might fall short of your goals, so assess the pros and cons of each approach carefully.

But when you can put aside negotiation dynamics, and consider the possibility that your goals could be compatible with those of your counterpart, you open up opportunities for win-win deals.

Be sure to download our special free report, The New Conflict Management: Effective Conflict Resolution Strategies to Avoid Litigation, where renowned negotiation experts uncover unconventional approaches to conflict management that can turn adversaries into partners. Featuring three case studies, this valuable report provides proven strategies for leveraging opportunity out of conflict, and tips for creating value and improving relationships, even with difficult people.

The following items are tagged negotiation dynamics:

Negotiating Difficult Conversations: Dealing with Tough Topics Productively

Posted by & filed under Harvard Negotiation Institute, Harvard Negotiation Institute (Five-Day Programs).

Course Dates: This course is closed When negotiations become difficult, emotions often escalate and talks break down. To overcome barriers and turn negotiations from difficult to collaborative, from breakdown to breakthrough, you must learn to understand the inter- and intra-personal dynamics at play. In this program, you will examine how your own assumptions and behaviors can … Read More 

Best-In-Class Negotiation Case Studies

Posted by & filed under Teaching Negotiation.

What’s one of the best ways to teach the art and science of negotiation? Case studies and articles that spark lively discussion or facilitate self-reflection. Based on real-world examples, these teaching resources are designed to help students envision how to apply what they’ve learned in the classroom and beyond. The Teaching Negotiation Resource Center (TNRC) at … Read More 

Managing Faultlines in Group Negotiations

Posted by & filed under Mediation.

Group negotiations are a fact of managerial life, yet the outcomes of teamwork are highly unpredictable. Sometimes groups cohere, reaching novel solutions to nagging problems, and sometimes infighting causes them to collapse. How can you predict when conflict will emerge in groups, and what can you do to stop it? Dora Lau of the Chinese University … Read More 

Great Negotiators vs. Great Negotiations: The Program on Negotiation’s Great Negotiator Teaching Series

Posted by & filed under Negotiation Skills.

Teaching negotiation using case studies focused on the efforts of great negotiators can help achieve several pedagogical goals at the same time. Developed by Professor James Sebenius of Harvard Business School, the Program on Negotiation’s Great Negotiator case study series, available from the PON Clearinghouse, highlights the lessons learned by each recipient of PON’s Great … Read More 

Gravel quarry or hiking grounds?

Posted by & filed under Business Negotiations, Daily.

The PON Clearinghouse offers hundreds of role simulations, from two-party, single-issue negotiations to complex multi-party exercises.  Rockwell Quarry is a five-party, multi-issue negotiation among elected officials, property owners, and a gravel company over a permit for a gravel quarry in a recreationally valuable canyon. The Rockwell Quarry Complex Environmental Negotiation is a five-party, multi-issue simulation that … Read More