The Paperback MBA: “Getting to Yes”
Welcome to a series I’m calling “The Paperback MBA,” where I review the world’s top business books, to give you ideas for which to pick up and which to leave behind.
The first book I’m going to look at is an acclaimed work on negotiation called Getting to Yes by William Ury and Roger Fisher, the follow-up to their hugely popular book, Struggling towards Maybe. (jk: they never wrote that)
This might be the book on negotiation, and is recommended reading in negotiation courses everywhere, including two I recently finished at the University of Toronto.
Why is it so important? Because negotiation is an essential part of life, business or otherwise. Whether it’s salary negotiations or trying to get your point across in a heated discussion, negotiation is an indispensable skill.
The key takeaways
Getting to Yes is an easy read, and very practical. Within the first 20 pages you’re into the method, which focuses on four key elements:
- Separating the people from the problem
- Focusing on interests and not positions
- Inventing options for mutual gain
- Insisting on objective criteria
The most important of these for me, is the importance of separating positions in arguments from interests. It’s essential to understand that what you want in negotiation isn’t your position: it’s your interests. The more you stick dogmatically to a position, the less you’re going to get out of any negotiation.
A lot of the rest of the book delves into details around these four areas, such as being able to empathize, understanding the emotional side of a negotiation and how to use skills such as active listening. Ury and Fisher spend a lot of time explaining why it’s important that both parties work towards mutual gain. A lasting, strong solution is one where both parties feel like they’ve won.
What’s interesting
Some of the case studies are really interesting: for example, the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty of 1979. Object lessons like that make for compelling reading, and given that the book is just over 200 pages long, you can get through it in no time.
Another interesting point the authors discuss is the importance of asking “why?” It’s an old business truism that you only discover the real reason behind something after asking “why” four times. There’s a lot of truth to that. However, wisdom lies in knowing when to stop asking “why?” If you need to understand the importance of knowing when to stop asking “why?” experiment by negotiating with – say – a two-year-old: constantly being asked “why?” gets very old very fast.
The rating
This book rates a five out of five: it’s a business must-read, and has spawned follow-on books like Getting Past No, The Power of a Positive No, Getting Ready to Negotiate and others.
If you’ve read the book, let me know what you thought of it in the comments. For me it was recognizing positions vs. interests.
