Negotiating Tip #32:
How to Overcome an Impasse
When a negotiation comes to an impasse, it may seem that there are two choices: stick to your guns and try to wear them down so you get as much as you can of what you want, or drop your demands and cave in just to get the deal done.
But, we at Mobus Creative Negotiating teach about another alternative, which is to go to a higher level, that is, to go into creative deal-making.
MCN teaches negotiators to think about what other assets does your side have that address their unspoken needs. And what other assets do they have that address my broader needs. The point is to think about how the two sides can trade actions on some of those issues to create greater value. We have a lot of ideas about areas to explore for creating more value, but our main lesson is: put yourself in the other person’s shoes and think about what would help them.
Of course this process is not the fairy-tale version of “win-win” because the reality is that the two sides still need to bargain hard over how to share the greater value that their creativity uncovers.