The Subtle Art of Persuasion

Negotiating can be a vital skill in today’s world. Every day we are met with conflicts and disputes lined up one after the other. These issues are simply a result of people having their own opinions and views. Negotiations help to find common ground between opposing parties and then resolve the problem. I know this ability to negotiate would help me in my day-to-day life and, if I perfected the ‘art of persuasion’, I could potentially use the negotiations to compound my point of view. This could help me in the moment and even after the fact if the issue was ever brought up again (or if the solution was long term). Mediation could also be handy in solving common disputes, but the challenge would be finding a person that is one hundred percent impartial to the situation. This task is difficult because appearances and preconceived notions can play a significant role in the final ruling. People are constantly judging each other based on their looks, behaviors and manner of speaking. Due to this type of judgment, a mediator can be unpredictable and unreliable. Therefore, negotiating is a more dependable option when it comes down to a tough choice. Although, negotiations can be a long and challenging process – one wrong move and you have to start all over.

Negotiating is like playing poker, it is imperative that you keep your game face on and prevent the opposition from knowing your true intensions. If they call your bluff, you must stray further away from your goals and closer to the opposition’s goals, and even risk losing the game. As well, you need to time your moves in order to gain the most; to achieve this, you must know when to fold and when to go all in – this is to say that you must win some and lose some to find common ground an reach the end, but you don’t want to stray to far from your original post. You essentially want to win all of the chips.