Negotiating Skills for Managers

By Steven Cohen

Book Overview

Now translated into nine languages This reader-friendly, icon-rich series is must reading for all managers at every level.

All managers, whether brand new to their positions or well established in the corporate hierarchy, can use a little "brushing up" now and then. The skills-based Briefcase Books series is filled with ideas and strategies to help managers become more capable, efficient, effective, and valuable to their corporations.

Virtually everything in business is negotiated, and the ability to negotiate strong agreements and understandings is among today's most valuable talents. Negotiating Skills for Managers explains how to establish a solid pre-negotiation foundation, subtly guide the negotiation, and consistently set and achieve satisfactory targets. From transferring one's existing strengths to the negotiating table to avoiding common negotiating errors, it reveals battle-proven steps for reaching personal and organizational objectives in every negotiation.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0071387579
• ISBN13: 9780071387576
• Release Date: March 2002
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill
• Length: 180 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.1" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

A very helpful book

Negotiating Skills for Managers is a practical book that doesn't talk down to the reader ­ or bore her with dense language. ... The organization of the book makes it easy to go back and forth to examine how concepts it presents relate to each other. ... The book's examples from real life give someone with real-world negotiating experience Œhooks' for relating their own war stories to a clearly-described philosophy and set of techniques. ... Unlike other negotiation books, this one has an index that makes it easy to review concepts after one's initial reading. ... Until I read the book, I had never understood the concept of BATNA; now this fundamental part of negotiation is much clearer to me. ... Perhaps the most valuable element Negotiating Skills for Managers presents is the Interest Map ­ a preparation tool that has already saved me considerable time in complex negotiations. While the book contains a lot of deep philosophical ideas, it is useful for someone whose negotiating experience is limited or whose confidence needs boosting. I recommend it highly.

Eastern Philosophy, Self Actualization, & Negotiation Skills

Negotiating Skills for Managers is a down-to-earth book, written in an engaging and clear way, which brings the complex issues associated with negotiation down to a handful of commonsensical ideas. I highly recommend Negotiating Skills for Managers by Steven P. Cohen for people in all professions, and on all rungs of the corporate ladder, who seek to improve their interactions with others, thus enhancing their effectiveness and efficiency at work, and even at home!From explaining the difference between positional and interest-based negotiations, to highlighting the benefits and detriments of human emotions in the negotiation process, to advising how to recognize and disarm "bullies" and other unreasonable colleagues, Negotiating Skills for Managers is a thorough book packed with information that is easy to comprehend and entertaining to read.The book is chock full of antic dotes and experiences gleaned from the author's professional and personal life. This is the best part! Cohen shares situations as explained by his clients and students that helped me understand how and when to apply the clearly detailed tactics he outlines. Courteous mannerisms, like: "don't hog the credit," "let others present their ideas first," and "best not to eat an onion sandwich before entering the negotiation room" lead into explanations of important negotiation tactics. Among the most significant insights offered in the book is that negotiating parties are not competitors but people who seek to reach an agreed upon solution to their shared problem that will be followed through to completion. This theme of respecting others for their interests, opinions and professional and/or cultural difference runs throughout Negotiating Skills for Managers, helping readers stay focused on the importance of understanding others' needs and values before engraving their own into stone. "Listen to yourself and to others, searching all the time for seeds that can germinate into ideas that work," Cohen advises. Later in the book, he drives this point home in a more familiar way. "God gave us two ears and one mouth. Use them proportionately." Within the first pages of Negotiating Skills for Managers I was challenged to seek self-awareness through thoughtful introspection before and during the negotiation process. I got the sense that Eastern philosophy has influenced Cohen's approach to business ethics and thus negotiation, as he urges readers to understand the emotions that drive their desires and think of their own interests in terms of the greater whole."Negotiation is not rocket science," Cohen concludes. Husbands and wives, parents and children, and CEOs and secretaries all negotiate with each other everyday, according to Cohen. The key is to remember tactics learned by reading this book in my daily life.

Excellent, succint guide to negotiation

In his book, Cohen develops negotiation tools that can be applied to both personal and business challenges. Cohen's structured and rigorous approach provides a method for analyzing a partner or opponents positions, and for clarifying your own interests and positions. The book is easily absorbed, even though many of the best points are counter-intuitive. The author draws on experience from real-life negotiations, and the tone is always engaging. "Negotiating Skills for Managers" is an excellent road map on how to prepare for and execute succesful negotiations.

negotiating skills

"Negotiating Skills for Managers" is a good guide for understanding the process of negotiation. The book is broken up into parts that can be absorbed individually and then combined for application. Shaded blocks clarify issues and detailed Table of Contents and Index help to review points as the system is put to use. I find that really understanding all my own interests (ie: company,co-workers, etc.) and then spending time to make sure that I understand the interests of the people I am negotiating with is making a big difffernce. I would recommend this book for both personal and work negotiations.

Real World Negotiating Skills

In Negotiating Skills for Managers Steven P.Cohen provides readers an accessible, practical resourse for business, and personal negotiations. The book is eminently readable, including multiple real life examples of negotiations from Cohen's broad experience as well as what he has learned from clients around the world.The book provides checklists of it's learning points at the end of each chapter as well as an extensive index. These tools make it quite easy to return again and again to review the ideas it presents. The format makes it not only a learning tool, but also an ever-ready handbook for one of life's most common activities.Cohen's book provides real-world tools for prepairing for and analyzing negotiations. In some ways it provides its readers an ongoing pep talk, reminding them that while negotiation is not a competitive sport, it is their responsibility to focus their interests, and not run the risk of giving in when it is against their fundamental needs.