Concept
Negotiation Prep
Negotiation prep is the one-page preparation that decides most negotiations before they start: your alternative and walk-away point, the other side's wants, fears and deadlines, your numbers, your questions, your objection plan and your trade list.
The idea is a synthesis rather than any single author's. Fisher and Ury supply the BATNA and the interests; Kahneman's research on anchoring supplies the reason to write your numbers before you hear theirs; Voss supplies the calibrated questions, the accusation audit and the leverage map. All of them treat preparation as the part of negotiation you control. Putting it on one page matters because the page is what you can consult when the room is loud and your attention is needed for listening. What people get wrong is preparing arguments. Arguments are the smallest part of it; alternatives, questions and trades move outcomes far more, and none of them can be improvised well under pressure.
A real-life example
Before her salary review, Ayşe fills one page: the other offer she holds, the number she will not go below, her manager's likely constraints, three calibrated questions, the two objections she expects with a label for each, and what she can trade (her start date and the scope of the role). The meeting takes twenty minutes and she reads nothing from the page; she has already done the thinking.
How to use it
- 1The day before, write the page in seven parts: your alternative and walk-away point; what the other side wants, fears and must finish by when; your opening, target and walk-away numbers; what you want for the relationship and what you want on the substance; three calibrated questions; the objections you expect, with a label for each; and what you can trade.
- 2Bring the page but do not read from it; its job was done when you wrote it.
- 3Afterwards, add one line: what surprised you. The next page starts further ahead.