Every negotiation is a process of leveraging what you have to get what you want.
To understand how this practice enriches your negotiations, it may be best to begin with the basics. A strategy is, in essence, a blueprint of what you are going to do to get what you want through a negotiation. A doctrine is the sound line of reasoning behind why you are doing what you are doing as part of your negotiation. Lastly, tactics are the main actions you take when implementing your entire strategy.
For a high-stakes negotiation to succeed, the forces of a sound doctrine, a clear strategy, and effective tactics must be in confluence with each other. Without such a confluence, you will not be able to get what you want.
When this vital confluence is disrupted, your negotiation collapses into unproductive states — states that trap you by continuously leaking your creative energy, demanding tremendous efforts from you while mimicking progress but ultimately stalling the necessary outcomes:
→ Dialogue (Strategy ∩ Tactics): Wherein creative juices are in free flow. You have a roadmap and collaborative motion with your counterpart, but without a strong doctrine in place, the effort remains a pleasant loop of creative ideas that do not produce anything concretely valuable for you
→ Discussion (Doctrine ∩ Strategy): Here it is contemplation that tends to be in a state of laminar flow. There is usually a deep conviction and a grand structural blueprint behind what needs to be done, but without any tactical execution of the ideas that were contemplated, it quickly turns into being an intellectual exercise in analysis paralysis
→ Debate (Doctrine ∩ Tactics): Where the combative energies are dominant. You have intense beliefs and forceful arguments, but without an overarching strategy, you invest massive energy into winning smaller points while sacrificing more meaningful pursuits
Dialogue, discussion, and debate are not and can not be negotiations. They will take up your time, cloud your judgment, waste your ability to think, and end up exhausting your efforts without creating the value you deserve.
Moreover, when negotiating in hostile contexts or when situations are hostage-like in nature or when an aggressive counterpart is having your BATNA for breakfast and countering your certified tactics for sport, it tends to become rather painful to negotiate.
In such cases, this practice enables you to see where your negotiations are turning ineffective and what is needed for you to evolve out of situations that are binding you to outcomes that you did not want in the first place. Once those foggy spots are mapped out clearly, the practice empowers you to tactically execute whatever is needed to effectively cause the reality you want through your negotiations.
If that resonates with you, you may choose to initiate the process below.