Coaching practices for Fisher and Ury Negotiation

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Fisher and Ury Negotiation, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• The numbers actually work and yet they still won’t budge, and I keep sweetening the offer to no effect
• We finally reached a deal, but I have this nagging sense we both grabbed the first version that worked just to be done
• I think they’d privately accept what I’m offering, but the way I’ve framed it they’d basically have to admit defeat to say yes
• It’s turned into a pure contest of who’ll budge first, and I hate that whoever caves just loses face
• There are several things on the table here, and some matter way more to me than others

Practices that may help

1. Principled Negotiation, Made Practical
   Principled negotiation, developed by Roger Fisher and William Ury in Getting to Yes, replaces positional bargaining with a method built on four elements: separate the people from the problem, focus on interests rather than positions, generate options for mutual gain, and insist on objective criteria. It aims for agreements that are better for both parties than their alternatives — without requiring either to capitulate or play hardball.
2. Distinguish substantive, procedural, and psychological interests
   The interest behind a position is often not about the money or the terms — it may be about face, fairness, or control.
   Interests vs. Positions: The Core of Integrative Negotiation
3. Getting to Yes: Principled Negotiation
   Getting to Yes (Fisher & Ury, of the Harvard Negotiation Project) argues for negotiating on the merits instead of haggling over positions: separate people from the problem, focus on underlying interests, invent options for mutual gain, and judge outcomes by objective criteria — with your BATNA as the source of real leverage. It’s an influential framework grounded in decision theory and negotiation experience rather than a lab-tested protocol.
4. Interests vs. Positions: The Core of Integrative Negotiation
   A position is what someone says they want ("I need $80,000"); an interest is why they want it ("I need to cover my expenses and feel valued"). Fisher and Ury’s insight in Getting to Yes is that positions in direct conflict often mask compatible interests — and that negotiating on interests rather than positions is the main lever for creating agreements that satisfy both parties rather than splitting the difference.
5. Use a post-settlement settlement to improve a deal after agreement
   Once you have a deal, offer to keep exploring whether a better one exists for both sides.
   Expanding the Pie: Negotiation Beyond Splitting the Difference
6. Frame proposals as "yesable propositions"
   Make your proposals easy for the counterpart to say yes to — not easy on your terms, but easy to accept as legitimate.
   Principled Negotiation, Made Practical
7. Insist on objective criteria to evaluate options
   Agree on an independent standard — market rate, precedent, expert opinion — before applying it to the specific deal.
   Principled Negotiation, Made Practical
8. BATNA: Your Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement
   BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement), developed by Fisher, Ury, and Patton in Getting to Yes, is what you will do if this negotiation fails completely. It is the only rational basis for your walk-away point. A strong BATNA gives you genuine power because you can credibly walk away; a weak BATNA means any deal is better than your alternative, and a skilled counterpart will sense and exploit that.
9. Logroll by trading issues of unequal importance
   Concede on what matters less to you in exchange for gains on what matters more.
   Expanding the Pie: Negotiation Beyond Splitting the Difference
10. Insist on objective criteria
    Anchor the deal to independent standards — market rates, precedent, expert opinion — not willpower.
    Getting to Yes: Principled Negotiation

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