If you think people pleasers automatically strengthen negotiations, you’re wrong. Yes, they believe in the value of protecting relationships (and that’s good), but the choices that come from this urge frequently do more damage to outcomes than most negotiators realize.....

Every baseball fan starts the season with hope. Every team has a path to the World Series. There’s something irrational about it, but that’s part of the fun. Then the season begins. Hope starts to shift from “Let’s win it all!” to what's more realistic. Negotiations follow the same pattern......

March Madness has a way of capturing attention unlike almost anything else. It’s often suggested that US businesses lose billions of dollars in productivity during the tournament as work competes with a compelling distraction. For the most part, this is harmless. But in situations like negotiations.....

The way you enter a room, the energy you bring, whether you seem tense or grounded — it all communicates to the other side before a single word is spoken. And it informs whether the conversation will be collaborative or combative......