Deadline Dynamics and the Healthcare Reform Bill

CNN reported today that Democratic leadership in the House reached a deal with several “Blue Dog” Democrats to allow the Energy and Commerce Committee to resume its debate of the health care bill with a vote expected by the end of the week. The deal also reportedly puts off a vote by the [...]

Do the Standards Dance

In many sophisticated negotiations, each party will find independent standards like market value, precedent, expert opinions, etc., that favor their side and will use their most favorable standards to independently justify the “fairness” of their positions. The result? We get the “standards dance” - when the parties negotiate over which standard represents [...]

Top Ten Independent Standards

Why should you use objective criteria to support your moves or offers and concessions in a negotiation? Because we derive power and legitimacy from the perception that our standards and criteria are based on objective, independent factors. If our positions are based on truly objective, independent standards, our counterparts will more likely conclude [...]

Bracketing and the Center Mover

The Financial Times reported this week that AIG has reopened talks with MetLife for the sale of AIG’s American Life Insurance Company (Alico) subsidiary. Reportedly, AIG hopes to raise “more than $15 billion” to help repay the $80 billion in bailout funds it has received from U.S. taxpayers.
The article also mentioned MetLife had previously offered [...]