I really appreciated hearing Mr Christensen's lecture on negotiations. I had never considered the importance of maintaining a dialog. It made me think of the hostage negotiators in the movies who are always trying to talk to the hostage takers. I also appreciate the focus on relationships; some seemingly trivial conversations can lead to progress in negotiation. People aren't robots out to maximize their stake at every step. There's real value in the conversation outside of the specific negotiation topic. Once a relationship is established, real negotiations on a human level can occur.

I had the good fortune of attending a workshop on negotiations with Stan Christensen and we had the opportunity to look more closely at negotiations as something more sophisticated than a one time engagement.  This idea remained the most striking to me in Wednesday's lecture because it highlighted how important mentality behind negotiations and good relationship management are to successful negotiations.  I especially agree with his comments that so many of the people you conduct negotiations with are not one-time encounters -- examples started popping into my head as I thought more about it -- and I can think of many occasions were approaching negotiations as a transaction has been detrimental.

Stan is a wonderful speaker and he had great answers to all the questions. I would consider my greatest takeaway from this talk is to not view the negotiation as a one time engagement. Once I realize that, other points he made seem to follow logically - like dont follow tactics, establish a relationship, expand the pie, etc.