1. Come prepared. A pound of pain can be avoided with but an ounce of preparation.

2. Know who you're talking to. What role is the other party playing? What powers do they have (or are lacking)? This helps focus the meeting so that you only ask for what you know you can get. Otherwise, you're wasting your time because you're talking to the wrong person.

3. Know your objective. What is it that you want to achieve by the end of the meeting? Always work towards that in the back of your mind. That's why you should always have an agenda that will allow you to better achieve your objective.

4. Identify your issues and prioritize them. This will help all parties know what the other wants and how badly they want it. This also facilitates creative solutions because you can trade off a low-priority issue for a higher one (especially when the opposing parties' priorities are the reverse of your own).

5. Don't waste time on the nitty-gritty. If you get stuck for the trees, move back to the forest. Make a note of where you got stuck and then move on.

6. Deal with the easy things first; leave the contentious issues until later. This strategy helps move the meeting along and makes the parties ease up until contentious issues are

7. Mention your position briefly, but talk about the interests that you're trying to satisfy. If these interests can be satisfied in creative ways, then parties' positions will melt away.

8. Spend most of your time coming up with creative solutions. Expand the pie! Find commonalities! Brainstorm creative and mutually-beneficial solutions! Everything else about the meeting is just a lead-in to this part. You should spend at least 75% of your time coming up with solutions to give all parties something. Evaluate alternatives based on objective criteria that are acceptable to all parties. These criteria could be time, money, effort, publicity, etc.

9. Put everything in paper before, during, and after the meeting. Visual meetings are the best. Parties are better focused on the task at hand when they have been notified ahead of time of the agenda, objective, issues (listed and prioritized), and proposed alternatives. This way, time isn't wasted coming up with these things during the meeting. During the meeting, use a pad of paper or the chalkboard to show the progress that has been made throughout the meeting. Finally, make sure to write a summary and next steps (discussed below). Remember: he/she who controls the language of what is ultimately written and agreed upon will usually have power over the other party.

10. Summarize the meeting and note next steps. Make sure you record who is going to take action, what action they are going to take, and when they are planning to complete the action. You'll need this in writing to make the parties accountable. At the next meeting, these notes should be reviewed to determine whether action items were satisfied.



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