Step 2: Creating a Shared Vision

Companies that treat each other as parties to their success achieve transformational results because organizations are working together to achieve a shared purpose or vision for the future. Each organization may have different motivations for wanting to achieve that vision, but the vision for the future remains the guiding point. Creating a shared vision may seem out of context for a book on negotiating. Many books that discuss negotiation strategies and tactics recommend that a negotiator’s first step is preparation. In the what’s-in-it-for-me (WIIFMe) context, this means that a negotiator is simply preparing to maximize his position vis-à-vis his counterpart. Even when approaching a negotiation as a problem-solving exercise, conventional techniques focus on looking through the lens of self-interest to find shared interests as the first step. These cumbersome approaches assume there is no shared vision for the future and this is therefore not part of the negotiation.