Pragmatic advice from a master negotiator

HLS Negotiation Workshop hosts Robert Barnett, Jack and Suzy Welch

For 35 years, Robert B. Barnett has been one of the nation’s most sought-after lawyers, representing major corporations including General Electric. He is also the world’s premier representative of authors, with a star-studded client roster that includes Barack Obama ’91 and Tony Blair. And for decades, he’s helped Democrats prepare for critical debates, including preparing Hillary Rodham Clinton for all 23 debates in 2008.

Barnett, a partner at Williams & Connolly, is also a mentor to HLS Assistant Clinical Professor Robert Bordone ’97, director of the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program. In March, Barnett appeared as a guest lecturer in Bordone’s Negotiation Workshop. The audience included two special guests, Jack Welch, the former CEO of General Electric, and his wife, Suzy Welch, co-authors of the international best-seller “Winning.”

Whether litigating a case or sealing a book deal, Barnett is a master at the art of negotiation, having learned from the best: his law partner, the legendary Edward Bennett Williams. “He had the most amazing ability to convince and persuade,” said Barnett.

Kyle Glover '10

Suzy and Jack Welch at HLS

The biggest challenge of his career, Barnett said, was helping broker the agreement between Obama and Clinton at the end of the 2008 campaign. “I suppose there was nothing more challenging than putting the Clinton and Obama campaigns together, because there was a lot at stake, a lot of strong feelings,” Barnett said. “It worked out fine. [S]he did everything the Obama campaign wanted, and she’s now secretary of state.” Answering a student’s question, Barnett clarified, “Secretary of state was not part of the negotiation.”

Barnett told the students that in any situation, the first negotiation is always with your own client, managing what’s reasonable for them to expect. “The goal of most negotiations is not to get yourself and your client totally pleased but pleased enough. If you can leave the field of play with no enemies, for the client and for yourself, that’s a victory.”

Jack Welch told students, “Bob is the only person I know, as a litigator of all kinds of cases, who … never has an enemy,” adding, “No one on either side of a negotiation has anything but respect for Bob.”

Barnett offered students some other pragmatic advice on the art of negotiation, including:

• Know more about your case than anyone. “Know more even than your own client knows.”
• “Try to treat your adversary fairly, and pride yourself on always treating them the same way you hope they’d treat you.”
• Assess your leverage. “I try to figure out how important what I’m selling is to the buyer, or what I’m buying is to the seller.”
• Present your best story first. “I want to be able to influence the first offer, not just receive it.”
• Four invaluable phrases:
  1. “‘Please correct me if I’m wrong’ means you’re asserting your position but you’re appearing humble and you’re leaving the other side open to correct you in a way that might inform you or get you something you want.”
  2. “‘I appreciate your offer, but … ’ shows gratitude and respect but is not obsequious.”
  3. “Say, ‘Let me see if I understand,’ then repeat what they said.”
  4. “Don’t take a position but say, ‘One solution might be … ’ You haven’t offered anything, aren’t stuck with it, and it hasn’t been approved by your client yet. But it furthers the dialogue.”
• “Don’t be afraid to say, ‘Let me get back to you.’ ‘A continuance is as good as an acquittal; it just doesn’t last as long,’ Edward Bennett Williams used to say.”
• Always be the drafter of the agreement. “Williams used to say, ‘He who drafts, wins.’”
• Never lie. “It isn’t worth it, it isn’t ethical, it’s grounds for disbarment, In the end, you’ll always get caught.”