Negotiate This! By Caring, But Not T-H-A-T Much

Rating:
Summary: THE HIGHEST RATING
Review: I read "Negotiate This! By Caring But Not T-H-A-T Much over a weekend and found myself constantly smiling and laughing out loud. Afterwards upon reflection, I realized that this is a serious and profound work about human behavior. what the author has done is give us another lens or dimension through which to understand and predict human beings and their behavior. It's an empowering work that I would highly recommend.

Rating:
Summary: Want Control? Read this book!
Review: I used to be a guy that was always waiting on the longest lines, paying top price for everything, sitting in seats above the scoreboard. In fact, if you paid half price it is probably because I was at the same event paying double. Yes, I have friends, but even they knew me as a sucker. No More! After reading this book, I am at last in the game, having used Cohen's techniques to take control of my life, the flow of the game, so to speak, and now, if you see someone sitting about ten rows in front of you, courtside, with a beautiful woman on his arm, you can bet that's me. Thanks Herb Cohen!

Rating:
Summary: NEGOTIATE THIS!
Review: It's a mistake to label this solely as a self-help book. It's so much more. Mr. Cohen has given readers a masterpiece - - a humorous page-turner that's filled with a philosophy of life that comes to most of us, if ever, only through long and arduous trial and error.
As someone who has spent decades reading non-fiction books about selling, negotiating and human behavior, "Negotiate This" by far and away the champion - a tour de force.

Rating:
Summary: Nothing new here, a collection of stories and generic advice
Review: Let me start with what this book is. It is a collection of stories from Herb's personal experience and from historical figures.
Story-telling: 3/5

Generic pieces of advice such as "Before the strategic interaction occurs, establish a specific and measurable goal that gives direction to your activities." are then offered as "Prominent Points", supposedly resulting from the lessons learned from those stories. A very tentative connection! A very common mistake in self-improvement books is the implied causality: You do as I did (in that one particular instance 35 years ago!!!), and you will achieve the same result ...
Methodological/scientific foundations: 1/5

Some stories and issues have even been repeated from "You Can Negotiate Anything", perhaps the author feels strongly about them or perhaps no better example could be found.
Novelty: 1/5

The relevancy and value (to business negotiators and to individuals negotiating their salaries, cars and houses) of book sections dealing with international negotiations and politics (arm-twisting by the only truly powerful nation) is dubious, but will certainly be liked by many.
Relevance of examples: 2/5

What this book isn't? A systematic and deep overview of negotiation strategies, premises, styles and tactics. A mentally stimulating journey through the fascinating subject.

Complete coverage of the subject: 2/5
Mental stimulation and inspirational value: 3/5

For serious and relatively advanced students of negotiation, this could be a mildly interesting, although lowbrow read. For those who are hoping to gain a solid understanding of the negotiating process based on this book only - look elsewhere!

You won't be bored, but you wont be ecstatic, either.
Entertainment value: 2/5

Personally, although I have read at least a dozen negotiating books that are inferior to this one, my concluding thoughts after reading this work were: unremarkable, mildly disappointing. I honestly could not give it 3/5 even if my arm was twisted ...

Rating:
Summary: A 5 STAR BOOK
Review: Negotiate This! By Caring But Not T-H-A-T Much is filled with wit and wisdom. Arguably, it is the best book ever about succeeding in business and life. Reading it can be a life-changing experience.

Rating:
Summary: How to use effective persuasion to jockey for position!
Review: Negotiate This! By Caring, But Not T-H-A-T Much
by Herb Cohen

I had the pleasure of attending one of Herb Cohen's speeches several years ago on becoming a master of persuasion, and perfecting the art of meaningful negotiation. Of course, by that time, his signature work, You Can Negotiate Anything was already a must read book destined to become a masterpiece. That book, now 23 years old and still packing a solid punch will find company in the aforemention's current offering. Now comes Negotiate This! Albeit, with an interesting subtitle, "By Caring, But Not T-H-A-T Much", it gives the impressionable image that there's more to the title as implication would have you view it. It is inevitable that this author's seminal work, and a new twist to gaining footholds on how to win at an effective personal developmental tool would lend one to believe that there's something new to the game, and as you read Negotiate This! you'll be able to see just how different it is, yet some of the same principles in the former are present and prominent in the latter.

Please be reminded that the purpose of this expose is not to draw parallels, but rather, to aim the reader's perspective in communicating how personal allegorical and simple logical insight to view experienced behavioral patterns can make a difference in positioning yourself to turn no's into yeses. In this book, you will find out why Cohen is such an accomplished, successful negotiator, a talent that personifies his creative intelligence, his intense focus on using the art of persuasion and emphasizing a negotiating style that is subliminal, entertaining and flexible. The primary message in this book is the negotiator's need to cultivate a certain aloofness, or employ an analogy to suggest a detached sense of awareness but still be able to take in the seriousness of what one should be doing to win -- hence the book's subtitle. I like the way he uses well-placed metaphors to color the street-smart advice on effective demeanor, an implied uniqueness to style and the importance of the bargaining process. As I read, I wanted to have the answers that kept cropping up in my head. To wit: Is it possible to create advantages in negotiations? When would you know that you have the upper hand? What ploys should be used to project a preeminent air to intimidate your adversary?

Cohen manages to do an excellent job in explaining all of the above. As such, manipulating the perceived levels of time, information and positioning to create an advantage in negotiations is a must to foster the image that knowledge is indeed power. In the process he gives a perfect if not defining analogy of what negotiating is all about while using three precepts. He opines: "Negotiating often involves the managing of conflict. At times, however, some conflicts that come your way need not be confronted but should be avoided. If you have some perspective you can see things beginning to develop and use your lead time to adopt a blueprint of avoidance, then do so. Another strategy that comes with distance is to diffuse or reconcile differences before they even come to a head. Finally, a third option is to confront the problem directly looking for alternate solutions that will provide for joint gain and build mutually beneficial relationships"

All in all, this is an excellent read, but may not be anything new for those that feel that it's an old rehashment of an earlier atonement on the same subject. In my opinion, there were a few things of less interest, and despite the book's verbosity in odd places nothing should be taken away from the author's unique expressionism in illustrating points that can make the difference between winning or losing arguable points of contention in negotiating détente. The result is a book that is quite useful, practical, and uses Herb Cohen's experience and success as a hallmark for authoritative wisdom. Read it for yourself to draw conclusive evidence for any limitations on patience and perseverance. I rate it five stars out of five!

Rating:
Summary: Everyone should read this!
Review: Not only his ideas and insightfulness of people is helpful for everyone, he's also a good writer that I couldn't put the book down. I really enjoyed the book and ordered another book of his. It's something that I want my wife to read and my children as well. It's THAT good.

Rating:
Summary: Not What I Expected from this Master
Review: Okay. I know everyone so far has given this new book of Cohen's five stars. He is an excellent writer and great negotiator and I've enjoyed his previous books and gotten a lot from them. I found this one shallow and off-track. His previous book was much better and deeper.

There was a lot in this book from his previous one. In fact, word for word. And that's okay. But there just wasn't enough new stuff to make this worth the investment.

Susanna K. Hutcheson
Owner & Executive Copy Director
Powerwriting.com LLC

Rating:
Summary: HIT SIGN WIN SUIT
Review: Once again Cohen has knocked another homerun out of Ebbetts Field. This kid who negotiated on the streets of Brooklyn and now does it for the U.S. Government and Fortune 500 Corporations is the best negotiator in the business. I would not want him to try to buy a car off of me if I were a car salesman. This book is the best I have read in negotiation techniques. Cohen gives you the skills necessary for you to enter any negotiation and come out a winner. A must by for the businessman as well as the houswife.

Rating:
Summary: Welcome to Uncle Herb's Attic
Review: Pretend that Cohen is your Uncle Herb. He is an internationally renowned expert on negotiation. You express an interest. He invites you to follow him into the attic of his home where he begins to remove from a chest all manner of papers. They are only casually organized. He is intimately familiar with each document. And each document inspires Uncle Herb to share an anecdote, aphorism, or even a complete story. "Everybody tells me I should write a book about all this!" Well, he has. This is it. What it lacks in cohesion it more than makes up for with fascinating experiences which Cohen has accumulated over many years.

He organizes (if that's the word) his material within twelve chapters which range from "The Joy of Detached Involvement" to my personal favorite, "The Game of Life." His advice is eminently practical. At the end of each chapter, he provides a cluster of what he calls "Prominent Points." Here are a few:

"Always view yourself as a problem solver, searching for creative alternatives that can satisfy both sides' real concerns and interests." (Chapter I)

"Concessions are not appreciated unless effort is expended to obtain them." (Chapter V)

"As the deadline approaches, remain confident and composed. Fretting and fussing is like a rocking chair: It gives you something to do but gets you nowhere." (Chapter VII)

"What matters is not what power you've got, but what the other side thinks you've got." (Chapter IX)

With all due respect to the "Prominent Points," if you are looking for a comprehensive manual on negotiation -- filled with check lists, detailed case studies, etc. -- this isn't it. So what is it? As I attempted to suggest earlier, Cohen's style is informal, conversational really. He shares a wealth of information about his career and discusses several important lessons that he learned about human nature. The subtitle suggests the importance of caring about the given issues but not T-H-A-T much. So really, Cohen spends most of his time on the psychology of negotiation rather than on its mechanics. One clue to his attitude is revealed by the last of the "Prominent Points" at the end of the last chapter: "With all due respect, learning negotiation solely by reading a book is like making love vial e-mail. Thus, get out there and dare to begin."