Shaping the Game

The New Leader's Guide to Effective Negotiating

By: Michael D. Watkins

Narrated by: Grover Gardner

Michael Watkins' best-selling book The First 90 Days has become the business bible for accelerating leadership transitions. Now, Watkins zeroes in on the most critical skill leaders must master to secure new roles and accelerate their transitions: negotiation.

In Shaping the Game: The New Leader's Guide to Effective Negotiating, Watkins draws from extensive research and practical consulting work to reveal four fundamental objectives that should guide new leaders' actions in every negotiation they undertake: create the most possible value, capture that value for yourself and your company, carefully tend to key relationships, and preserve your reputation. Watkins lays out hands-on strategies for becoming a world-class negotiator, including how to match your negotiation strategy to the situation, influence the perspectives of key counterparts, shape negotiation outcomes in your favor, and create the learning discipline necessary to become a world-class negotiator. Navigating the myriad complex, high-stakes negotiating challenges that confront new leaders, this book provides all the tools readers need to make the right moves up the career ladder and succeed in those roles once they get there.

©2006 Michael Watkins (P)2007 Gildan Media

Critic reviews

"This logical, thought-provoking guide is a useful tool for leaders, new and old." (Publishers Weekly)

A Must Have for Anyone who Negotiates Anything!

This best selling, highly respected author, teaches hands-on strategies and provides all the tools you need to become a world-class negotiator. He shows how to create the most value for yourself and your company. I recommend it to all leaders and anyone who wants a boost up the career ladder.

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What disappointed you about Shaping the Game?

It is possible that the author knows what he is trying to say, but I learnt nothing from it. He generalizes when he needs to be specific. He is far too verbose, assaulting us with a flood of corporate speak instead of English.
For example, instead of simply writing "come to an agreement", he writes "come to an agreement on a particular set of issues". This might sound like not big deal, but this repeated use of unnecessary words only serves to obscure his meaning and annoy the listener.