Canonical · Negotiation & Persuasion · Book

Difficult Conversations

Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton & Sheila Heen · 1999

"Every hard conversation is secretly three conversations at once — what happened, the feelings involved, and what it says about each person's identity — and most arguments fail because people only ever address the first."

The idea

Three members of the Harvard Negotiation Project noticed that couples, coworkers, and families all fought the same underlying fight, no matter the topic on the surface. They mapped it into three layers.

Why it works

The takeaway — recall it first

Crucial Conversations

"When stakes are high, opinions differ, and emotions run strong, most people either go silent or go aggressive — and the way back to a productive conversation is to make it psychologically safe before you try to make it right."

Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan & Al Switzler · BookContinue→