Classically, negotiations are thought to be about playing one’s hand well at the bargaining table: The right combination of resolve, nerve, and polish can get you what you want.

But a new book from an MIT professor brings a different message: It’s what happens both before and after parties meet at the bargaining table that makes a negotiation successful.

“It’s not just about a person being smart or tough,” says Lawrence Susskind, a leading expert on negotiating practices.

Susskind’s book Good for You, Great for Me: Finding the Trading Zone and Winning at Win-Win Negotiation (Public Affairs Press, 2014) details the framework that has emerged from his long-term studies of bargaining.

Instead of relying on negotiating-table bravura, Susskind believes negotiators should prepare in advance and think about everyone’s strategic interests, grasp how much license to maneuver their counterparts have, seek out flexible agreements with logical contingencies, and consider what constitutes an acceptable outcome for each party.

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