The ubiquitous Bob Mnookin was interviewed on NPR’s the Diane Rehm Show this morning.  Go here for the show and scroll down to the 11am heading for the link to listen.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with the show, it’s an hour long interview with emails and calls during the last 15 minutes or so.   Naturally he’s discussing his book Bargaining with the Devil: When to Negotiation, When to Fight. 

I received my copy of the book last week and it is at the top of my summer reading list.  That said, I’ve skimmed some of it and I like the real life negotiation stories he uses to create a decision making framework for the negotiate or fight question.  My gut concern about the book, we’ll see if it is assuaged at a later point, is that readers will too readily believe that their negotiation counterparts are the “devil.”  Here’s hoping there’s a significant discussion over demonization in the negotiation setting – there’s some in the early parts.  I expect the book gets there, I just haven’t made it that far yet.