This is part of a series of notes from the Information Architecture Summit from 2012. All posts will be tagged ias12. This talk was presented by Carol Smith (@carologic on Twitter). The slides are available on Slideshare.

• Even if you have the best design you won't get a good user experience if you can't negotiate and get it to happen
• You need need confidence in negotiation, and the best way to get it is to have a Best Alternative To Negotiation Agreement (BATNA): knowing what your course of action will be if negotiation fails (not the same as a walk-away point) gives you
  • a standard to measure negotiated options against and determine if you have something better than no negotiation at all
  • freedom to pursue more creative solutions (because you have that standard to compare against)
• Make sure you ask for more, and don't accept the first offer
• The better your BATNA the greater your power. You don't have to disclose it, especially if yours is weak.
• Preparation for negotiation
  • Who are you dealing with and what is important to them?
  • What are their preferred negotiation strategies?
• Separate people from the problem
  • Match culture to minimize misunderstandings (clothing, attitude)
  • Not about the people in the room--minimize emotions (positive or negative)
• Compromise is the goal of negotiation, you want to come up with the best solution for everyone. Focus on your shared interest:
  • Use "we", not "you" or "me"
  • Work toward mutual gain within constraints: cost, time, resources/people, level of insights, etc.
• Use objective criteria and standards like web analytics, surveys, internal measurements over time. Have the analysis beforehand or offer to go gather it as part of the negotiation.
• Resources
  • Measuring the User Experience by Thomas Tullis and William Albert
  • Getting to YES: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Roger Fisher and William Ury
  • It's Our Research: Getting Stakeholder Buy-in for User Experience Research Projects by Tomer Sharon
• Audience question: her boss's BATNA is "I said to do it so do it." Speaker says "I always say that when people actually see usability tests it turns their world upside-down"--make advocates in your organization, maybe in your own time (e.g. organize brown-bags and other events)

Key take-home points for me:

Having a clear picture of what I will do if negotiation completely fails sounds like a great idea and is something I should remember to do. And I should really read that Getting to YES book.