Applying Principles of Improvisation to Negotiation

In my earlier work, I explored the art and science of improvisational acting and their relationship to the unscripted critical moments in negotiation (Harding 2004). Dissecting an improvisational scene that I created at the 2004 conference on critical moments, I highlighted the critical moments of improvisational acting: the initial offers of the actors, the ways they identified the beats of the scene—the moments when they chose to move the scene ahead, explore elements of the scene, or heighten an element already in play—and the determination of the ending of the scene. Some key skills at play included making an offer and then having the flexibility to shift that idea to accommodate other actors’ offers, listening and attentively “reading” the other actors throughout the scene/interaction to capitalize on possibilities, and avoiding the pitfalls of stalling or stopping an idea. These skills are used by improvisational actors at critical moments in improvisation—the moments of “what if,” “yes,” “no,” “yes, and,” or “yes, but”—moments that are analogous to critical moments in negotiation, allowing us to think about negotiation from a unique perspective.

For over twenty years, I have taught improvisational acting to adults and have led corporate workshops using improvisational exercises. During this time, patterns have emerged in the ways that people interact when doing improvisational acting. These patterns are also found in negotiations and identifying them helps to illuminate the ways in which negotiations are navigated.

One pattern that emerges is that people new to improvisation tend to find opposites and to disagree from the very start of their interactions. One of our first warm‐up exercises is a word association game; this gets participants’ minds used to working off of someone else—taking in other people’s ideas and reacting with their own. Invariably, if someone says “day,” the next person says “night.” If someone says “good,” the response tends to be “bad.” “Rich” gets a reply of “poor” and so on. While that may be indicative of how we learn opposites when we are very young, it is interesting to see that pattern of “pick the opposite” again and again.

Participants also tend toward opposites when they start improvising scenes/interactions. We often do a scene exercise with two actors on stage, in which one person starts with any line of dialogue they want, the second actor replies, and the first actor responds to the new information. It is a great exercise to practice the beginnings of scenes—reading each other and responding once a scene takes a turn from what someone might have been expecting. For the new improvisor, time after time this exercise results in the second actor immediately picking an opposite viewpoint, touching off an argument between the two actors. While they may think they are “finding conflict” that can fuel a scene, they are really just negating each other’s offers and the scene has nowhere to go. If the scene continues it usually leads to more arguing and nothing new or exciting emerges, as illustrated by the following examples:

Even when the improvisation instructor directs the actors to make the scene more positive, they struggle to resist the temptation to continue to pick opposites and to disagree. The instructor needs to teach participants that there are many more interesting possibilities when people try to find agreement—possibilities that perhaps were not even evident when the initial offer was made, as shown in the following example:

And suddenly we are in an interesting place. Maybe these are two coworkers in an awkward situation, or trying to hide a budding romance, or one is vying for a promotion by bribing the other with food. There are so many more “what ifs” and scene possibilities. The actors in this second example are engaged, feel heard, and want to keep working with each other to make that scene great, and they also want to do more scenes together. A baseline of trust has been developed allowing for more options, more ideas, better beats, and an easier ending. Even if the actors express opposite viewpoints but are open to navigating the interaction together, the scene improves:

Finding points of agreement (it is sunny) does not necessitate abandoning one’s ideas or expressing feelings similar to those of the other actor. Those initial offers are critical moments, and the more that people can agree to basic elements and add their own counteroffers, perspectives, and “what ifs” within that context (e.g., what if forgetting sunscreen was a good thing, to show how tough we think we are), the greater the number of possibilities. For improvisers, the first lines of the scenes are critical moments. The initial line is Actor 1’s “offer” and the second line is Actor 2’s “offer” back—it is a critical moment in which to listen, understand each other, and negotiate the scene together. Managing the critical moment in this way, a mutually rewarding outcome is negotiated.

Let’s revisit those simple scene beginnings again. Beyond that one scene or interaction, those critical moments can have long‐lasting effects, positive or negative, if those two actors have to negotiate another scene together. In the first example:

The scene will probably break down further if the actors continue to disagree and negate each other. Often there is a temptation for Actor 2 to negate Actor 1 to get a laugh; this might be the result in the example above, which can reinforce Actor 2’s bad choice. Actor 2 may come to believe that his response was great, and he is puzzled by the ensuing failure of the actors to make the scene work well. As the scene deteriorates, both actors leave the negotiation of the interaction disappointed with the result and reluctant to act in/negotiate scenes together in the future. That initial negation is a critical moment that can have an ongoing ripple effect on future negotiation. If Actor 2 always negates, Actor 1 might decide to lay back and not go on stage when she sees Actor 1 head for the stage. Or Actor 1 might decide to let Actor 2 get the first line next time, so she can negate for a laugh of her own. Often Actor 1 decides to play it safer and safer with Actor 2 to avoid looking bad again when they are together on stage, leading to less interesting offers and narrower interactions and possibilities. The next time Actor 1 starts a scene she might not put as much out there. Rather than saying “This pie is delicious!” she might offer a terse “Hi.” The scene is less interesting, less win‐win. As illustrated above, offering “This pie is delicious!” makes possible a more engaging interaction:

While the success of the negotiated scene from that point on is not guaranteed, it is far more likely. And the lasting effect of that critical moment may be the actors’ desire to continue to work together and take more chances with each other, opening up more possibilities for future interactions and scene negotiations. Each actor feels that he or she has been listened to and has contributed. Each experiences the resulting scene as his or her own idea and takes shared ownership of its success.

The power of “Yes” versus “No” has been demonstrated in numerous corporate training sessions. In an exercise called the “Yes” game that I have observed hundreds of times, patterns continually emerge. Although it is a simple exercise, participants can apply strategy and game theory as they negotiate with each other using only “Yes” and “No.” The mechanics of the exercise are as follows:

Several people stand in an open space. One person (Person 1) is “it” and his goal is to leave his spot and take someone else’s spot. He does that by getting anyone else in the exercise to say “Yes” to him, whereupon he can leave his own position and take the position of the person who said “Yes.” To do so, Person 1 points to anyone else and waits for a response. The person chosen (Person 2) can say “Yes”; if she does so, Person 1 can walk toward Person 2 and take her spot. Or Person 2 can say “No” and Person 1 must choose someone else. If Person 2 says “Yes” to Person 1, Person 2 is now “it” and—as Person 1 did earlier—must point to anyone else (Person 3), eliciting a “Yes” (allowing Person 2 to move to Person 3’s spot) or a “No” (requiring Person 2 to select someone else). The game progresses in this manner.

Once participants understand these basic mechanics, the concept of elimination is introduced. A player is eliminated from the game if someone gets to his spot before he can obtain a “Yes” and move away. Participants must walk normally so that speed of movement is not a determining factor of survival or elimination. Everyone in the game can say “Yes” as often as they want or “No” as often as they want, or mix up responses however they see fit—with one caveat: if someone gets two “No’s” in a row, the next person is required to say “Yes” (to avoid a continuous stream of “No’s” and the stalling of the game).

While it may sound a little complicated, it is a simple game of “get a yes and take that person’s spot” and “get a no and move on to someone else,” and try to get a “Yes” before you are eliminated. There is no stated goal, although different goals tend to emerge (and sometimes clash). Most people play so as to avoid their own elimination. Many people play to eliminate everyone else and be the last person standing, and some try to keep everyone in. There are critical moments that develop—moments in which to say “Yes” and save someone in the game, potentially creating an ally or to say “No” and cause the person’s elimination, and moments when one must strategically decide whom to choose when the pressure is on.

With the game parameters and varying unstated goals in place, patterns emerge that indicate how actors do or do not work well on stage, as well as how people interact and negotiate with others in general. The patterns are as follows:

• If I pick you and you say “Yes,” I tend to go back to you. I see you as a team player, on my side. I also tend to say “Yes” back to you. Interestingly, even if I am playing to eliminate others, I tend to keep you in the game until we are the only ones left and I have to get you out.

• If I see you saying “Yes” to other people, I will go to you since I think you will say “Yes” to me as well.

• If I pick you and you say “No” to me, I tend not to go back to you. It is a waste of my time. I also tend to say “No” back to you. If you eliminate me in a game by saying “No,” I will be gunning for you in the next game to try to get you out!

• If I see you saying “No” to other people, I tend to avoid picking you since I think I will probably get the same result.

Usually, someone takes the “all No” approach—strategizing that if they just say “No” they will be safe and will survive in the game. Interestingly though, if other people identify the “No” Person, they tend to gang up on that player. They can, and often do, try to eliminate that person—they make that player the third person picked by getting two “No’s,” with the second “No” being someone standing next to the “No” Person, who then selects the “No” Person, who by the rules of the game now has to say “Yes.” Once the “No” Person says “Yes,” invariably the next two people selected say “No” and everyone celebrates if the “No” Person is eliminated.

A final pattern that emerges over the course of repeated game play is that different strategies arise with varying levels of success:

• The “All Yes” strategy to win over allies tends to end quickly, when the “All Yes” Person says “Yes” to the person next to him, giving himself no time to get his own “Yes” and in effect eliminating himself.

• The “All No” strategy tends to survive in the short term but then the “All No” Person is ignored and uninvolved (raising the question if she is even still in the game) or is targeted and ultimately eliminated.

• The strategy that tends to survive the longest is “Say Yes whenever I can, and No when I have to.” In other words, if you are far away from me and I have time to react and get my own “Yes” in time to stay in the game, I will always say “Yes,” even avoiding a short‐term opportunity to eliminate you. However, if you are too close and put me at risk, I will always say “No.” Interestingly, such a “No” is more readily accepted by the other participants who realize I said “No” purely to stay in the game and do not say “No” to me unless they also must do so to stay in the game.

Ultimately, the “Yes” game is a simple warm‐up exercise for improvisers designed to reinforce the notion that we have motion and fluidity when we say “Yes” and we start and stop and have problems when we say “No.” And yet there are also critical moments of decision making that affect the game/negotiation at hand as well as future games/negotiations. I have found that the exercise tends to reinforce how people work well with each other and seek integrative bargaining or how they do not work well, particularly if participants need to have repeated interactions or negotiations with each other. If players only must negotiate with each other once, it is easier to say “No” and eliminate the other/take advantage of him with less long‐term consequence. If people have to negotiate with each other repeatedly, though, they should consider saying “Yes” whenever possible but “No” when necessary.

In improvisation we strive for “Yes, And.” However, sometimes our habit of disagreeing can crop up in the form of “Yes, But.” It’s a sneaky way of physically saying “Yes” but really saying “No.” Looking again at the sunscreen scene described above, notice the difference:

Actor 2’s responses may seem similar, yet the “but” tends to work like a “no.” It tends to be less positive, indicating an unwillingness to work together, whereas “and” tends to be more positive and to leave open the possibility of finding a solution. For instance, with the “but”:

And the scene goes nowhere.

With the “and,” more solutions may develop:

“Yes, But” tends to indicate that a roadblock is coming, whereas “Yes, And” at a minimum demonstrates listening, understanding, and trying to negotiate a scene together. The “Yes, And” mindset enables actors to pivot and to discover new possibilities. As I have noted, the initial offers are examples of critical moments that can vastly affect the outcome of the scene. If actors start with “Yes, And” possibilities for mutual gain open up; if actors start with “Yes, But” the scene suffers from the same initial and lasting negative effects associated with saying “no” or negating an offer.

A “Yes, But” can also be subtle—indicated not just by outright negating the initial offer, but also by not working off of that offer. The language used might even be “Yes, and” yet the counteroffer has nothing to do with the initial offer. For instance:

And nothing really happens. The actors are not listening to and working off of each other’s initial offers. Actor 2’s assertion about the food has nothing to do with the great rides. Then rather than incorporate the counteroffer at all (e.g., “Let’s grab a funnel cake and go on the Funnel Flume!”), Actor 1 just continues to push his offer, which is once again ignored by Actor 2. In effect, they are saying “Yes, But” to each other—they are not expressly saying “No”— but they are missing the opportunity at a critical moment to drive a mutually beneficial scene negotiation.

As the skills and principles of improvisation have become more valued in the fields of business and negotiation, some misconceptions of the meaning of “Yes, And” have emerged.

When I discuss improvisation and negotiation, people often say “Oh yeah, improvisation—it’s all about just saying ‘Yes.’” While getting to “Yes” is part of it, saying "Yes" is really just the baseline. New ideas, “what ifs,” and solutions tend to be in the “and” part of "Yes, and"—the "and" builds and expands the idea. Thinking of or striving for the “and” requires reading the other actor, understanding what she says and what her offer means, providing input to move the idea ahead, and negotiating the scene together. Just saying “Yes” can mean giving away one’s own initial offer and status or throwing back on the other person all of the responsibility to keep driving the negotiation. Going back to our example of the pie, if the second actor just says “yes” all the time, nothing interesting emerges:

Notice that Actor 1 is driving all the choices. Actor 2 is not getting in the way, and his responses may be better than negating, but the actor is not adding anything to the scene. Actor 2 has no stakes in the interaction and nothing that he might want is added to the scene; nothing that he may have wanted initially to offer or gain in the scene is realized. Moreover, his responses can make the interaction harder for Actor 1. Actor 1 may proceed just fine, controlling everything in the scene and negotiating for whatever she wants, or she might run out of ideas and the interaction stalls—either Actor 2 will not contribute to or benefit from the scene negotiation, or the scene may never reach its full potential.

Getting to “Yes” is the baseline. In those critical moments of the initial offers, the “and” is where the new ideas arise and the connections and win‐win interactions occur.

Similarly, in negotiation, there are situations where the “and” of “Yes, and” may help drive new options for mutual gain, whereas just saying “Yes” may leave unexplored options off the table. For example:

Compare the above scenario to the one that follows:

In the first example, the parties ultimately both found more value than they would just agreeing to the offer. Maybe Person 2 was ready to sign on with that discount, and yet she also listened and understood that Person 1 valued having her company on his client roster. Open to that idea, she explored how valuable he might consider promoting that relationship by offering a testimonial and “preferred vendor” status if the discount were extended. Person 1, recognizing the potential value of that recognition, agreed to extend the discount if he could promote the partnership. As a result, Person 1 not only got the deal, he also secured a piece of valuable marketing for future clients that might net far more business than the cost of the ongoing 20 percent discount. Person 2 not only got the initial deal; she also secured an ongoing discount that could mean years of savings. In the second example, Person 2 was ready to sign on and simply said “Yes” without really listening and understanding that there might be additional added value to both parties with an endorsement. Person 1 was happy to get the deal and left with what he went into the negotiation seeking—and yet they both left undiscovered mutual gains off the table.

The other thing I often hear when I discuss improvisation and negotiation is almost a dismissive “I know, ‘Yes, And, Yes, And,’ let’s all get along and play nice.” While that can happen (and maybe is not such a bad idea), “Yes, And” does allow for disagreement and difficult conversations and negotiations. The essence of “Yes, And” is that we are listening to and reading each other, acknowledging each other’s offers and viewpoints, and building toward a solution. That can be positive while also allowing for disagreement or opposing viewpoints as we find common ground. Let’s return to the sunscreen scene:

In the beginning, there was an air of disagreement. Actor 1 may have wanted to go outside and Actor 2 may not have wanted to go outside. Instead of just arguing, Actor 1 listened to and recognized Actor 2’s potential hang‐up or dilemma in going outside and used it to create a new idea. In three quick exchanges the actors conceived of an idea and arrived at a solution that neither foresaw when the scene started—they would band together and show other beachgoers how tough they are.

Similarly in negotiation, there are situations where the concept of “Yes, And” can be applied. For example:

Compare the above scenario to the one that follows:

In the first example, the parties may still have to find a way for the budgeting to work, and ultimately it may not work, yet they are potentially problem solving as they negotiate. At the very least Person 1 feels heard and now understands that there is a funding problem and may seek a way to solve it, or at least to understand why it cannot be solved. In the second example, Person 1 may feel disregarded and the conversation may escalate in frustration.

The concepts of improvisation have corollaries to the integrative bargaining tactics of negotiation. As Walton and McKersie outlined in A Behavioral Theory of Labor Negotiations, integrative bargaining and problem solving require motivation, common information and language, and trust (Walton and McKersie 1965). The improvisers’ “Yes, And” technique similarly requires mutual motivation to work together to create and problem solve, understand and read each other, and build a baseline of trust. To build those conditions (or not), similar attitudinal components of relationship patterns come into play:

Table One displays the original table of relationship patterns and attitudinal components in negotiation (Figure 6‐1 “Attitudinal Components of the Relationship Patterns” in Walton and McKersie 1965: 189), and adds in the corresponding similar relationship patterns and attitudinal components (“No,” “Yes, But,” “Yes,” and “Yes, And”) that emerge within improvisation.

Similarly, the principles of improvisation reinforce the concepts of moving from positional bargaining to principled negotiation. As Fisher, Ury, and Patton outline in Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In, principled negotiation creates problem solvers and may open up new possibilities and “options for mutual gain,” whereas positional bargaining tends toward “hard” and “soft” positions that limit options and create winners and losers (Fisher, Ury, and Patton 2011). In improvisation, “Yes, And” creates problem solvers and opens up new scene possibilities with options for mutual gain, whereas “Yes, But” or “No” (hard position) or only “Yes” (soft position) limit options and create scene stealers and window dressing. As the number of improvisors increases in any one negotiated scene, it becomes even more important that each is engaging in “Yes, And,” or principled negotiation, so that the resulting product goes from bad, or merely good, to great.

Improvisation focuses on the power of saying “Yes” rather than “No” and ultimately “Yes, And” rather than “Yes, But” as actors interact with each other to create scenes that are rich and complex. To be successful, actors need to fight the knee‐jerk habit to disagree and instead explore the “what ifs.” There are both immediate and long‐term powerful effects of saying “Yes” and “Yes, And” instead of “No” and “Yes, But.” A “Yes, And” mindset requires listening to, reading, and understanding the other person at critical moments and seeking to build off of their offers and counteroffers to find better, mutually agreeable ideas or solutions. The principle of “Yes, And” is not just about saying “Yes” and it can be applied in both “friendly” and “adversarial” negotiations. “Yes, And” can help identify and capitalize on critical moments in negotiation, whether on stage or in “the real world.”

And, scene…