All Things Negotiation

Stan Christensen
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A podcast about negotiation, persuasion, and influence—taught through real stories. Hosted by Stan Christensen, who has taught negotiation at Stanford University for over 20 years, this bi-weekly podcast features founders, executives, investors, and foreign policy experts sharing real-world negotiation experiences. Episodes explore how leaders negotiate with venture capitalists, employees, customers, boards, and governments—and what actually works when the stakes are high.

  1. 21 hr ago

    Daniel Pink: The Art of Persuasion in a Changing World

    What do your regrets reveal about what you value, and how can they make you a better negotiator? Bestselling author Daniel H. Pink (The Power of Regret, Drive, A Whole New Mind) joins Stan Christensen to talk about regret, persuasion, motivation, and building a career as AI takes over entry-level work. Drawing on regrets collected from more than 26,000 people in 134 countries, Pink explains why we regret the chances we didn't take far more than the ones we did, why moral regrets cut deepest, and why "awkward" is almost never a good reason not to reach out. Stan and Dan also cover: - How to change someone's mind in a divided country, and the "looping" technique for understanding people you disagree with - Why taste, composition, and wisdom become more valuable as AI improves - Career advice for 21-year-olds, and why "follow your passion" falls short - What really motivates people, and why fairness matters in pay and negotiation - How Dan reads, when to quit a book, and the fiction and nonfiction that changed his mind Timestamps (0:00) Introducing Daniel Pink (1:35) What our regrets reveal about what we value (3:01) The girl on the school bus (6:20) How regret makes you a better negotiator (7:26) A silver dollar and a handwritten letter (10:45) Regrets of action vs. inaction (13:07) Connection regrets: "If only I'd reached out" (17:05) Understanding each other in a divided country (19:25) Looping for understanding (22:31) Negotiating your career in the age of AI (24:56) Taste, composition, and wisdom (31:56) Why "follow your passion" is bad advice (37:00) What really works for productivity (40:50) Why empathy isn't weakness in negotiation (45:20) What actually motivates people (47:41) Negotiating job offers and fair pay (51:43) How Daniel Pink reads (55:13) Daniel Pink's book picks (57:54) Who persuaded Daniel Pink Links Daniel H. Pink: https://www.danpink.com The Power of Regret: https://www.danpink.com/books/the-power-of-regret/ The World Regret Survey: https://worldregretsurvey.com/ The Puzzle of Motivation (TED): https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_the_puzzle_of_motivation Books discussed: A Whole New Mind and Drive (Daniel H. Pink), High Conflict (Amanda Ripley), Deep Work (Cal Newport), Getting Things Done (David Allen), Getting to Yes (Roger Fisher and William Ury), Yesteryear (Caro Claire Burke), James (Percival Everett), Animal Farm (George Orwell), The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald), The Nickel Boys (Colson Whitehead), Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk (Ben Fountain), The Righteous Mind (Jonathan Haidt), The Stoic Challenge (William B. Irvine), Influence (Robert Cialdini), The Art of Gathering (Priya Parker). Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@AllThingsNegotiation Host Stan Christensen has spent his career as a professional negotiator and teaches negotiation at Stanford. On All Things Negotiation, he talks with leaders, diplomats, and thinkers about how persuasion and influence work in the real world.

    Daniel Pink: The Art of Persuasion in a Changing World

  2. 8 Oct

    Samantha Power: Negotiating With Russia, Persuading Obama, and the Fight for USAID

    How do you persuade a president, negotiate with Russia, and build a coalition when change seems impossible? Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and USAID Administrator Samantha Power joins Stan Christensen for a candid conversation about diplomacy, negotiation, and leading through crisis. Power, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of A Problem from Hell and The Education of an Idealist, shares how she talked her way into covering the war in Bosnia, what she learned negotiating the removal of Syria's chemical weapons, and why Russia's UN ambassador Vitaly Churkin was the best negotiator she ever faced. They also discuss how to raise human rights issues without sounding moralistic, what really worked in persuading President Obama, the Ebola response, the dismantling of USAID and its human cost, and the lessons from her Harvard course on making change when change is hard, including why every coalition needs both "Baptists and bootleggers." 0:00 Samantha Power and The Education of an Idealist 0:30 The audiobook and a letter to her son 2:15 How a failed negotiation made her a war correspondent 4:05 Writing her own press badge 4:45 Why you have to get close to the issue 6:50 Negotiation lessons: leave it all on the field 9:30 Leading USAID 11:15 How USAID was dismantled 15:10 Why Congress didn't push back 24:20 How to persuade President Obama 27:40 Raising human rights in policy debates 33:25 Syria, chemical weapons, and the red line 41:30 Negotiating with Russia's Vitaly Churkin 45:35 Lessons from the Ebola response 51:15 Teaching social change at Harvard 52:25 Shrink the change 53:30 Find your Baptists and bootleggers SAMANTHA POWER Harvard Kennedy School faculty page https://www.hks.harvard.edu/faculty/samantha-power BOOKS BY SAMANTHA POWER The Education of an Idealist: A Memoir https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-education-of-an-idealist-samantha-power A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide (2003 Pulitzer Prize) https://www.amazon.com/Problem-Hell-America-Age-Genocide/dp/0465061516 Chasing the Flame: One Man's Fight to Save the World https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/300934/chasing-the-flame-by-samantha-power/ HER HARVARD COURSE WITH CASS SUNSTEIN Making Change When Change Is Hard: The Law, Politics, and Policy of Social Change https://www.hks.harvard.edu/courses/making-change-when-change-hard-law-politics-and-policy-social-change BOOKS DISCUSSED Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard by Chip Heath and Dan Heath https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/77696/switch-by-chip-heath-and-dan-heath/ Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Team-of-Rivals/Doris-Kearns-Goodwin/9780743270755 LISTEN TO ALL THINGS NEGOTIATION Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/all-things-negotiation/id1769229339 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@AllThingsNegotiation Host Stan Christensen has spent his career as a professional negotiator and teaches negotiation at Stanford. On All Things Negotiation, he talks with leaders, diplomats, and thinkers about how persuasion and influence work in the real world. #SamanthaPower #Negotiation #Diplomacy #USAID #AllThingsNegotiation

    Samantha Power: Negotiating With Russia, Persuading Obama, and the Fight for USAID

  3. 22 Sept

    David Brooks: How to bridge America’s divide

    David Brooks, bestselling author of How to Know a Person, explores how to bridge America's political and cultural divide, and why listening, empathy, judgment, and understanding people we disagree with may matter more than persuasion. Brooks, host of the new podcast The Permanent Questions and author of The Second Mountain, argues that many of the institutions shaping young people have become better at preparing them for careers than preparing them for life. We explore what universities should be teaching that they often are not: judgment, empathy, moral reasoning, curiosity, listening, and the ability to understand people whose beliefs differ from our own. David explains why intelligence and good judgment are not the same thing, why asking better questions can transform our relationships, and why understanding another person should come before trying to persuade them. The conversation ranges from America's political and cultural divisions to AI and education, meaning and faith, marriage and parenting, loneliness and friendship, and what David learned about suffering and character. At the heart of the conversation is an idea from How to Know a Person: in an increasingly divided culture, learning how to truly see and understand another human being may be one of the most important things we can learn to do. This is ultimately a hopeful conversation about becoming better listeners, better thinkers, better parents and partners, and better at living with people who see the world differently. BOOKS AND RESOURCES David Brooks How to Know a Personhttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/652822/how-to-know-a-person-by-david-brooks/ The Second Mountainhttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/3375/david-brooks/ DAVID BROOKS'S NEW PODCAST The Permanent Questions with David Brookshttps://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-permanent-questions-with-david-brooks/id6803240325 BOOKS DISCUSSED AND RECOMMENDED The Sense of Reality by Isaiah Berlinhttps://www.amazon.com/s?k=The+Sense+of+Reality+Isaiah+Berlin Community by Peter Blockhttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/815995/community-third-edition-by-peter-block/ The Meaning of Marriage by Timothy Keller and Kathy Kellerhttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/309809/the-meaning-of-marriage-by-timothy-keller-with-kathy-keller/ Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Franklhttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/206272/mans-search-for-meaning-by-viktor-e-frankl/ Morality by Jonathan Sackshttps://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/jonathan-sacks/morality/9781541675322/ The Tyranny of Merit by Michael J. Sandelhttps://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250770028/thetyrannyofmerit/ Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegnerhttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/172500/crossing-to-safety-by-wallace-stegner/ Juvenescence by Robert Pogue Harrisonhttps://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/J/bo18596462.html

    David Brooks: How to bridge America’s divide

  4. 8 Sept

    Angela Duckworth: Why Grit isn’t Enough and How to Get Situated

    Angela Duckworth, bestselling author of Grit, returns with a powerful new idea: success depends not only on your character and perseverance, but also on the people, places, cultures, and environments surrounding you. In her new book, Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best, the University of Pennsylvania and Wharton professor explains why grit and willpower are sometimes not enough. Instead of always asking, “What’s wrong with me?” Angela suggests asking a different question: “What’s wrong with my situation—and how can i change it?” In this conversation, Angela explains how to intentionally create situations that make success, better relationships, and positive change more likely. They explore how to recognize a culture that is holding you back, choose influential peers, find mentors without awkwardly asking someone to “be your mentor,” and design an environment that makes good decisions easier. Angela also discusses what Taylor Swift understood about the power of place, how parents shape children through behavior rather than lectures, and how changing the situation helped Angela and her husband navigate a crisis in their marriage. The conversation concludes with a wider examination of political polarization, social media, smartphones, public education, and the environments that increasingly separate us from people who think differently. Topics include: • Why grit is necessary but not sufficient • How your environment shapes your behavior and identity • When perseverance becomes a reason to remain in the wrong situation • How culture and peer groups influence career decisions• Practical strategies for finding mentors • Parenting through modeling rather than lecturing • Changing the situation instead of trying to change your spouse • Social media, smartphones, and political polarization • How to design surroundings that bring out your best Get Angela Duckworth’s new book, Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best:https://www.angeladuckworth.com/situatedGet Angela's Best Selling Book Grit: https://www.angeladuckworth.com/grit Angela Duckworth is a professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of the international bestseller Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, which has sold more than five million copies. Her new book is Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best.

    Angela Duckworth: Why Grit isn’t Enough and How to Get Situated

  5. 25 Aug

    Blake Mycoskie: No Magic Pill

    Blake Mycoskie, founder of TOMS Shoes, joins Stan to discuss his entrepreneurial journey through the lens of negotiation, from losing The Amazing Race due to wrong assumptions to building TOMS’ one-for-one model that donated over 100 million pairs of shoes. He shares negotiation lessons from supply-chain struggles in Argentina and China, early PR-driven demand he couldn’t fulfill, and a costly Nordstrom deal he “won” by refusing boxes that later backfired. After selling TOMS for nearly $1B and moving to Jackson Hole, Blake describes losing purpose, falling into deep depression, and seeking external fixes before realizing fulfillment required inner work. He explains the role of community, reducing mental-health stigma, his No Magic Pill podcast, and his “Enough” bracelet nonprofit supporting mental-health causes. ------------------------------------ No Magic Pill Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@NoMagicPillwithBlakeMycoskie Personal Website: https://blakemycoskie.com/Enough: https://blakemycoskie.com/enough Morning Water: https://blakemycoskie.com/morning-water 00:00 External Success Inner Crash 00:43 Meet Blake And The Big Life 02:04 Amazing Race Lesson 04:14 Risk Conviction And Early Hustles 06:28 Argentina Spark And Career Advice 08:35 Supply Chain Negotiation Reality 13:22 LA Times Orders And Customer Emails 15:48 Retail Growth And Channel Control 17:39 Airport Fan Moment And Storytelling 21:10 Breaking Into Retail By Showing Up 23:36 Nordstrom Box Negotiation Backfire 24:59 Nordstrom Box Fiasco 25:51 Stubborn Values Lessons 27:56 Post Exit Purpose Crash 30:23 Core Wound Enoughness 32:08 No Magic Pill Podcast 39:37 Community Beats Stigma 46:00 Serve Others Daily 48:28 First Steps for Help 49:51 Enough Bracelet Movement 52:40 Closing Reflections

    Blake Mycoskie: No Magic Pill

  6. 11 Aug

    Michael McFaul: Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia on Putin, China, and the Future of Democracy

    In this episode of All Things Negotiation, Stanford professor and former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul discusses the difference between autocrats and democrats. How leaders like Putin, Xi, and Trump think differently than leaders who seek to protect democratic institutions. As someone who has known Putin since before his rise to power, Ambassador Mcfaul explains why he is not interested in personal friendship with American leaders and how offering unilateral concessions yields nothing in return. Ambassador McFaul reflects on the Obama-era Iran nuclear deal, arguing it successfully constrained Iran’s program and that Trump’s withdrawal accelerated Iran’s capacity while failing to meet stated objectives. He explains how autocrats are paranoid about democratic ideas, and he traces Putin’s evolution and obsession with Ukraine. The conversation covers leadership, U.S. polarization and isolationism, President Zelensky’s wartime transformation, the strategic importance of aiding Ukraine for European security and Taiwan deterrence, and how China uses international institutions and new multilateral bodies while maintaining a limited partnership with Russia. Check out Michael’s new book: https://www.amazon.com/Autocrats-vs-Democrats-America-Disorder/dp/B0DW2GWHLQ 02:59 IRAN & THE NUCLEAR DEAL 06:21 UNDERSTANDING PUTIN 14:14 NEGOTIATING WITH PUTIN 18:47 TRUMP & THE AUTOCRATIC PLAYBOOK 22:38 NAVALNY 25:13 POSSIBLE BUMPER 28:21 BEGIN ENDING 28:28 UKRAINE & ZELENSKY 39:37 CHINA & XI 47:25 MOVE FORWARD 50:07 ALLIES & CLOSING

    Michael McFaul: Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia on Putin, China, and the Future of Democracy

  7. 21 Jul

    Roger Carstens: America’s Chief Hostage Negotiator

    Stan talks with Roger Carstens, former U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs and ex–Army Ranger/Special Forces officer, about high-stakes hostage negotiations and the realities of persuading adversaries. Carstens explains how the hostage office was created after U.S. failures in Syria, argues engagement is essential despite “we don’t negotiate” rhetoric, and reports his team helped bring home 65 Americans and over 250 non-Americans. He details preparation methods, identifying true decision-makers, and the often tougher “interagency combat” inside Washington. Case discussions include Russia prisoner swaps involving Viktor Bout, expanding negotiations into a multi-country deal, efforts to include Alexei Navalny, and the importance of allies. He describes President Biden’s deep involvement with Gaza hostage families, contrasts Iranian tactics with other states, and emphasizes trust, empathy, transparency, intuition, and creativity. 01:55 Military Roots of Negotiation 02:57 Special Forces Mindset 05:22 Hostage Envoy Office Origins 07:21 Why You Must Engage 09:38 Inside a Russia Swap Prep 10:50 Finding the Real Decision Makers 14:50 Interagency Friction and Resilience 17:00 Families as Creative Partners 19:53 What Makes a Fair Trade 24:05 Hardest Negotiation Is Internal 25:27 Victor Bout After Release 26:28 Enlarging the Swap With Allies 28:35 Navalny on the Table 33:18 Allies and Trust at the Top 34:10 Biden and Gaza Hostage Families 36:47 Tragedy on the Call 38:45 White House Takes Lead 40:26 Relationships First 41:42 Iranian Negotiation Games 44:02 Winning Over the Taliban 47:45 Maduro and Venezuela Lessons 53:07 Intuition and Judgment 58:28 China and Building Rapport 01:01:39 Surging Trust Fast 01:06:33 Lightning Round and Closing Host Stan Christensen has spent his career working as a professional negotiator in a variety of arenas. He has also taught a popular course on negotiation at Stanford University for over twenty years.

    Roger Carstens: America’s Chief Hostage Negotiator

  8. 30 Jun

    Christa Gannon: Negotiating With Kids the System Gave Up On

    Stan interviews Christa Gannon about founding Fresh Lifelines for Youth (FLY) after volunteering with incarcerated teens and asking what could have prevented their involvement with the justice system. A former UC Santa Barbara basketball All-American and Stanford Law graduate, Gannon describes negotiating with fear to take a nontraditional path, learning entrepreneurial lessons from sports, and using deep listening to co-design programs with youth around legal education, mentoring, and leadership development. She discusses the demographics and trauma many justice-involved youth face, the use of role plays to teach life skills and conflict resolution, and the importance of authenticity, consistency, and humility in earning trust. The conversation covers persuading system stakeholders and donors with shared goals, outcomes, and youth-centered storytelling, plus FLY’s results in reducing recidivism and building hope, and Gannon’s later transition from CEO and her work supporting leadership transitions. Check out FLY: https://flyprogram.org 00:00 Vision Beyond Prison 00:22 Choosing a Different Path 02:29 Claiming the Torch 04:23 Athlete Mindset for Leadership 05:52 Juvenile Hall Catalyst 07:31 Founding FLY Mission 09:00 Credibility and Permission 10:49 Who the Youth Are 13:23 Deep Listening Co Creation 15:36 Teaching Through Role Plays1 8:21 Persuading Systems and Stakeholders 20:06 Authenticity Builds Buy In 23:02 Trust Story Football Mentor 25:34 Role Plays in Real Life 26:28 Mentor Program Lesson 27:51 Volunteer Consistency Matters 29:19 Parents Gangs Ripple Effects 31:56 Replacing Gang Belonging 32:34 Justice System Stakeholders 34:43 Donors Stories Ethics 39:10 Measuring Youth Outcomes 40:32 Teaching Conflict Skills 41:44 Meeting Kids Where They Are 44:34 Work Family Balance 48:29 Founder Transition Bridge 50:28 Transition Advice Closing Host Stan Christensen has spent his career working as a professional negotiator in a variety of arenas. He has also taught a popular course on negotiation at Stanford University for over twenty years.

    Christa Gannon: Negotiating With Kids the System Gave Up On
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About

A podcast about negotiation, persuasion, and influence—taught through real stories. Hosted by Stan Christensen, who has taught negotiation at Stanford University for over 20 years, this bi-weekly podcast features founders, executives, investors, and foreign policy experts sharing real-world negotiation experiences. Episodes explore how leaders negotiate with venture capitalists, employees, customers, boards, and governments—and what actually works when the stakes are high.

Information

  • Creator
    Stan Christensen
  • Years Active
    2024 - 2026
  • Episodes
    57
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Stan Christensen
  • Show Website
    All Things Negotiation

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