Welcome to DealCraft, insights from great negotiators. I'm Jim Sabinius, professor at Harvard Business School and director of the Harvard Negotiation Project at Harvard Law School. This podcast series features my interviews with some of the world's top dealmakers and diplomats, from whom I'll distill practical lessons. Dealcraft is a masterclass in negotiation.
straight from the masters themselves. What he put on the table was unacceptable. I said, if you're saying take it or leave it, well, obviously I have to leave it. But I don't think that's what you meant. It's pretty simple. Jim, when you're dealing with somebody, if you can figure out what they're interested in and whether you can satisfy that need, you unlock some amazing door.
That was Charlene Barshevsky, top U.S. trade negotiator and Steve Schwartzman, chairman and CEO of Blackstone, whom Forbes called Wall Street's greatest dealmaker. They are but two of the world's top dealmakers and diplomats whom I'll interview in DealCraft. insights from great negotiators to extract winning strategies and tactics will go behind the scenes of some of today's most intriguing negotiations for example here's john branca
a music industry super lawyer who's had over 30 clients elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Branca was in the final stages of negotiations to buy the Beatles catalog for Michael Jackson when he got an unwelcome call just as he was boarding a flight to London.
I pick up the phone and it's Richard Branson. And he said, I think I'm going to make a bid. What do you think? I'm like, oh my God. I'm about to get on the Concorde to fly and close the deal. And he was about to get on a balloon flight over the Atlantic. or from Christiana Figueres, Costa Rican diplomat who led and saved the Paris climate negotiations as she was trying to get the Saudis on board. I was on a flight on my way back.
from an oil field in a Saudi Aramco little jet because they don't do propellers. And we were sitting next to each other. And I just said, how are you going to deal with that heat? And he began to put on the table several options of what could bring them into an agreement. More from legends like Henry Kissinger. Marveling.
at his marathon negotiating sessions with Zhou Enlai, his Chinese counterpart. I used to say to him, I couldn't give you this much uninterrupted time if you came to Washington short of the second coming. I came to Harvard after years of valuable experience in business and government. For decades, I've practiced, researched, advised high-level clients and taught effective approaches to complex negotiations.
These rich experiences led me to create this DealCraft podcast series. As I said at the outset, think of it as a masterclass in negotiation, straight from the masters themselves. Enjoy DealCraft insights from great negotiators. wherever you get your podcasts.