The art of negotiation depends on your ability to successfully communicate with the other side of the table. An important part of this communication is your ability to signal to the other side what your intentions are. Likewise, they will be signaling to you what they want to accomplish.

This additional signaling communication channel provides a negotiator with a great deal of information and allows them to steer the negotiation in the direction that they want it to go. However, signaling is not easy to do and it can be difficult to learn how to do it well.

Signaling in a negotiation is not just one thing, rather it is a complete collection of different actions that you can take to send a message to the other side. These actions can include body language, escalations, and the use of deadlines.

Signaling is a subtle form of communication. It's not something that any of us are born with, rather we need to learn how to use this technique to express what we want to the other side. Our goal must always be to be using our signaling to show the other side how we can keep the negotiations moving towards an eventual deal that will be acceptable to everyone.

In order to become better signalers, we need to take the time to observe how signaling is used in other negotiations. What we'll quickly realize is that signaling involves the ability to patiently wait and the ability to repeat ourselves over and over again just to make sure that we're able to get our point across.

This book has been created to provide you with an understanding of both what signaling in a negotiation looks like as well as how you can develop the signaling skills that you will need. We'll examine how you can use signaling when making concessions and how to get the other side to see things your way.