460.08 Negotiation for Lawyers

For lawyers in every type of law practice, the ability to negotiate effectively is an essential skill. As a lawyer, you will negotiate when you try to settle a lawsuit, close a merger, or arrange a plea bargain. You will negotiate with counterparts, clients, and co-workers. You will negotiate with service providers and the “system” – the court, the government, or your community. And, you will continue to negotiate with your friends and family. In this highly interactive seminar, we will explore the theories, skills, and ethics involved in legal negotiation. With limited exceptions, in each class you will participate in a role-play simulation of increasing complexity, experiment with new techniques, and then reflect on what negotiation strategies worked best for you. Through this process, you will not only gain insight into your own negotiation style, you will develop the toolkit you need to approach each new negotiation with confidence.

Even without a pandemic, negotiating by electronic means has become a common way of how lawyers do business. This requires lawyers to be versatile and able to negotiate by email, telephone, and videoconference, to evaluate the pros and cons of each, and to select the most appropriate technology (or combination of technologies) given the particular parties and circumstances. Because this course will be offered entirely online, you will get significant practice negotiating by videoconference. You will also have opportunities to negotiate by telephone and email.  By the end of the semester, you will be comfortable negotiating in a digital world.

Because of the nature of the course, the amount of information delivered during the first class period, the importance of participating in the first role-play simulation during the first class period, and the typical waitlists for enrollment in the course, attendance at the first class is absolutely required. A student who fails to attend the first class without prior consent of the instructor will forfeit his or her place in the class. (Working for an additional week in the summer and call-back interviews are not acceptable excuses for missing the first class.) Students who are on the waitlist for the course are encouraged to attend the first class, and those who do will be given preference to fill open slots in the class. There is a shortened drop period for this course so that students who are waitlisted can enroll before the second class occurs. Thus, students may drop this course without permission only before the second class.

Because of the similarities between this course and the negotiation course taught at the Fuqua School of Business, a law student may not receive law school credit for both courses.

 

Spring 2021

Course Number Course Credits Evaluation Method Instructor
460.08
Course Credits
Reflective Writing
Research and/or analytical paper(s), 15-20 pages
Practical exercises
Class participation
Casandra L. Thomson
Sakai site: https://sakai.duke.edu/portal/site/LAW.460.08.Sp21
Email list: LAW.460.08.Sp21@sakai.duke.edu
Course
Degree Requirements
Course Requirements - JD
Course Requirements - JD-LLM-LE
Course Areas of Practice