Anyone who has raised kids knows that there is no tougher negotiator than the average nine year old. Help has at last arrived for parents eager to negotiate more effectively with their own children.

The February issue of Negotiation offers tips to “Negotiate Better Relationships with Your Children” (PDF). Negotiation is a monthly newsletter produced by the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School. Learning to negotiate with your kids produces real benefits, including more cooperative children and more trust between parents and children:

Just as smart business negotiators avoid bullying tactics and undue concessions, relationship-centered parents engage in a problem-solving process that enhances cooperation and satisfaction for the entire family. Rather than pretending that conflict always can be avoided or behaving as though kids must be dominated, these parents teach their children to deal with conflict in productive ways.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 13th, 2008 at 6:59 am and is filed under Divorce, Marriage, Family, Negotiation and Settlement. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.