Settling a case does not have to be complicated. Certainly, you need to know what you are willing to pay, and you should try to find out what your adversary is willing to take. How you get there is the issue.
The most important thing is to prepare yourself in the best way possible. You must understand your case. You must understand what the issues are, what the damages could be, and what variables there are. These are all things that anybody who knows how to settle a case knows is the starting point.
Sometimes people think it is some of game, or some kind of ego trip where you try to outsmart the other person. That is not the way to go.
Some people feel they must be tough and show that they are tough. Some people feel they must appear as if they really do not want to settle. These approaches are not productive.
In the movie Sea of Love, there is an intimate scene between a New York City detective, played by Al Pacino, and Ellen Barkin, who manages a shoe store in the Upper West Side of Manhattan. He comes to her apartment. She thinks he is there because he is interested in a relationship. He may be, but what she does not know is that he is also investigating a murder, and she is a suspect. She disappears into the bathroom. While she is out of the room, he sees her pocketbook on the floor and, when he looks in it, he sees a gun, and suddenly he thinks he may have found the killer.
Then she comes out of the bathroom wearing only a towel. She then whispers something in his ear, as she pushes him against the wall. He says, what? And she says it again, and he says, what? And then she says it more loudly: “Tell me what you’re looking for?” She was not sure what his intentions are or what he is looking for from her. However, he was not willing to share with her what he is looking for –whether she is the killer. Once he saw the gun, he showed her what he was looking for — the murder and he thinks it’s her…so he arrests her!
to know what happens what see the movie….
But her words are really the key. It is everything in life. If you want to know what someone wants, you must ask. She is trying to find out what he is looking for in her, and he is trying to find out whether she is the killer.. But the point is that she was trying to communicate, and he had no intention of communicating….
If you are trying to reach a resolution of a dispute, that is what you must do. If you can get to the point where you feel enough confidence that you know the other side’s case, and you know your own case, you can just say those words — “…tell me what you’re looking for? If you have done your homework, and the adversaries have done theirs, you both will show your cards and the case will settle. It is that simple.