{"id":1052,"date":"2011-07-11T19:31:08","date_gmt":"2011-07-11T19:31:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/libraryshenanigans.wordpress.com\/?p=1052"},"modified":"2026-02-11T23:21:32","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T23:21:32","slug":"getting-to-yes-library-shenanigan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/2011\/07\/11\/getting-to-yes-library-shenanigan\/","title":{"rendered":"Getting to Yes library shenanigan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.worldcat.org\/oclc\/24318769\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-1053\" title=\"gettingtoyes\" src=\"http:\/\/jessyrandall.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/gettingtoyes.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"128\" height=\"196\" \/><\/a>My friend Kris has written to tell me of a possibly library shenanigan on page 40 of <em>Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In<\/em> (Roger Fisher and William Ury, 1991).<\/p>\n<p>Kris tells me:<em> The point of the story is about how negotiations are generally not zero-sum, but can be about giving both people everything they want, because you focus on their interests, rather than on their position in the negotiation.\u00a0 So here&#8217;s the story:<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Consider the story of two men quarreling in a library. One wants the window open and the other wants it closed. They bicker back and forth about how much to leave it open: a crack, halfway, three quarters of the way. No solution satisfies them both. Enter the librarian. She asks one why he wants the window open: &#8220;To get some fresh air.&#8221; She asks the other why he wants it closed: &#8220;To avoid the draft.&#8221; After thinking a minute, she opens wide a window in the next room, bringing in fresh air without a draft.<br \/>\n<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> I think it is really interesting that the one who fixes a problem is not only a librarian, but also the only woman in the story. But this interest is overshadowed by the fact that they are in a LIBRARY with windows that OPEN. I am pretty sure I have never been in a library with windows that open, but I am willing to concede that this might have been very common in The Olden Timey Days.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Thanks, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pitt.edu\/%7Ekanthak\/\">Kris Kanthak<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My friend Kris has written to tell me of a possibly library shenanigan on page 40 of Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In (Roger Fisher and William Ury, 1991). Kris tells me: The point of the story is about how negotiations are generally not zero-sum, but can be about giving both people everything [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":413,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-shenanigans"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3q4oW-gY","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/413"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1052"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4100,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions\/4100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/ccspecialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}