There is a saying among mediators: often at the start of a mediation, the mediator is the only optimistic person in the room. She is the only one who believes the matter will settle.
It turns out that there is something to this adage. In a blog post by the staff at Harvard’s PONS entitled “Do Attitudes In Negotiation Influence Results?” (July 28, 2020), the authors discuss research that showed that your attitude towards and in a negotiation does make a difference. If you are one who thinks that you can improve your negotiation ability and thus the outcome, you are very likely to reach a much better resolution than one who believes in fate and thinks that negotiation ability is innate and nothing can be done to change the result or outcome. (Id.) It turns out that having a positive attitude (along with high expectations) towards and in a negotiation will indeed affect the results, leading to a better result. (Id.)
