“I will use what I've learned to be more mindful of my daily interactions and more considerate and realistic about getting to solutions with others.”
– Imani | Together We Bake | 2023
Who We Serve
Negotiation Works serves members of marginalized communities in the Washington, DC metropolitan area. The constituency groups who benefit from our services include individuals returning to the community from prison, women who are experiencing homelessness or living in domestic violence shelters, and individuals who are dealing with other life challenges such as long-term unemployment or recovery from substance abuse.
“This course gave me more incentive to advocate for myself in every situation.”
- “Donna” | Together We Bake | 2023
“One of Calvary's core values is empowerment. Learning negotiation skills gives our women the courage to know that they can advocate for themselves and work through difficult conversations.”
- KATIE GREGSON | MANAGER OF EDUCATION AND PROGRAMS, CALVARY WOMEN’S SERVICES | 2023
“The instructors did an excellent job with making everyone feel welcomed so that we could be open and honest on how to handle real life challenges.”
- Portia, 35 | The WIRE | Fall 2021
“I have used negotiations for some time with my daughter's mother, however since I've begun taking this course, our co-parenting has been much more successful.”
Sa’id, 38 | Georgetown Pivot Program | Fall 2021
“I believed I was a good negotiator before this class. Now that I have proper training I'm ready for any type of negotiation. I won't go into negotiations blindly anymore. Instead, I'll spend time beforehand figuring out possible interests, options, and BATNAs so that I can go in and get the best outcome for all parties.”
- Maya, 32 | Georgetown Pivot Program | Fall 2021
“The biggest thing this class taught me is that calmness and empathy go a long way in helping to negotiate and resolve conflict.”
- Michelle, 50 | Georgetown Pivot Program | 2021
“In this competitive world, you will find that everybody wants the best outcome, so you have to be prepared, and this class has done just that.”
- Samantha, 34 | Calvary Women's Services | 2020
“I am not an assertive person. This class has taught me that I have the right to negotiate. It’s exciting to learn that I can negotiate.”
- “Carrie,” 49 | Together We Bake | 2019
“This class has taught me to negotiate, communicate, understand, and listen.”
"TIFFANY," 28 | SOUTHEAST MINISTRY | 2020
“This class is a refresher course for getting back into life.”
- “SHELLY,” 60 | CALVARY WOMEN’S SERVICES | 2021
“Teaching with Negotiation Works has been wonderful and fulfilling. The participants really want to learn and put so much of themselves and their own life experiences into the class. By the end, many of them already saw the benefits of the course’s strategies for handling disputes in their lives. I’ve never had a teaching experience before where I could so clearly see the impact of the material on my students’ lives.”
- KATHRYN MENEFEE | CLASS INSTRUCTOR
“The class helped me a lot. It showed me what factors are successful in negotiations and gave me a detailed understanding of the process.”
"Mariah", 33 | Calvary Women's Services | 2020
“I used to either yell or shut down when faced with a conflict. Now I know how to fully prepare before I go make my case. I am calmer and I use communication skills.”
- Chelsee, 26 | Together We Bake | 2020
Why Negotiation?
Individuals in the communities that we serve need strong negotiation skills as they work to rebuild their lives. Negotiating effectively is critical to their interactions with potential employers, landlords, case managers, family, and friends, yet many have not had access to the self-advocacy and conflict resolution skills that would make them effective negotiators in their endeavors to overcome obstacles and get their lives in order.
Many of these individuals come primarily from low-income communities of color which, throughout history, have been marginalized by collective experiences of housing and employment insecurity, poverty, mass incarceration, and discrimination. Negotiation Works, recognizing the value of each individual confronting these challenges, offers its services through the lens of empowerment in an effort to repair the harm generated by racial injustice over time.
Negotiation Works offers tools community members can use to address their complex needs and empowers them to navigate these situations with confidence and lead fulfilling, productive lives. When the members of a community have the tools to advocate for themselves and negotiate with each other, they are better able to achieve shared goals, create lasting relationships, and improve the stability of the community as a whole.
Our Signature Program
Our multi-week negotiation courses are designed specifically for vulnerable residents of the DC area.
We partner with community-based providers who serve individuals returning to the community from prison, women who are experiencing homelessness or living in domestic violence shelters, and others who are dealing with significant life challenges, and we offer our negotiation programs on a recurring basis for the providers’ clients.
Our unique and trauma-sensitive curriculum not only teaches basic negotiation strategies and dispute resolution skills, but it also connects the negotiation strategies with real-life scenarios relevant to the participants’ lives, such as situations involving child custody, rent security deposits, and family probate disputes.
Each class session corresponds to an element of negotiation theory and builds on skills discussed and practiced in previous sessions. Using games and interactive role-play simulations to engage the participants, the instructors offer participants opportunities to practice the skills with a group of peers and to develop a common language regarding problem-solving techniques. The participants jointly craft a set of negotiation strategies and tips for resolving disputes, which reinforces the basic lessons and helps the participants generalize the strategies to all areas of their lives.
We tailor each program we present to meet the needs of the particular group served. All programs can be taught remotely, upon request.
Additional Services:
Professional development programs on negotiation skills and strategies for nonprofit staff
A self-guided, four-part video series for community groups, correctional institutions, nonprofit organizations, and others, with scenarios, worksheets, and opportunities for self-reflection
One-day workshops on negotiation strategies
“Train the trainer” workshops for groups and organizations that prefer to use internal trainers with our curriculum
Negotiation Ambassadors Program
A community where select former participants discuss their negotiation successes and challenges and help shape future negotiation courses.
The Negotiation Ambassadors Program is a learning and service community where participants can continue to improve their own negotiation skills while also finding opportunities to help others develop and improve their negotiation skills.
Recent projects of the Ambassadors include helping to brainstorm youth-related negotiation scenarios to address situations such as substance abuse and bullying, and developing a centralized 'hub' for current and former participants to submit questions, engage with fellow students, and exchange negotiation stories.
The Ambassadors also publish “The Negotiator Speaks,” a newsletter by and for former program participants. The newsletter contains negotiation insights, stories, and tips, along with information about relevant community partners and events. The newsletter offers program participants the opportunity to stay connected to Negotiation Works and one another and to keep their negotiation skills sharp! You can read the latest edition of “The Negotiator Speaks” here.
Since we started teaching our negotiation strategies in 2017, we have:
Measuring Our Impact
As Negotiation Works continues to adapt and improve its programming, we are constantly evaluating the effectiveness of our courses.
We administer surveys and “quick checks” within our curriculum to analyze participants’ knowledge and negotiation tendencies both before and after taking our program. This allows us to identify changes in how the participants deal with conflict, advocate for themselves, and navigate relationships with friends, family, employers, landlords, and others.
Two class participants discuss their experiences in the Negotiation Works program
How our program impacts the daily lives of our participants:
They increase their knowledge and understanding of core negotiation concepts, and gain the important foundation to effectively resolve conflicts.
They are less likely to respond to conflict with escalation or avoidance and more likely to approach situations in a way that would cater to all parties’ interests.
They begin using the strategies they learn immediately upon starting the course, and report positive outcomes right away.
They gain both skills as well as the confidence to apply these skills in a variety of challenging situations.
See how program participants experience results immediately upon going through our negotiation program.
See how program participants, 6 months or more after they have completed our program, continue to use negotiation to achieve positive results in their lives.
Recent Accomplishments
Since early 2021, we have expanded our staff, created new programs, and developed more teaching tools to reach a broader audience.
As the public health conditions from COVID-19 began to improve in 2021, we continued to grow and adapt to the changing times. A few of our accomplishments since January 2021 are listed below:
Presented Bringing Negotiation Training to Underserved Communities at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Women and Public Policy Program's Fall 2022 Research Seminar Series on Intersectional Perspectives on Gender & Negotiation
Hired a Program and Communications Coordinator to manage our remote and onsite programming and ramp up our marketing and community engagement efforts, and a Staff Instructor to teach and manage a portfolio of our programs
Developed customized professional development workshops for several of our community partners, including for violence interrupters working with Father Factor, through which we offered strategies they can use to address simmering community conflicts before they escalate into violence
Created and published multiple editions of ‘The Negotiator Speaks,’ our Ambassador-led newsletter
Developed a customizable refresher course focused on workplace-related scenarios for our program participants who request additional support after completing our course
Initiated a long-term evaluation process to determine how participants use negotiation strategies when they are at least six months past taking our program
Streamlined our lesson plans to make them more accessible to our volunteer instructors and better aligned with best practices in educational pedagogy
Developed new role plays and teaching materials, including a graphic guide to help participants visualize and internalize the negotiation process more tangibly
Participated in a competitive process and were chosen to take part in a Capacity Building Training Project sponsored by the DC Office of Victim Services and Justice Grants (OVSJG)