![\"Image](\"https:\/\/onebluepaperclip.files.wordpress.com\/2008\/07\/bluepaperclip.png\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nNew York Law School<\/a> attracts a diverse student body for a variety of reasons. Often, students who are already professionals in a nonlegal field choose NYLS so they can earn legal training while continuing their own practice. Seldom have the fruits of a diverse student body been as apparent as the submission of Joseph Piacentil<\/a>e, which I reproduce below, unedited and with his permission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n —————————————————————————————————-<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I was so happy to hear that the final negotiation exercise was this one. As soon as I heard about it I knew how I wanted to handle it. I knew that the paper clip itself represented so much more than a paper clip. It represented the essence of what the course is about, the ability to negotiate. It is the essential skill that lawyers rely upon in every aspect of their practices. Trading, bartering, convincing, maneuvering, positioning, cajoling, hard balling, soft balling, understating, overstating, building expectations, limiting expectations, creating value, diminishing value, making the pie larger, making the pie disappear entirely, all part of negotiating. All those things and many more all represented by the simple blue paper clip. Not an ordinary clip, but a special clip, a blue clip. That was my story. That was going to be my beginning and my end. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade One: 11-29-19 <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nbank lady. I never knew her name other than \u201cMary\u201d and she had a thing for\nmusic boxes, the little wind-up type that have the pop-up dancers. She knew me\nfrom being a customer at the bank, nothing more. I approached Mary with a\nsimple proposal. \u201cMary\u201d, I said, my name is Joe Piacentile and I\u2019ve been a\ncustomer here for 20 years. I have a small favor to ask you. I have something\nI\u2019d like to trade with you. It\u2019s a Blue Paper Clip. A simple blue paper clip.\nI\u2019d like to trade it for one or your give-away plastic banks, lined up here on\nyour counter.\u201d Mary replied, \u201cOh, You can have the bank only if you open an\naccount, they\u2019re promotional.\u201d I said, \u201cI know, but I have a condition that I\u2019m\ngoing to impose on this trade. I want you to hold the paper clip in a special\nplace for one week. At that time, I\u2019ll come back and trade you something back\nfor it, something worth much more than that clip to you.\u201d Mary asked \u201cwhy?\u201d. I\nsimply said that the clip was special to me and it was a sort of experiment\nthat I was running, to see if I could trade back for that special clip. She\nchecked with her manager who said it was fine. He knew me but had no idea what\nI was up to. We made the trade and she put the clip in an envelope in her\ndrawer. I took the plastic giveaway bank. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Analysis:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nused my reputation of being a loyal customer to set the stage for trust, then\nplayed on the teller\u2019s sense of curiosity to participate in my \u201cexperiment\u201d. I\nthink she was happy to be involved in an adventure. In a negotiation, I find it\nmotivating for both sides to be engaged somehow, emotionally vested and\nintellectually intrigued. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade Two. 11-30-19<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nnext day I took my beautiful little giveaway bank to our friend\u2019s house. She\nhas a four-year-old son. I asked her if I could trade her son the shiny plastic\nbank, which he loved, for an odd little Toy Story toy that he received for his\nbirthday but didn\u2019t like. It looked like an odd little pencil person, it was a\ncharacter toy called \u201cForky\u201d. For some reason the toy scared him and I took\nadvantage of that. His mom loved the idea of the bank because she felt it would\nencourage him to save his pennies and loose change. We made the trade. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Analysis:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nknew that the mom would respond to the concept of saving for her son\u2019s future\nproviding him his first bank played into that concept. She was trading away an\n\u201cugly\u2019 toy and gaining a financial future for her son. I created an opportunity\nfor both of us out of mere concepts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade Three. 12-03-19<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n A\nfew days later I took the \u201cForky\u201d to a local Exxon super gas station, the kind\nthat sells toys and lighters and all kinds of knick-knacks and the like. I explained that I had traded someone for the\ntoy but I had changed my mind and was looking for a different gift, something\nof equal or greater value. I explained that I was only looking to trade. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They\noffered me a cigarette lighter which I turned down, because I preferred some\nsort of toy or a bouquet of flowers, which they also sold there. I explained\nhow sought-after this toy was and I walked out with a beautiful group of roses.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n Analysis:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nknew I had a better chance of getting a trade done with a small business owner\nlike the guys at the gas station. He was middle eastern and comes from a\nhorse-trading culture and I think he enjoyed the opportunity. The toy was\nunusual and he probably kept it to give to it to of his own children. One\nchild\u2019s ugly toy is another\u2019s cherished Disney item.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade Four. 12-03-19<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Again,\nI went to a small strip mall, sole-proprietor. This time it was a toy store.\nArmed with my fresh bouquet of roses I\napproached the woman who runs the shop. I explained that I was willing to trade\nthe roses for a small plastic music box, that she had in the showcase, the kind\nwith a little ballerina dancing in front of a mirror with a built-in wind up\nmusic box. I explained that I knew a woman who had no children but really\nenjoyed music boxes and had a collection of them. I explained that she worked\nat the local bank and I wanted to bring her a small gift for doing me a favor.\nThe store owner was very happy to trade the ballerina music box for the\nbeautiful roses. She even gift wrapped it for me. She seemed happy to get the flowers. I got\nthe sense that no one brings her flowers on a regular basis. It was a special\ntreat for her. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Analysis:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Again,\nI approached a small business owner because I believe they have the authority\nand the imagination and the spirit to make trades. Many of them come from\ncultures where the currency is not so stable and trading is an acceptable form\nof commerce. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade Five. 12-04-19<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nreturned to the bank a day later with the music box. It was a perfect gift,\nwrapped in a bright flowered paper which almost telegraphed what was inside. I\nbrought with me a small display case that I had on my memento shelf at home. It\u2019s\na shelf where I keep things that I have collected over a lifetime that hold a\nspecial meaning for me. Small things, simple things, things that hold no\nspecial value to the uninformed observer but are precious in my eyes. For\nexample, I have a name tag that I purchased for a special man, a physician\u2019s\nassistant whom I hired in 1990 to work for me. He needed a good job because he\nwanted to get married. He was from inner-city North Philadelphia. I hired him\nand ordered his new name badge. He was going to start the next week. He never\nshowed up. Instead his fianc\u00e9 called me, who I had not met, to thank me for\nhiring him, and how proud he was to get the job. He went out that weekend to\nbuy new clothes so he would look good his first day. While walking home he was\nrobbed at gunpoint and murdered, shot in the chest, by someone who stole his\nbag of clothes. The day she called me his nametag arrived. I cried like a\nchild. Another item on my shelf is my service bars from when I was a second\nlieutenant in the uniformed service of the Public Health Service, also, the bus\ndriver\u2019s hat my uncle was wearing when he died driving the number 2 bus down\nMorris Avenue in the Bronx, or the Lou Costello\u2019s fedora given to me by a great\nicon of television, Joe Franklin, or my Tony Award nomination for best revival\nof a play, Harold Pinter\u2019s the Homecoming, or toy luger the Secret Service\ntried to confiscate from my bedroom when they kicked our door in looking for my\nfather\u2019s counterfeit coins. They returned the toy gun, they kept my father. On\nand on it goes, memento after memento. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nwalked in with the gift-wrapped music box and walked up to Mary. I asked her if\nshe still had my \u201cSpecial Blue Paperclip\u201d. She smiled, opened her drawer,\npulled out the envelope and took out the clip. I asked her if she would take\nthe gift in exchange for returning the paper clip. She smiled a big \u201cOf course\u201d\nand we exchanged our prizes. She opened the music box, wound up the spring and\nwe both watched the little ballerina dance. I took the paperclip and placed it\ninside my memento frame, a clear frame in which the beautiful little clip seems\nto magically float. She asked me why the clip was so important. I told her the\nfollowing. \u201cI made a decision to go back to law school in my 60\u2019s and I was in\nmy last year, almost done. I had taken many courses, Criminal Law,\nConstitutional Law, Property, Civil Procedure and many others just like those.\nBut none of those courses were as important to me as this one course, called\n\u2018Negotiations\u2019\u201d. I told her that all the successes in my life and in my\nrelationships, have come to me because I was a good negotiator. Because I paid\nattention to what people want and what\u2019s important to them and what they\nperceive they need and what they are willing to give to get it. Because of that\nI would be graduating soon and I wanted something special for my memento shelf.\nSomething little that embodied everything I wanted to remember about law school\nand what I take away with me in whatever future I have left. That special item\nwas this little Blue Paper Clip. It was important to me and I wanted to have it\nand I would have traded away much more than I did to get it and now that I had\nit I had completed my task. I thanked her and told her to enjoy her music box\nand think of me and my paper clip whenever she winds it up. I went home and put\nthe clip, now in its fine, clear frame in a place of honor on my memento shelf.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n Final Analysis:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nknew from the beginning that I wanted that paper clip. It was my prize. It was\nthe one thing that I could take away from my law school experience that would\nnever mean anything to some stranger, but would secretly mean the world to me.\nI have owned many nice things in my life but it\u2019s the little things, the\nmementos, the meaningful little oddball items with a tremendous story attached\nthat I cherish the most. I have an office filled with a lifetime of memories,\nsome obvious, like patents, awards, diplomas and degrees and press releases,\nbut it\u2019s the little items, the curious little things that mean the most.\nNegotiation is not a subject in law school. Negotiation is life. We all\nnegotiate every day. Some of us are keenly aware of it, most of us are not, but\nwe all do it every day and will continue until the day we pass. I will always\nremember my days at NYLS but I will have a special blue paperclip to prove that\nI learned something. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The results were as follows: <\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade 1. Special Blue Paper Clip Plastic Give-Away Bank<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade 2. Plastic Give-Away Bank Toy Story 4 \u201cForky\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade 3. Toy Story 4 \u201cForky\u201d Group of Red Roses<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade 4. Group of Red Roses Ballerina Wind-Up\nMusic Box<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trade 5.\u00a0 Ballerina Wind-Up Music Box\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Special Blue Paper Clip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I have been teaching negotiation for nine years now, and the gratification never ends. For the past several years, I’ve made a final assignment called the “Blue Paperclip Exercise,” brought to my attention by Hal Abramson, in which a student is given a paperclip and assigned to increase initial value over the course of five …<\/p>\n