Saying No

The closest they came to negotiation was when they were doing yoga alone in one room and "decided" to allow a dozen other people in a different room to turn their A/C on.

> On these days, I've told them to turn the AC off until we're done. One day, I was the only one practicing and I had to tell this to a dozen people outside the room. I will never forget the bugged looks I got back. Eventually their leader spoke up and we decided that they can turn on the AC further away from the room.

Then when the other tenants finally get sick of this, they get the owner on the phone. This is the negotiating opportunity. Instead, this person gloats about not listening:

> The man on the other end introduced himself as some authority figure and told me to turn the AC back on. He listed some vague reasons, compressor this, compressor that, costs, etc... which I didn't care to understand. But then he asked me in an accusing tone, why I turned it off despite the note saying not to. Peter Block would find this question childish. After all, two adults should be able to ask each other for what they want. They should expect a possible answer to be 'No' and be prepared to negotiate the difference.

I think they forgot to consider that the other person can also say "no". This is the climax of the negotiation opportunity, and he uses it to tell off the manager:

> After some filler words, he said he will talk to the owner terminating the contract and giving a refund. I said great and hung up.

The intense worship for Peter Block throughout the post is a strange contrast to the way they fail to implement any part of the advice other than the "No" part.

There was no negotiation here. Just a strange pyrrhic victory.

Few people cave when there are lots of eyes on them., and less people make empty threats with a bar full of spectators - that's why punches get thrown.

Regardless : 'I'm a renter' is by no means a strong argument unless you have a very specifically worded renter agreement -- it's pretty obviously a bad idea to anger the crowd of presumably better paying tenants, what would you do as a land owner, kick out the group every other tenant hates or change policy to protect the small fry?

Being in the same yacht club as the owner of the building conveys these kind of powers - it's like no one has encountered preferential treatment, good or bad, before.

> They should expect a possible answer to be 'No' and be prepared to negotiate the difference. I didn't throw these wise words back at him, but that's what was going through my head. And it emboldened me further. I simply told him the room is unusable for yoga with the AC on and we've paid rent for the room.

They were emboldened to discard even mentioning negotiation and stood their ground instead. That might be fine if the lesson you're trying to illustrate is one about firm boundaries but the advice they're holding up here was very much the opposite.