You’ll all be pleased to know that at long last you can sign up to one of my lively and memorable Negotiation Skills masterclasses, thanks to the good offices of Guardian MasterClasses:

This is an exclusive opportunity to join Charles Crawford in a small group for an intensive workshop that will transform how you understand and practise negotiation at all levels – family, colleagues and in business. Through instruction and role play you’ll develop a negotiation toolkit and learn to keep control of even the most testing interactions. By the end of the day you’ll have many new insights into dealing with people, reinforced with vivid real-world examples from high-level diplomacy and commercial experience.

Course content

Concentrating on the psychology of negotiation, this highly practical one-day course will give you the opportunity to develop and test your new negotiation skills in role play situations. Topics covered include:

Basic psychology of negotiation

Core negotiation theory (including positions, interests and needs)

Asking and listening

Subjective and objective strength and weakness

Reflecting and reframing

Open and closed questions

Keeping control, including in ‘difficult conversations’

Tickets will sell like hot-cakes. Get one now. A full day session on Saturday October 19 – right at the Guardian HQ itself. There’ll be roleplays, so practise your best Hamlet accent…