You Go Left, I’ll Go Right:
On Sidewalks, Deals, and the Art of Shared Movement
By Bryan J. Kaus
The woman in the gray blazer saw me before I saw her.
We were both moving fast, me north on Madison, her south, the October heat still clinging to the pavement like August refused to let go. She shifted her weight left, I read it and went right. No eye contact. No nod. Just the quiet agreement that happens a thousand times a block in Manhattan: I’ll make space if you make space.
Three steps later, a delivery guy cut across the flow, phone in one hand, dolly in the other, oblivious. The rhythm broke. People stopped, swerved, recalibrated. The whole sidewalk stuttered. He didn’t notice or care that his refusal to read the room had just cost fifty strangers half a second each.
That’s when it hit me: this is negotiation. Not the boardroom kind, but the real kind. The kind that powers everything, cities, deals, teams, relationships. The unspoken choreography that makes motion possible.
There is something to be said for a change of scenery, a hope for a change of seasons that hasn’t quite arrived. Summer still holding on in the Northeast, stubborn and thick. A few days in New York. Not coming home, but adjacent. Respite. A chance to step out of routine and into motion.
This past week my wife and I were in the city for a mix of pleasure, a bit of business, and time with family. I grew up in the shadow of New York, in rural New Jersey, so it is familiar, while Houston has been home for a while. I like the rural cadence, but I am energized by the pace of cities.
New York was never exactly home, but never far, and always fun. From the history and legacy to the moments of today, deals and people, culture and opportunity. We took in a couple of shows, ate well, heard some music, and walked. A lot.
It is impossible for me not to look at people and wonder what they are thinking. The thought behind an investment, what made this work, why did that place shutter. I wonder where that person is going and what is on their mind. There is no shortage of ideas or opportunity, despite what social media or the news or the latest reboot of a tired franchise might suggest. As I often say to my wife, there are no new ideas, only better executions and clearer insights.
When I come to the Northeast, no matter how long it has been, I feel a kind of home. That does not discount the friends, life, and work I have built elsewhere, but this region holds roots for me. My earliest North American ancestors trace back to the late 1600s on Long Island. I have seen the headstones and homesteads. It is hard not to be introspective.
On the sidewalk you notice it first: the quiet choreography of a city of millions. Glances, half steps, shoulder tilts. You go left, I’ll go right. No one announces it, everyone participates. It is ordinary and remarkable at the same time. Researchers call it mutual anticipation, the way we read one another’s movement and coordinate without words.
Walk a few blocks and you remember that most of life is negotiated, not declared. Not the headline kind, just the daily exchange that lets us keep moving without colliding.
Perspective Changes Everything
On a Manhattan block, success is about perspective, seeing the other person’s line, speed, and intention. The same holds at the table. Perspective taking, trying to see the deal through the other side’s lens, reliably produces more creative and durable outcomes than raw empathy alone. It helps you discover hidden trades and create value.
That does not make it sentimental, it makes it practical. If you cannot see the world as the other side sees it, constraints, incentives, timing, you misread the opening and miss the win win.
The delivery guy on Madison was not malicious, he just was not looking. When you stop reading the signals, in a crowd or a conference room, you become the friction everyone else has to navigate around.
But here is the thing: the sidewalk works because most people are not trying to win, they are trying to keep moving. That is a different objective entirely. Winning implies someone loses. Movement means both parties advance.
What Is The Win, Anyway?
We talk about negotiation as if it is always a contest of wills, and sometimes it is. Winner take all exists. There are moments when the pie is fixed and you are fighting for the bigger slice.
More often, the win is not zero sum. It is apples and oranges. One side values speed, the other values certainty. One needs the announcement, the other needs the economics. One wants to preserve relationships, the other wants to set a precedent. When you understand what the other side actually values, not what you assume they value, you can structure deals where both parties walk away better off than when they started.
That is not compromise. Compromise is splitting the difference and often leaves everyone equally disappointed. This is exchange. You give up something that costs you little but matters to them, they do the same in return. No one sacrificed. Both won.
Sometimes you find the structure where value is created, not just redistributed. That is the holy grail, not because it is moral or nice, but because it is durable. Deals built on mutual benefit do not unravel the moment conditions shift. They adapt.
Emotion Is Information, Not The Driver
The best street crossers are not emotionless, they are steady. The same is true in deals. Emotions shape outcomes. Anger narrows options, anxiety undermines performance, positive emotion can widen cooperation. The work is to notice, label, and regulate, not to pretend you do not feel.
Walking through the city you feel the pull of impatience when someone stops short, the flash of irritation when a tourist cluster blocks the crosswalk. The pros, the real New Yorkers, do not fight the feeling. They register it, route around it, and keep moving. The emotion becomes data, not destination.
In negotiation the same principle applies. If you are frustrated, that is information, something is not flowing the way you expected. If you are anxious, that is a signal that you do not yet see the full picture. If you are excited, that is useful too, but check whether it is making you sloppy. Name the feeling. Use it. Do not let it use you.
From The City To The Valley
Cross the river to Jersey and the cadence shifts. Fewer micro decisions per minute, more margin. Keep driving up the Hudson and you get space, literal and mental, to see the pattern you were too close to in Midtown. Perspective is not just a mindset, it is where you stand.
I grew up across the river in rural New Jersey. The Hudson River Valley carries a long, storied past, centuries of negotiation, settlement, and exchange. People figuring out how to coexist, how to trade, how to move through shared space without destroying it.
Leaders need both lenses. City sense, fast reads, tight choreography, constant calibration. Valley sense, step back, see the longer arc, conserve energy for the moves that matter. The trick is knowing when to switch, when the moment needs a half step and when it needs a pause.
Practical Anchors
A few things I am working with, offered not prescribed:
Ask the sidewalk question. What line is the other side walking. It forces perspective before position. Before you launch your opening bid or clever reframe, ask what the world looks like from where they stand.
Protect rhythm. Interrupt sparingly. In a crowd or a company, unnecessary stops ripple. Every Slack ping, quick call, or meeting that could have been an email is the delivery guy with the dolly. Sometimes you need to cut across. If you do it reflexively, you become the friction others route around.
Create margin. Buffers prevent pileups in schedules, budgets, and relationships. The sidewalk works because there is enough space for the dance to happen. Pack it tighter and the system breaks.
Name the feeling. If you can label it, you can use it or set it aside. “I am frustrated this is taking longer than I expected.” “I am anxious about how this will land.” “I am excited, but I do not want that to make me sloppy.”
Define winning for both sides. Before you walk in, ask what a win actually is. Not what you want to extract, but what success looks like if you are still doing business together in three years.
This trip reminded me that progress is mostly the sum of unspoken agreements, tiny signals we send that say, I see you, let us both keep moving.
The city is full of these micro negotiations. A hand shoots up for a taxi, even though Ubers are everywhere now, and three people on the same corner silently acknowledge who was first. Cars edge into intersections while bikes weave through, everyone reading speed and commitment, no one wanting to be the one who causes the pileup. A doorman holds the door just long enough, you nod thanks, the rhythm continues.
None of it is governed by contract or rulebook. It works because people read intent, signal their own, and trust that most others will do the same. The moment someone stops participating, someone who plows through without looking or reading the room, the whole system has to compensate.
Business is not so different. Value shows up when we trade perspective, not just positions. The best deals, the most durable partnerships, the teams that actually execute, they all run on the same principle: shared movement beats solo victory when you are playing the long game.
The Point Taken
Negotiation is not a contest of wills alone. Sometimes it is, and you should know when to fight for the whole pie. More often, the real win is shared movement, both parties advancing because they understood what the other actually valued.
The same choreography that moves millions through Manhattan every day, the hand up for a cab, the bike threading between cars, the give and take at every corner, that is what makes organizations work, deals close, and relationships last. It is not about being nice. It is about being attuned.
Ask what the win looks like before you assume it is zero sum. Change your vantage point and the path opens. You go left, I will go right, and both of us get where we are going.