他是那种非常聪明的人，总觉得你在下一盘高阶象棋，而不是和他进行一场热情友好的辩论。
He was the type of person who was so smart that it always felt like you were playing an advanced game of chess rather than having a cordial debate with him.
他没有像训练国际象棋运动员那样思考此后的三步棋，而是思考已经走过的三步棋并质疑当时所做的假设。【事后诸葛亮】
Instead of thinking three steps ahead the way chess players are trained to, he was also thinking three steps backward and questioning any assumptions that had been made to that point.
与他进行任何讨论都是不可能的，因为他总是会在你的逻辑中戳出一些漏洞，这让我们的领导层和团队感到沮丧。
It often felt impossible to win any discussion with him because he could always poke holes in your logic, which was frustrating to our leadership and the team.
毫无疑问，这也让他感到沮丧。
No doubt it was frustrating to him too.
他害怕犯错和失败，以至于许多决定都陷入僵局，这最终在那些项目上与他产生了很多内部冲突。
He was so afraid to be wrong and fail that many decisions came to a standstill, and that ultimately created a lot of conflict internally on projects with him.
但他是一位主题专家，我们想让他参与讨论，以获得最佳信息。
But he was a subject matter expert, and we wanted to include him in discussions to get the best information.
当我第一次被老板要求与我们的技术负责人合作，为即将到来的项目进行估算时，我小心翼翼地去找他，因为我知道他是一个不情愿的参与者。
The first time I was asked by my boss to work with our technical lead to get estimates for an upcoming project, I approached him gingerly about it because I knew he would be a reluctant participant.
我们有着牢固的工作关系，我看到他在很多场合是如何抵制一连串提问的，所以我知道我无法强迫他做出回应。
We had a solid working relationship, and I’d seen how he resisted inquisition on a number of occasions, so I knew I wouldn’t be able to coerce responses out of him.
我决定先问他很多问题并倾听，而不是试图与他辩论。
Instead of trying to debate with him, I decided to first ask him a lot of questions and listen.
然后，我把我所听到的内容转述给他听，并以书面形式记录下来。
Then, I paraphrased what I heard back to him and captured it in writing.
接下来，我需要得到估算。
Next, I needed to get estimates.
当我直接要求对某项特定任务进行估算时，他会列举多个原因来解释为什么任何估算的尝试都是错误的。
When I asked directly for an estimate on a particular task, he would cite multiple reasons why any attempt at an estimate was wrong.
我不得不改变我的策略。
I had to change my strategy.
为了让他克服对错误答案的恐惧，我开始审视他曾经分享过的恐惧，并要求他为一条“幸福之路”做出假设，以避开这些恐惧。
To get him to overcome his fear of committing to a wrong answer, I started looking through the fears he had shared and asking him to make assumptions for a “happy path” to get around them.
例如，如果我们无法继续，直到我们知道客户需要多长时间才能向我们返回信息，我请他假设客户最常见的回复时间。
For example, if there was no way we could proceed until we knew how long a client would take to return information to us, I asked him to assume the most common turnaround time for a client.
我们捕捉住这个假设，然后完成了该任务的估算。
We captured that assumption and then completed the estimate for that task.
我们像这样完成了每一项任务，——考虑一个忧虑，建立一个假设，并根据假设提供一个估算，直到我们最终有了一个估计的计划。
We walked through each task like that—taking a concern, building in an assumption, and providing an estimate based on the assumption until we finally had an estimated plan.
当我和老板分享这个计划时，他对我在这次谈话中的成功感到惊喜。
When I shared the plan with my boss, he was pleasantly surprised by my success in the conversation.
我和他分享了我认为谈判成功的原因：第一，我真正有兴趣听取这些担忧，第二，对每一项估算都使用了假设。
I shared with him what I felt made the negotiation a success: first, my genuine interest in hearing concerns and, second, the use of assumptions for each estimate.
该计划充分捕获了我们的技术负责人的那些担忧，并提供了事先声明、注意事项，以减轻他对错误的恐惧。
The plan adequately captured our technical lead’s concerns and provided caveats to alleviate his fear of being wrong.
这是一次成功的谈判，取得了成果，也使我与技术负责人的工作关系从那时起变得更好。
It was a successful negotiation to an outcome, and it also made my working relationship with that technical lead better from that point forward.
未完待续