Four factors influence how well individuals negotiate: personality, emotions, culture, and gender. We might think agreeable individuals are easy prey in negotiations, especially distributive ones. The evidence suggest that personality and negotiation outcomes are related, but only weakly. Evoking emotions, such as sympathy, or expressing other emotions like anger or sadness may be used to persuade others. You should show anger in negotiations only if you have at least as much power as your counterpart.

People from different cultures negotiate differently. However, there are many nuances in the way this works. It isn’t as simple as “these negotiators are the best”; indeed, success in negotiations depends on the context. It appears that people generally negotiate more effectively within cultures than between them. In cross-cultural negotiations, it is especially important that the negotiators be high in openness. There are many areas of organizational behavior (OB) in which men and women are not that different. Negotiation is not one of them.