I love this book. I run into this quite accidentally at a time the business unit I was building from scratch (about 20Mn revenue) had to be scaled to a little under a $1Bn run rate in 6 years. We hired highly competent leaders each of whom had a stellar and successful past. They were all now a leadership team working to collaboratively achieve this big, hairy, audacious goal. But I was not sure if they had the emotional security to be able to constructively challenge each other, contribute to each other and do what was a win-win outcome in situations where they held innately opposing views on policies, business portfolio choices , markets etc., There were many elephants in the room and no one was talking about them. Me and my leadership team went through a “Crucial Conversations” training. The theme at its centre was the concern on our minds : When stakes are high, emotions are running deep and people have solidly opposite views, is there a way to work together to create and enlarge a common pool of meaning aligned with their purpose. Is it possible to avoid win-lose situations methodologically. It worked great. I read the book, worked with master trainers who taught its deployment in life and it was great. I still use the principles in personal situations too.