We are a small team of committed Thirdsiders dedicated to
transforming the way the world makes peace.
William Ury
Initiator
A lot of people ask me after all these years of working on war, are you an optimist or pessimist? I like to answer that I’m actually a Possibilist. I believe in human potential…
Bestselling author, and co-founder of Harvard’s Program on Negotiation, William Ury has spent the past 45 years helping individuals, organizations and nations at war get to YES.
William is one of the world’s leading experts on negotiation and mediation. He is co-author of Getting to YES, a sixteen-million-copy bestseller translated into over thirty-five languages, and the author of Getting Past No, The Power of a Positive No, The Third Side, and, most recently, the award-winning Getting to Yes with Yourself.
William has served as a negotiation adviser and mediator in conflicts ranging from wildcat coal mine strikes to boardroom battles to ethnic wars in the Middle East, Africa, the Balkans, the Caucasus, and Indonesia. Together with President Jimmy Carter, he co-founded the International Negotiation Network aimed at resolving civil wars around the world. In recent years, he has served as a peace advisor to President Santos of Colombia and President Ghani of Afghanistan.
My purpose here is to share the art of Possibilism with you so that together we can help make our world safer and happier for all.
