As we continue sharing stories from professionals, one thing is already becoming clear: interaction matters long before outcomes do.
In deal making, there’s a familiar saying: the devil is in the details.
What I’ve seen more often is something else.
The deal doesn’t fail because of the details themselves, but because people let those details replace the conversation they should have been having.
On paper, everything can look right.
The business fit.
The technology.
Even the strategic intent.
And still, the deal never materialises.
The problem usually isn’t bad faith.
It’s context.
In some settings, trust is scarce, sometimes for very good reasons. Contracts are expected to protect against that. In others, contracts are seen more as guidelines, with the relationship carrying more weight than the clauses.
Payment terms become a sticking point.
Intellectual property clauses grow heavier.
What starts as cooperation slowly turns into negotiation by lawyers.
At that point, everyone is technically right.
And the deal is effectively gone.
What changes outcomes is not better legal wording, but naming the difference early.
Asking why certain terms matter so much to one side, and what risk they are actually trying to manage.
In one cross-border case, progress only returned when both parties stepped back from “best practice” and agreed on a simple mechanism: a jointly approved third party holding payments, released against clear milestones.
Nothing magical.
Just a shared understanding of what each side needed in order to move forward.
The devil was never in the details.
It was in the interaction around them.
About this Story
Story shared by Mikko Puhakka 溥 墨, corporate finance advisor and founder of Lion Partners, working with private and public clients across Europe and Asia.
Curated by Ghita Ramdhiansing, founder of See Suite and developer of Interaction Intelligence.