One of the toughest things to do in legal life is to complete difficult transactions where everyone is at loggerheads. It may be that all the parties want to conclude say a major commercial deal, but there seem to be insurmountable issues.

This will not be helped by the likely complexity of the transaction and the sheer amount of paperwork and people to be managed. This is where legal skills need to to be supplemented by project management ability.

The first and most essential thing to do is to identify the major deal breaker issues and to articulate them and remove them from the churn caused by the sheer volume of contractual provisions. Writing the main issues on a flip chart or whiteboard and recording dispassionately each parties view is a great starting point. The next key action is to make sure that the decision makers on both sides have been identified and are in the room. It is really hard to resolve points if one of the parties takes them back to "head office" who may take a different view.

Once an "executive group" which is properly empowered has been created then sub groups can be identified and dispatched to other rooms with a brief to come back to the decision makers with some constructive proposals as to how the issue can be resolved. 

This also allows the true experts on the problem, be it financial or technical or legal, to debate their issues in an open atmosphere without perhaps the positioning and show boating that can go on in the full negotiation - often led by individuals who do not truly understand the nature of the issue.

Once a problem has been resolved then the resolution at high level can be recorded - use a the flip chart or whiteboard again - and then let the lawyers go away and wordsmith it. Gradually, and quite miraculously sometimes, the seemingly endless list of unresolved points will dwindle to a few where some final compromise can be reached and the deal closed.

Wikipedia describes problem resolution as "using generic or ad hoc methods, in an orderly manner, for finding solutions to problems". This is fine but of itself it does not inspire me to see problems in a different light so as to be able to solve them.

I was faced recently with a long standing problem that had phased me for a couple of years. A mundane task of changing the lock in the door of a holiday apartment. It should be simple but the apartment and the door are in France and the lock is not a simple nightlatch lock but an intricate multi-point lock with a mechanism that interfaces with various parts of the door. I did not want to go to the no doubt immense expense of engaging a local locksmith, but the lock needed changing and updating to a more secure version.

Then I stopped being phased and looked again at the problem more logically. I unscrewed the door handle and read the name on the lock. Then I Googled the lock manufacturer and hey presto there was a PDF describing how I could remove and change the lock cylinder itself without affecting the rest of the mechanism. The local supermarket miraculously stocked a replacement cylinder for under £20, complete with more updated security keys, and I had solved my problem.

Translated into a more serious work situation sometimes all it takes to solve a problem of one sort or another is to start being constructive, look at the problem from a different perspective, break the issue down into its component parts, understand them in a logical way and then find an effective solution.

One of the challenges for any professional is turning off. If you are a doctor how do you stop thinking about your last patient or if you are a lawyer your latest deal. Work for professionals becomes all consuming. But that's not always good and we all need ways to wind down and turn off for a while.

One of the partners I worked with in a law firm once had to prepare a case to go to court in two weeks. It normally took at least 9 months. He was working all hours and was very stressed so he went to ask his doctor for advice. He thought for a while and then told my colleague to make sure he got home in time to have a large glass of red wine! No more or it would become counter productive, but enough to help put the pressure into context for a while.

I am not for a moment advocating a recourse to alcoholism as an escape - that would be a disaster. But finding a way to break out of the intensity of the work is important. It might be watching a television film or going out for a meal with your family or friends or even walking the dog - anything to remind us that there is life out of work at least for a short while. It's then much easier to go back to professional problems with a fresh approach.