Venn Diagrams

Venn diagrams are used to show overlaps between different factors.
For example, in a strategic alliance or a partnership, the two parties will be concerned with projects where they will benefit. We can see there might be three categories of benefit: projects where party A will benefit, projects where party B will benefit and projects where they will both benefit. An overlap of categories in a Venn diagram can illustrate this simply and quickly:

Overlapping benefits
This very simple model can help people to decide on priorities for action: for example at an early stage in a relationship it may be wise to concentrate areas of mutual benefit; throughout the relationship we might hope for a balance of benefits between the two parties.

A third component – or even a fourth and fifth can be added to this model. In negotiating strategies, for example, a manager employed by party A would consider not only areas of benefit, but also the pragamatic aspect of what the company is able to achieve: this indicates viable offers or joint projects that can be proposed.

Viable projects: based on SA Stumpf and TP Mullen 1992 Taking Charge Prentice Hall
The addition of the third explicit factor creates another four possible categories, which can be valuable in a specific situations, in this particular model or in others represented in this way.