If one side comes in with a demand for 10% improvement, and the other side wants to only give a 1% improvement, the only way to make it seem it was close is to draaaaaaaggggggg itttttt out and make it seem over, like, nine months, so it looks like the two sides were close.
Let's face it - CX says, on day 1, we will give you 1%. AOA NC says, "we want 10%" - by day 2 we are in CC.
Now - stretch these numbers out over nine months. - and have GMA/DFO tell us "how close we got after soooooooooooo many months of negotiation. Suddenly the 9% gap sounds it was almost bridged!!!!
This has never happened before - apart from every other negotiation in the last 20 years, speaking from direct experience of those involved.
So the bottom line is- the 'longer you make it appear to take to negotiate, is the more apparently the deal was so close to be agreed to. You could spend 20 years trying to compromise between 20% payrise and a 1% percent paycut. That disagreement could be sorted, and voted on, within a day. But if you are a Canadian Aspergerbers sufferer, you make it last for far longer than it should, and then make it sound like the sides were very close....