Why Can't We Just Be Friends? Reflections on the In-class Negotiation Activity

Unfortunately, I can't remember a "cool" example of negotation in my life (but I will of course remember one after this post is up), so I'm afraid this is going to be another boring reflection on the in-class negotiation activity. I'll touch on three areas: my own attitude towards negotiations, how it helped during the activity, and dealing with conflicts within one's own group.

Refresher: our team was representing Paige Turner and the other team BestBooks.

I don't like confrontation and I don't like subterfuge. While this allows me to get along with a wide variety of people, it's not always that useful during a negotiation where there are competing interests on table and your job is to secure the best deal for your side. My inclination during these events is to be very forthcoming and honest about what I want as well as sincerely asking the other side what they want. We're both here to get something out of this, so why can't both parties leave happy? Needless to say, our team did not take my approach (nor did I ask them to); instead, we decided to do things the traditional/recommended way: we would not disclose immediately what areas were most valuable to us.

My attitude did come in use pre-negotiation. Prior to meeting with the other team, we spent a good deal of time figuring out what the other side considered important and seeing where our interests overlapped: number of countries for distribution and number of book clubs. We also decided what we were most willing to compromise on: number of weeks author would promote the book and number of books author would write for BestBooks. If sending Paige Turner on multi-month book tour would secure us a better overall deal, we were going to agree to it regardless of temper tantrums! This analysis of what the other team wanted would serve us well once the negotiation had started: both sides quickly agreed on both maximizing the number of countries for distribution and number of book clubs, and we went on to use our list of compromisables semi-successfully to negotiate a better deal for ourselves.

Thankfully, no major conflicts occurred within our group. However, there was one incident which gave me some insight on how to handle such a situation. It was towards the tail-end of the activity and things were winding down. It seemed like both sides were getting tired and were ready to close on the terms. Team member Kai then made a proposal to reduce our numbers in one heavily fought over area (the royalties if I recall correctly) in exchange for higher numbers in another (the advance or signing bonus). I was close to ask Kai what he thought he was doing because we had spent a lot of time and effort to gain ground in royalties, and I wasn't ready to give anything up just yet. Instead, I decided to see what he was up to; referring to our point sheet, I realized he was actually making a deal that at first seemed like a loss but would actually net us 500 extra points. It must've been beneficial in the eyes of the other team as well because they readily agreed. Had I leapt into things without trying to understand what my team member was thinking, I could have easily botched an easy 500 point gain. Understanding where the other team is coming from is important, but so is understanding your fellow team members! Conflict averted.