BMA 5406: Negotiations and Conflict Resolution

NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE

NUS BusinessSchool

BMA 5406 Negotiations and Conflict Resolution

Special Term 1, BIZ2 04-13A

BMA 5406: Negotiations and Conflict Resolution

Instructor: Dr. Cynthia Wang

Phone:6516 3519

E-Mail:

Office:BIZ 2 3-36

COURSE INFORMATION

We negotiate every day. We negotiate with potential employers, coworkers, roommates, landlords, parents, bosses, merchants, service providers, spouses, and even our children. What price we want to pay, how much we want to be paid, who will do the dishes ... all of these are negotiations. Yet, although people negotiate all the time, most know very little about the strategy and psychology of effective negotiations. Why do we sometimes get our way whereas other times we walk away feeling frustrated by our inability to achieve the agreement we desire?

Negotiation is the art and science of securing agreements between two or more interdependent parties: a craft that must hold cooperation and competition in creative tension. Therefore, the purpose of this course is to understand the theory and processes of negotiation as it is practiced in a variety of settings. The course is designed to complement the technical and diagnostic skills learned in other courses at NUS. A basic premise of this course is that while a manager needs analytical skills to develop optimal solutions to problems, a broad array of negotiation skills is needed in order for these solutions to be accepted and implemented. Great analysis is of little value if you are unable to win support for the action it recommends.

COURSE OBJECTIVES

The best way to learn negotiation skills and actually internalize them is to negotiate in a setting where insight is offered, feedback is plentiful, personal reflection is encouraged, and careful analysis is required.

This course is designed to foster learning through doing, to explore your own talents, skills, and shortcomings as a negotiator. The negotiation exercises will provide you with an opportunity to attempt strategies and tactics in a low-risk environment, to learn about yourself and how you respond in specific negotiation situations. If you discover a tendency that you think needs correction, this is the place to try something new. The course is sequenced so that cumulative knowledge can be applied and practiced.

In this course, I hope you will:

Experience the negotiation process, learning how to evaluate the costs and benefits of alternative actions.

Improve your ability to analyze the negotiation situation and learn how to develop a strategic plan so as to improve your ability to negotiate effectively.

Develop confidence in the negotiation process as an effective means for resolving conflict in organizations.

Understand more about the nature of negotiations and gain a broad intellectual understanding of the central concepts in negotiation.

Improve your analytical abilities and your capacity to understand and predict the behavior of individuals, groups, and organizations in competitive situations.

Develop a toolkit of useful negotiation skills, strategies, and approaches.

COURSE FORMAT

The course is highly experiential, and is therefore built around a series of negotiation exercises, debriefings, and readings. There will be a negotiation exercise in every class. Classes will also include lectures and class discussions.

Almost all exercises require preparation in advance. Some exercises require students to prepare outside of class as a team, either by phone, e-mail, or in person. Students are expected to be fully prepared for exercises prior to class and to participate in the debriefings. Students should also be prepared to stay a few minutes after class to arrange meetings with other members of the class.

It is important to do the week’s readings AFTER class. Please do not read ahead. I have selected readings to reinforce the learning points of each exercise, and the concepts will be more comprehensible if you have already experienced them directly.

COURSE MATERIALS

Fisher & Ury. (1981) Getting to Yes: Maybe purchased at the NUS Co-op.

Handouts: Readings will be available online.Negotiation materials will be handed out in class.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS AND GRADING

Your grade will be made up of:

Course contribution15%
Post-negotiation analysis20%
Negotiation planning documents15%
On-going Team Negotiation 15%
Real world negotiation analysis (w/ planning document)35%

1.Course Contribution: Attendance and Participation in Class Discussions (15% of grade)

Because negotiation exercises are critical to the learning process in this course, students are expected to participate in all of them. If you must miss an exercise, it is your responsibility to contact Kenneth at least three days before the class session.

Your participation in class discussion will be evaluated on the quality of your contributions and insights. You are expected to be prepared for class and actively participate in all class discussions and negotiation exercises. You will be evaluated on the quality of your contribution to class discussions. Quality comments possess one or more of the following properties:

Offer a different and unique, but relevant, perspective based upon analysis and theory (not intuition or casual observation)
Contribute to moving the discussion and analysis forward
Transcend the “I feel” syndrome (i.e., include evidence, demonstrate recognition of basic concepts, and integrate these with reflective thinking)
Link relevant concepts to current events and experiences

2.Negotiation Role Planning Documents (15% of grade)

Because negotiation exercises are critical to the learning process in this course, you should be fully prepared for every negotiation. To help you prepare for the role you will play in each negotiation, you should prepare a planning document before each negotiation. If you are negotiating as part of a team, you and the other team membersshould prepare one planning document together. An example of a planning document is included at the end of this syllabus.

You or your team (if you are negotiating as a team) should bring 2 copies of the assigned planning documents to class so that you can turn one copy in at the beginning of class and use the other as a reference during your negotiation. Please submit thefollowing planning documents to Kennethbefore the negotiation (email format preferred):

Moms.com (with your teammate):graded on a / system (1% of grade).
BullardHouses: 10% of grade
ABC/Local Round 1(as a team): / system (1% of grade)
ABC/Local Round 2(as a team): / system (1% of grade)
ABC/Local Round 3(as a team): / system (1% of grade)
Viking: / system (1% of grade)

3.Post-Negotiation Analysis (20% of grade)

You will be required to turn in a post-negotiation analysis. This analysis consists of two parts: 1) an analysis of an in-class negotiation and 2) an application of these learningsfrom your in-class negotiation analysisto a real-life negotiation you have personally experienced or seen in the news.

Part 1: In-class analysis

You can provide an analysis on anyof the following negotiation exercises: Biopharm-Seltek, New Recruit, or Moms.com. The purpose of this analysis is to encourage you to reflect on your behavior and your classmates’ behaviors in a negotiation exercise, and to analyze what you have learned from your experience. Your analysis will also give me a sense of your individual progress and provide me with an idea of which topics require more class discussion. Your task in this post-negotiation analysis is to describe your reactions, perceptions, and significant insights gained from participation in a negotiation exercise. The analysis should not be a detailed report of everything that happened in the negotiation. Rather, it should focus on the following issues:

Provide a briefoverview of the key events.
What were the critical factors that affected the negotiation situation and outcomes, and what can you say about these factors in general?
What did you learn about negotiation or conflict from this situation?
How do the concepts presented in lectures or readings enrich your understanding of the process of this negotiation, its outcome, or your own style?
What would you do the same or differently in the future, or how would you like to behave in order to perform more effectively?

Part 2: Application of analysis

The second part of the analysis is to apply your in-class learnings from the in-class negotiation to a real-life negotiation – either one you have personally experienced or have seen in the news. This part of the analysis should answer one following questions:

How does thein-class experience compare to others that you experienced under similar or comparable circumstances?

How does this experience provide insight into a recent negotiation you have seen in the news? (Examples of topics include the Google-Yahoo-Microsoft negotiation (2008); on-going Taiwan-China negotiations; recent Israeli elections (2009)).

A “good” entry is one that tries to step back from a negotiation, identifies key events and processes, uses readings to help structure the analysis, and is written well.

The post-negotiation analysis should be 3-4 typed pages (no longer than four pages, double-spaced, Times 12 point font, and 1-inch margins) and is due on Class 5 (you may also submit it earlier in class or via e-mail).Part 1 should be approximately three pages; Part 2 should be about one page long. You are encouraged to share your post-negotiation analysis with the other people who were involved in your negotiation; your feedback could be quite helpful to your peers.

4.On-going Team Negotiation (15% of grade)

You will be working in a team with other classmates on a multi-round negotiation. Your team will be assigned either the role of union negotiators or management representatives, and will be paired with another team for three rounds of negotiations. Your team will work together to develop negotiating strategies and complete the negotiations.

Before each of the three negotiations, you will receive detailed information regarding the negotiation. After each negotiation, your team should turn in the outcomes of the negotiation. In addition, after the first round your team will be asked to turn in the scoring system you developed for the negotiation. We will talk more about scoring systems in class.

Round 1 Scoring System (10% of grade)

The scoring systems developed by your team will be evaluated as part of your overall grade. In particular, the scoring system you design for the first round will constitute 10% of your grade. Your scoring systems will be graded based on your understanding and application of an additive scoring system and your integration of issues in the case, and should be emailed to me the end of the night of Class 6, at the very latest.

Round 2 Outcome for On-going Negotiation (5% of grade)

For the second round, each team’s outcomes will count for 5% of your grade. This grade will be based on how well your results compare to those of your peers in the same role. This on-going negotiation is the only instance in which your performance in a negotiation exercise will affect your grade. Your outcomes can be submitted to Kennethvia email the night of the negotiation (Class 8).

5.Real World Negotiation Analysis (35% of grade)

Although our course on negotiations has just begun, you have all been negotiating for years – perhaps without even thinking about the exchanges as negotiations. Likewise, in the past, you have probably overlooked many opportunities for potential negotiations. To encourage you to think about the many everyday opportunities you have to negotiate, and to improve your negotiation skills, you are being asked to go out and negotiate!

You can negotiate for anything you would like. Be creative. Your negotiation could involve a good or service from a merchant, a salary or bonus with an employer, a discount from a service provider, or anything else. Also, note that you do not have to buy anything to complete this assignment (e.g., negotiating with a child over bedtime). Similarly, your negotiations do not need to be a success – often, we learn as much from negotiations that fail as from those that succeed.

There are only two rules for this assignment:

You may not tell the person you are negotiating with that this is for a class project until the negotiation is complete (and even then, it’s probably not necessary).
You are not allowed to engage in a negotiation that you do not intend to follow through with if the outcome you desireis obtained.

After you have finished negotiating, you should write an analysis of the negotiation that includes a planning document, scoring system (if applicable), and a post-negotiation analysis. To understand how to format and write the analysis, please follow the instructions for the in-class post-negotiation analysis. Your analysis should be 4-6 typed pages (no longer than 6 pages, double-spaced, Times 12 point font, and 1-inch margins). This paper is not due until Class 12, so you should have plenty of time to find an interesting negotiating opportunity.As with the post-negotiation analysis, the key is to focus on an analysis rather than a description of the negotiation. Your grade for this project will be based on your creativity and your analysis of the preparation, process, and outcome of the negotiation.

Extra Credit

You can earn an extra credit point in the course by posting an article on negotiations in the popular press or examples of interesting negotiations from movies, television shows, comic strips, etc. This input oftentimes results in enriched class discussions or further development of the course. The references must illustrate a concept from the course and you must write a few sentences of how it relates to the concepts discussed in class or in the readings. For example, if you see a noteworthy negotiation in a movie, just write a brief description of it, provide the name of the movie, and note when (approximately) the negotiation occurs in the movie. Post the item and write-up on IVLE for credit, so others can also enjoy. Finally, only high quality submissions will receive credit – last year, a fair number of the submissions were sub-par, which caused more clutter and chaos than interest!

ATTENDENCE POLICY

If you must miss an exercise, it is your responsibility to contact me. With at least three days notice, please e-mail Kenneth Tai at . If you have last minute emergencies that necessitate missing class, please contact me on my mobile phone at 9146-3415.This strict policy is necessary because your classmates rely on your attendance for their educational experience, and because instructors must arrange logistics and pairings in advance.

HONOR CODE

The honor code applies to this class as follows:

You may use any strategy, short of physical violence, to reach an agreement, including misrepresentation. However, in selecting a negotiation strategy it is important to remember that a strategy may have ramifications that go beyond the particular negotiation in which it was used.

You may not make up facts that materially change the power distribution of the exercise, e.g., your family just bought the company with which you are currently negotiating. If you are asked a question that calls for information that is not in your confidential instructions, you may say, “I don’t know.”

You may tell the other side what you wish, but do not show them your confidential role instructions.

It is not appropriate to borrow notes or discuss cases with people outside of class.

Class discussion stays in class.

Material used in this class including but not limited to handouts, exercises, cases, discussion questions, charts, and graphs are copyrighted and may not be used for purposes other than the education experience of this class without the written consent of the instructor.

RESEARCH

The research at NUS has been instrumental in developing the University’s reputation as one of the premier institutions for teaching negotiations. As a result, cutting-edge research on negotiations is conducted at NUS. You have an opportunity to benefit from this research in this course. Just as prior NUS students have contributed to your learning experience by participating in research, you contribute to the experiences of future students. If you do not want your outcomes from any exercise used for research purposes, please notify me. Negotiation results for research purposes are always aggregated and anonymous.

THE NEGOTIATOR’S LIBRARY

Babcock, L, & Laschever, S. (2003). Women Don’t Ask. New Jersey: PrincetonUniversity Press.

Bazerman, M.H. & Neale, M.A. (1992). Negotiating Rationally. New York: Free Press.

Brett, J.M. (2001). Negotiating Globally: How to Negotiate Deals, Resolve Disputes, and Make Decisions across Cultural Boundaries. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Fisher, R., Ury, W.L., & Patton, B. (1991). Getting to Yes. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

Lewicki, R.J., Litterer, J.A., Minton, J.W., & Saunders, D.M. (1994). Negotiation (2nd ed.), Boston: Irwin, 1994.

Malholtra, D. & Bazerman, M. (2008). Negotiation Genius: How to Overcome Obstacles and Achieve Brilliant Results at the Bargaining Table and Beyond. Bantam Books.

Raiffa, H. (1982). The Art and Science of Negotiation. Cambridge: HarvardUniversity Press.

Shell, R. (1999). Bargaining for Advantage. New York: Viking.

Ury, W.L., Brett, J.M., & Goldberg, S.B. (1988). Getting Disputes Resolved. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Ury, W. (1991). Getting Past No: Negotiation with Difficult People. Bantam Books.

BMA 5406: Negotiations and Conflict Resolution

Date / Topic / In Class / Assignments Due Today / After Class - To Do / After Class – To Read
Class 1 / Introduction to Negotiations
Simple, Two-Party Negotiations / Prepare Biopharm-Seltek
Negotiate Biopharm-Seltek
Debrief Biopharm-Seltek / Read Ury & Williams: Getting to Yes, Chapter 1-4, before coming to class
Answer and email 2 questionsto fore coming to class / Prepare role for New Recruit / Bazerman & Neale: Thinking rationally about negotiating
Lewicki, Saunders, & Minton: Strategy and tactics of distributive bargaining
Class 2 / Multiple Issue, Two-Party Negotiations / Negotiate New Recruit
Debrief New Recruit / Prepare role for Moms.com / Lax & Sebenius: Interests: The measure of negotiation
Lax & Sebenius: The Negotiator’s Dilemma: Creating and Claiming Value
Class 3 / Beyond "Win-Win" / Negotiate Moms.com
Debrief Moms.com / One planning document per negotiating team for Moms.com (Graded  or 0) / Write post-negotiation analysis / Thompson: Win-win negotiations: Expanding the pie
Hammond, Keeney, Raiffa: Even Swaps: A rational method for making tradeoffs
Class 4 / Intra-team Negotiations / Prepare Globesmart
Negotiate Globesmart
Debrief Globesmart / Post-negotiation analysis for Biopharm-Seltek, New Recruit, or Moms.com(20% of grade) / Prepare role for Bullard Houses / Thompson: Team Decision Making, Pitfalls and Solutions
Preparing for your Team-on-Team Negotiation
Class 5 / Agents and Ethics in Negotiations / Negotiate Bullard Houses
Debrief Bullard Houses / Planning document for Bullard Houses (10% of grade) / Begin preparing your role for ABC/Local 190 Round 1 – you will also be given some time to prepare with your team at the beginning of the next class. / Malholtra & Bazerman:
Recognizing and resolving ethical dilemmas
Class 6 / On-going Negotiation Round 1 / Prepare ABC/Local 190 Rnd 1
Negotiate ABC/Local 190 Rnd 1 / Scoring system for ABC/Local 190 Round 1 (E-mail me the pre-negotiation scoring system and outcomes when you finish Round 1, at the end of the night)
Date / Topic / In Class / Assignments Due Today / After Class - To Do / After Class – To Read
Class 7 / Power, Trust, and Influence / A Little Game
Film: 12 Angry Men / Cialdini: Harnessing the Science of Persuasion
Malholtra: Six Ways to Build Trust in Negotiations
Class 8 / On-going Negotiation Round 2 / Negotiate ABC/Local 190 - Rnd 2 / Prepare role for Viking
Class 9 / Dispute Resolution / Negotiate Viking
Debrief Viking / Prepare role for ABC/Local 190 Round 3 (negotiated on 5/24) / Lytle, Brett & Shapiro: The Strategic Use of Interests, Rights, and Power to Resolve Disputes
Class 10 / On-going Negotiation: Round 3 / Prepare and Negotiate ABC/Local Round 3 / Outcome for ABC/Local 190 Round 3 (e-mail outcome by end of night)
Class 11 / Multi-Party Negotiations and Coalitions / Debrief ABC/Local 190
Prepare role for Social Services
Negotiate Social Services
Debrief Social Services / Malholtra & Bazerman:
Negotiating from a Position of Weakness
Class 12 / Multiparty, Cross-Cultural Negotiations
Wrap-up / Prepare Mouse
NegotiateMouse
Debrief Mouse / Real world negotiation