Page 92 - DMGT519_Conflict Management and Negotiation Skills

Conflict Management and Negotiation Skills

Notes 4. Building a relationship: Building a relationship and establishing trust is an important
aspect of negotiation. However, it is not sufficient to proclaim a negotiation as win-win.
Even people with a genuine interest in the other party may not be thinking creatively and
crafting win-win deals. In fact, people who would seem to have the most interest in
building a relationship with the other party (for example, husbands and wives, dating
couples, and long-term partners) often fail to reach integrative agreements (Fry, Firestone,
& Williams 1983; Thompson & De Harpport, 1998; Kurtzber & Medves, 1999).
Win-win negotiation really means that all creative opportunities are exploited and no
resources are left on the table. We call these outcomes integrative negotiations. In hundreds
of examples, money is left on the table in real-world negotiations; the problem is that
people do not realize it. It is, of course

5. Telltale signs of win-win potential: Integrative potential exists in just about every
negotiation situation. However, people often fail to see it or do not believe that win-win
is possible. Most negotiations do not appear to have win-win because whatever one party
gains, the other party loses, however, even in the simplest of negotiations, it is possible to
identify more than one issue. The probability that negotiators will have identical
preferences across all issues is small, and as we will see, it is differences in preferences,
beliefs, and capacities that may be profitably traded off to create joint gain (Lax & Sebenius,
1986). For example, in the peace treaty talks between Syria and Israel, technical experts
formed committees to identify several issues, including the extent of an Israeli withdrawal
from the Golan Heights, water rights, security measures, and the time-table for
implementing an agreement. Israel puts the emphasis on Security guarantees, and Syria
placed greater weight on the withdrawal from the Golan Heights, thus allowing a more
integrative agreement to emerge (USA Today, January 5, 2000).
Can other issues be brought in?

Another strategy is to bring other issues, not previously considered, into the negotiation. For
example, in a four-day negotiation between San Marino, California, and the local fire fighters
association, the key issue was salary. Fire fighters wanted an increase. The negotiators began
searching for several options to reach this goal by connecting benefits to wages, allowing cost
savings to be distributed to fire fighters, and taking on additional duties (thereby increasing
incomes). In addition, management spent a great deal of time providing the fire fighters with
information on cost benefit analyses, operating costs, and other relevant budgetary information
so that all parties could evaluate which options were the most practical and beneficial. This
information sharing contributed not only to this negotiation but provided helpful information
for future organisational discussions

Can side deals be made?

In many situations, people are strictly cautioned not to make side deals or side payments, in
contrast, the ability to bring other people into negotiations to make side deals may increase the
size of the bargaining pie.

Do Parties have different Preferences across Negotiation Issues?

If parties have different strengths of preference across the negotiation issues, by definition, it is
a win-win negotiation (Froman & Cohen 1970). Again, consider the orange-splitting example.
Essentially, the situation involves two issues: the juice and the rind. Moreover, with regard to
preferences, one sister cares more about the juice, the other cares more about the rind, then an
integrative agreement would not be possible. The key is to determine each party’s preferences

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