Joy's negotiations

In this last role play, Celia and I were the EuroMouse representatives. We had the government on our side. We made the the strategy together, but the government told us that they would remain fair and that’s what they did. At the meeting 4 mayors of surrounding towns of our construction site were also present. They were angry because of the noise and increase in traffic caused by the construction site molested them. Moreover, they were upset that they had not been included in the initial negotiation (when the government sold the land to us and made profit out if it) but this wasn’t our fault, we just bought the land from the government and didn’t know that people had been expropriated from it… That’s what we explained to the mayors. The government officials chose to led the conversation. For their interest it was important that the project did go on (economical reasons). We chose to take a lot of time and patience to hear and try to understand the complaints of the mayors....

Cultural differences can influence negotiations. We’ve seen in a class called “Cross Cultural Management” with Mrs. Cohen-Cheminet that culture influences the way we act. It is important to map the players and the process: Who are the players? Sometimes there are more players than the ones at the negotiation table (for example in governments or big organizations). Who decides what? It is essential to identify it and it can change with the countries (and cultures).   What are the informal influences that can make or break a deal? It can be government agencies, keiretsu in Japan (industrial groups linked by a web of business ties), in Germany there are powerful insurance companies, in Italy there are powerful families, in Russia the mafia etc. Dispute resolutions are also very different: in Japan they rely on relationships, in Russia there is almost no legal system. Then you have to adapt your approach to: Top Down We talk about that when the “real ...

            For this roleplay, I was playing JT, the head of payroll for CPA Inc. There was trouble between the workers because pay checks had been stolen. Three long-term employees of the firms were sure that Sandy was the one who did it, because of that, they wanted me to fire him without any delay.             I had to remain calm, and try to impose a respectful atmosphere that was not present. The employees were ruthless and did not let Sandy nor me speak. They were quite aggressive and really rude towards him. Sandy chose to remain discrete during most of the discussion and I had to be the ne taking his defence but not too much otherwise the other employees would accuse me of favouritism. I had to contain the general argument and to think a lot about my sayings before hand as is was a difficult situation. I’m kind of proud of what I did, but I know I could have been be...