I feel that this weeks negotiation was a good way to end the class.  The details of the case were fairly straightforward and the issues were pretty easy to negotiate.  However, because they dealt with different cultural backgrounds, we really needed to understand where our counterpart was coming from.  We had different understandings regarding how a business is run.  However, we had very similar interests in that this venture was for both of us to profit.  The negotiation was really to ensure the success of the company and a fair amount of control by each company. 

We had a unique case with both Tanya and myself negotiatiing as a team.  This however, did not really work to our advantage because we had not prepared to work together.  We were able to take a meeting and consult in the middle.  However, this was just so we could get on the same page and agree on an issue ourselves.  On the matter of the board control I was leaning towards 60/40, whereas Tanya felt that 50/50 was fair.  Because time was running short and I did not want to argue with my own partnet I agreed with Tanya.  However, I feel that in real life in such an instance it is more likely that the company with a greater stake in the venture would get greater control.

As a whole the negotiation was easier because this was not a final agreement, but merely a preliminary proposal for Mr. Thompson and Mr. Lee to look over and finalize.  Therefore, I felt less pressure about winning my side.  Also, because we were to enter this venture together I felt it more important to preserve a strong relationship.  If no agreement could be met, it was up to Mr. Thompson to decide this.

I feel that throughout this course I have truly matured as a negotiator.  Although there are still a great deal of areas that I need to work on I can confidently say that I at least improved on all areas.  Perhaps the area where I needed the greatest amount of work was my ability to look at the whole picture.  By this I mean my ability to look at all the interests and all the alternatives.  However, each week I have found that I truly improve at understanding the other sides views and alternatives for both myself and the other side.  I know the importance of having a BATNA, because in real life I know that many circumstances will end in not meeting an agreement.  Looking at the interests, options, and alternatives, I feel that I have become more creative in finding solutions to problems.  Although I still work hard to meet an agreement,(perhaps sometimes when it is a lose, lose situatioon), I am improving at finding the few win, win situations. 

Although I did not include being forceful as a category on hte radar chart I feel that the opposite category is "Be Cordial" .  I believe that perhaps I was being too cordial at the beginning.  Through negotiation with many different types of people I have at times become very frustrated and even angry at people.  Additionally, working with partners that are more aggressive has gotten me to be more forceful as a negotiator as well.  Therefore, I feel that I have decreased in the "Be Cordial" category.  However, I have improved with being more forceful, stern, and aggressive with my interests. 

One area where I have not seen great improvement is doing my research.  This is not to say that I did not put forth that effort to find out more info.  However, I felt that in many of the cases, I did not have enough information to really do research.  I felt that some of hte cases did not give enough information to allow me to reasearch.  Looking at the cases now, in hindsight I see some areas which I could have looked up some information.  However, the really important thing that I learned was that in real life many times I won't have enough information either.  In fact in most situations I will probably have less information than was even given to me in these negotiations. 

Surprisingly, although this weeks negotiations dealt with the issue of ethics, in both cases that aspect was basically ignored.  Interestingly however, they were ignored in order to focus more on the parties' interests.  I feel like this shows how I've developed as a negotiator to look at interests rather than just the numbers. 

In the Knight/Excalibur my counter part, Liz, did not even bring up the issue that the company was puttin in extra time to manufacture the pistons.  Nor did I consider asking her about those extra man hours.  I just assumed that it would cost them a greater amount.  In this way I should have seriously questioned the circumstances.  Additionally, I should have considered what her BATNA was.  The range that was given to me was $500-$600.  Liz's initial offer was $600 and therefore I felt that $500 was my lowest offer. I never considered a lower price because I felt that it would have insulted her.  As I bargained she was giving ground very slowly and thus didn't indicate her willingness to drop the price.  Much of our negotiation focused on the insurance on flaws and guaranteeing the product.  I felt that 10% was too high for a product which was supposed to be very high quality.  In the end we agreed that she would guarantee 100% of the pistons at a price of $560, the base price, with a 5% markup for rushing the order.  I was able to negotiate this price because we offered their company name on the pistons.  In the end I felt that this was a relatively fair price. 

Although I feel that I could have gotten a low price, I feel that it would have been very difficult for me to have really obtained the information she was not sharing through questioning.  I should have directed my questions on why the prices were so high and what the 5% markup accounted for.  However, she could have lied about this.  Luckily for her, I never questioned her on this matter.  Although she did not deceive me directly I feel rather cheated.  In fact, she told me that her company received a Swiss contra, which is partly true.  However, she never told me that it was nullified.  In this was I feel somewhat cheated.  This hurts her in some ways because I would not give the company a positive recommendation. 

The Bullard Houses case went extremely smoothly and actually involved very little negotiationg.  Craig, downtown's representative, initially told me that the number one priority was to restore the houses and avoid building a commercial property.  He asked for my offer and was somewhat thrown off by this.  As a sort of middle number between the $11.5-$13.5 million  and $20 million estimates, I told im $16 million.  My concern, however, was whether any agreement could be met.  I knew that Abstensia wanted to develop a hotel.  However, I did not want to divulge this.  Craig quickly asked of our plans though.  I responded by keeping it very vague and that my client did not actually have an exact plan.  I listed restoring the houses, building something similar to a Quincy Market, and building a hotel as all possible options.  There majority of our discussion then concentrated on what consisted of commerical property.  In the end, Craig agreed that luxury hotels would be acceptable along with apartments and houses.  The big issue was that he wanted to ensure no commercial property otherwise to be built.  Therefore, I knew that it would be necessary to tell him our plans in order to get a deal made.  I was not worried about communicationg this information though because Craig had agreed that a hotel was acceptable.  Therefore, an agreement was made to allow the development of a hotel, while converting the current houses hald into luxury apartments and half into a common public room, with the condition that if I wanted to resell the property I would have to offer it back to Downtown at $16 million first.  Although I was told not to divulge the idea of Abstensia building a hotel, I feel that my actions were more focused on our interests.  I told him that this deal was to be kept confidential.  Although, there was still a chance that this information would leak out.  I felt confident, due to our very open and friendly negotiation, that he would keep this between us.  Additionally, he agreed that a hotel could be built.  Therefore, I feel that this agreement was very favorable for Abstensia. 

In hindsight some more negotiation probably could have been made regarding the actual price.  However, it is more likely that it would have gone up rather than down with more discussion.  Therefore, I feel that it all worked out in my favor. 

It was fantastic to finally see the gripping, edge of your seat, ending to the film this week.  Joking aside, to see a negotiation that was based on a real event was very informative.  It is, of course, very realistic to encounter a hard-nosed negotiator who focuses more so on the numbers like the woman. 

In terms of our negotiations I felt that they all went very smoothly this week.  Salary negotiations are something that we will probably all encounter at some point in our lives.  It is an interesting position to be in as an employee because you have to try to leverage yourself as an asset to the company.  Because there were not many restrictions or even goals in terms of the numbers in these cases, this gave us all alot of flexibilty in how to negotiate.  However, I felt that we all had fairly similar negotiation styles.  Because our styles tended to be more cordial than aggressive it made for very easy negotiations.  I learned that it is key to not just go in and debate on the figures.  Regardless of whether this is the goal, we must look at what characteristics determine how to adjust the numbers.  In this case we all opened with asking about performance of the employee.  Given that all three employee positions were excelling in most aspects the, the employers began on the same page of the employee deserving a raise. 

Therefore, the negotiation really focused on how much of a raise the employee deserved and how to creatively distribute it.  In each case we more or less compromised with the numbers and reached a midpoint.   

It was interesting to see that through each negotiation we took the feedback from the observer of the previous role-playing and incorporated it.  The main area of the concern for the employer was that they wanted to reward the employee for any good work but also wanted to ensure positive future contributions.  Therefore, in 2 of the negotiations the raises were given in increments for several years and bonuses were given depending on the performance of the top-flite line. 

In any case it seemed that most of us took the influence tactic of rationality that the employee was deserving of the raise based on performance. 

It was very interesting to see how the outcome of my negotiation differed so greatly from the other 2 groups.  I thins this was the first week when there was such a huge contrast.  It just goes to show that even with the exact same information, how people's different personalities, perparation, and negotiations strategies can completely change the entire negotiation and outcome.  This was probably the most comfortable I have ever been in a negotiation.  In the initial preparation with the scientists, we strictly focused on alternatives for how to cut costs while staying in San Francisco.  Although I do not how realisitc is really was, it was certainly beneficial for all the scientists to stand together as a united front with myself being hte primary speaker.  It resulted in the best outcome for us.  However, I feel that in real life there would likely be some people who would be more willing to make the move and outspoken about it.  Because we had relative control of the negotiation however, it never came down to one or two scientists being swayed to move.

The managers bascically got us to initiaite communication, wanting to see our strategy.  Although they told us after the negotiation that it was their strategy not to tell us much, I feel that this worked greatly in our favor because we felt that they were unprepared and felt that we had the leverage as a result.  Additionally we initially felt that we were really the heart of the firm and had prospects for finding new jobs.  The company, on the other hand, would go under without all of its top researchers, especially since it's strongpoint is it's quality and innovation.  During the break, we decided to add in our strategy asking for a performance option based on getting additional contracts, which would include stock options and increased wages.  We partly belived that we deserved this, but at the least we felt that this would get the managers not to reduce our salary. 

It is somewhat interesting because I don't necessarily feel like we focused on the interests of both sides, but rather just focused on the interests of the corporation.  As a part of the scientist group we were just able to align their interests with ours to come up with a mutually beneficial result.  There was no mention of how our personal lives would be upset by the move.  Instead we asked what the managers were looking for in terms of savings, which was $6 million.  With our alternative to lease university facilities, we felt confident that savings would be sufficient and allow us to stay in San Francisco.  The concession made by management was to transfer the San Ramone R&D group to San Francisco as well.  We felt that this would allow us to bring on additional savings and necessary to meet an agreement.  Realistically, conflicts between our two R&D groups may have actually caused some debate over the issue.  However, we were rather willing to accept this because we understood it would make the company more efficient.  The only issue that we brought up was to give us all managerial roles over the San Ramone group.  We knew this was somewhat unlikely because it would cause some conflict.  Thus, we were willing to settle for informal mentoring roles for now and a meeting in one year to discuss formal managerial positions because we felt that as we were the more knowledgeable researchers, that we would get promotions soon anyways. 

As a whole I feel that the negotiaiton was rather one-sided favoring us, the scientists.  However, I still feel that the result is beneficial to both sides. 

In a personal aspect, I have realized that I am usually willing to compromise in negotaions.  Although this is true, the initial preparation and breaks with just the scientists allowed me to become more forceful with our position and confident with the leverage we had. 

I felt that this weeks negotiation was probably the most realistic situation that was have done thus far.  By doing the preparation assignment I looked very closely into my assumptions and assumptions that others may have about me.  With a real negotiation where I have something at stake I would likely go to this extent of preparation as well. 

Being able to discuss and plan with another Trustee was probably the most helpful for this negotiation.  It was, however, rather difficult to rank the projects exactly according to the rules laid out in our confidential information.  This was because the hockey rink roof and busses, which were the most profitable, added up to $165,000. not allowing us to invest in the next most profitable project, which was the heating systems.  Therefore, we went into the negotiation with the ranks of

1) Heating System

2) Hocky Rink

3) Busses

4) Women's Locker Room

5) Fina Art's Building

6) Swimming Pool

What we should have planned more for was the way to facilitate the negotiation.  We did not formulate how we wanted to run the discussion, which would have been helpful in learning everyone's interests.  In general though I would say that talking to someone beforehand would be helpful in most situations even if the other person is not involved with the negotiation.  Whether it is with a friend or family member it is beneficial to get another perspective. 

The actual negotiation was very interesting as well.  Having three different parties was actually beneficial because it allowed some breathing room in the negotiation.  Having a fellow Trustee also helped in this way.  What could have been beneficial for all sides is if we have a brek in the middle, which in hindsight we as the trustees, should have called. 

Some of the negotiation was rather tricky to deal with because I did not want to follow the decision rules of how to pick projects exactly.  I felt that the Net Present Value was more helpful than the profitability index.  I also didn't think I could rule out projects with an index less than 1.  Doing so would have been completely closed minded and would have made the negotiation rather difficult. 

Other than that I felt that it was very interesting to have all the power in the negotiation.  I was not sure if I should exercise this or it the faculty or headmaster could have leveraged to gain some bargaining strength.  It definitely would have been helpful to knwo the breakdown of how much we received yearly from the interest in the endowment and how much was debt.  In a real negotiation these statistics would be available and beneficial in reaching some future concessions. 

Regardless, I feel that this negotiation was the best experience yet and learned a great deal about negotiation within a larger group of people.