Two Negotiation Posts - Essay Example

Negotiation Post According to Stuart Diamond, it is of paramount importance to demonstrate your appreciation for theother party’s values and perceptions. Everyone has values and perceptions on different topics; for instance different people vary on gayism. Is it right or wrong? Well, the most important thing is not if it is right or wrong but why I feel thus. Naturally, people tend to dismiss other people’s ideas, values and perceptions if they do not conform to their own. Diamond states that if one demonstrates that they value the other persons ideas, values and perceptions then it is easy to get them to agree. Recently my parents had an argument over whether or not to buy a new car. My dad wanted to buy a new car since he had worked for such a long time making good money but had never driven his dream car- a Mercedes. My mum on the other hand thought that the money could be used to buy a new house instead of buying something as frivolous as a car. I asked my mum why she felt a new car was frivolous and why my dad wanted to buy one. She said that the money should be spent on something that can last and also be appreciated by everyone in the family instead of one person only. But she did not know why my dad felt so strongly that he should buy himself a new car. I then remebered Diamond discussing the idea that at times it pays off to concede in order to benefit in the future. I explained this to my mum as meaning- you would rather loose the battle than the war. Allowing my dad to buy the car would be loosing the battle but not the war. I asked her to go ask him and to listen intently and also share her opinions. They had the dicussion and after that she understood where he was coming from. He felt that a man of his stature in society should be able to drive a good car after all his years of hard work. A skilled negotiator is one who can keep their eye on the “ultimate prize” and can thus afford to make certain compromises along the way but all in the aim of achieving the “ultimate prize”. Human nature dictates that once one person makes a sacrifice for another the other person then naturally feels obligated to reciprocate. I therefore asked my mum what her “ultimate prize” is and she said it was buying a new house because such investments were safe and they could be enjoyed by the family as a whole. I then told her not to lose sight of that objective because she would achieve it sooner rather than later. Fast foward seven years later, my parents who work together were rewarded handsomely for their efforts by a certain company and when I asked what they would do with the money, my mum simply said she had not decided yet. My dad looked at her sharply and asked if he did not have a say into how the money would be used and my mum simply said since she sacrificed last time then he had to sacrifice this time. Negotiation Post 2 Negotiation is often perceived to be a shouting match and about he who budges the least is deemed the winner. This is a misconception. On several occassions you find companies negotiating with their employees on their salaries and the company refuses to budge simply because it will be percieved as weak but the difference in increasing the employee’s salary would not have any effect on the company’s financial status. Stuart Diamond in his book Getting More states that negotiations are more about emotions than logic. It is therefore of paramount importance that the parties be on good terms. I recently worked in a law firm and a husband wanted to divorce his wife because they could not sort their differences out. From his demanour and speech you could immediately feel the anger and hatred between the two. I had to sit down with her lawyer as well and determine how the property would be shared out. Our client the husband was very wealthy before the marriage but he only truly cared about a certain piece of property that he had inherited from his father. He was willing to lose everything else but not that one. Acquiring this property was going to be very difficult because he had been adulterous during he marriage and had been found out by his wife and she was out to cripple him financially. To reiterate Diamond’s point- it is very difficult to negotiate with someone who does not like you because they are emotional and do not care about logic. From our client’s point of view his wife would stand to benefit alot if she would only take any other property apart from the one he inherited from his family and since she knew this she also wanted it, not because it was valuable but because it would hurt him. She was therefore illogical and emotional and our client could not understand this. I sat him down and explained it to him and gave him the example; during the trial of OJ Simpson, the infamous football player, all the evidence seemed to point to one conclusion, that he was guilty, but at the end of the day he was never convicted. I asked him why he thought OJ was never convicted despite all odds being stacked against him and he looked at me with a puzzled look. I told him simply because the jury did not like the prosecutor. The prosecutor had come out as being arrogant and he thought the case would be “a slam-dunk”. But he was wrong because he did not play o the emotions of the jury. Human beings are emotional creatures and they always will be. It is very difficult to separate the emotional aspect from the logical aspect and that is why you find employees who have been offered more than 50% increase in their salaries by other companies but they still do not leave. This is because they have formed social ties. The logical thing would be to move and earn more money, but logic does not always win. Works Cited Diamond, Stuart (2012) Getting More. Three Rivers Press Read More