Negotiation Paper

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….1

STRENGTHS………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..2
Managing the Relationship and Making the Counter Party Feel They are Winners……..….2

Leveraging Human Mentality to Arrive at a Deal……………………………………………………………3

WEAKNESSES……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..4
LESSONS LEARNED……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..4
THE WALK‐AWAY TECHNIQUE……………………………………………………………………………………………………5
BATNA and Walk‐away Point……………………………………………………………………………………….…5
The walk‐away “trap”………………………………………………………………………………………………….…6
When to Walk Away………………………………………………………………………………………………….……6
How to Use It…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……7
How to Handle the Walk‐away of the Counter Party……………………………………………….……..8
FUTURE LESSONS……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….8
APPENDIX – IN CLASS EXERCISES………………………………………………………………………………………….….10

Introduction
Before taking this course, I simply considered negotiation as a course of action to claim value, which largely relied on making compromises to get something in return. Given this narrow perception, my fundamental approach to negotiation was to begin with an opening offer far away from my resistance point and ensure that there is enough room to make concessions.
During the negotiation I would gradually make concessions and expect the return offer from the counter party to be of somewhat comparable magnitude thus a settlement point can be achieved.1 However, entering the first exercise – the Bradford Development Case, I immediately realized that I was not the only person using such strategy. With two people using the same lowball
(highball) tactic ‐ starting with a ridiculously low (or high) opening offer that they know they would never achieve2 ‐ the tactic becomes