Negotiation Case
The most valuable lessons I have learned from the negotiation simulation—which also happened to be the most difficult task of negotiating a deal because it involved many parties to come up with a solution—is on the Deeport negotiation. As the Federation of Labor Unions, I am most pleased with my own negotiating behavior in trying to consider the interests of the other parties, especially the underdogs—the ones with less bargaining powers—namely the Environmental League and Other Ports. Surprisingly, while we needed 4 out of 5 votes, never in the mind have I ever thought of cutting one of the mentioned underdogs. My negotiating behavior was always trying to achieve the solution that everyone had to be included in the deal. To this end, while trying to maximize my deal, I also tried to negotiate with other parties to cut the cake from the ones who gained most and gave it to the two underdogs who were risking themselves to be excluded so that they both would join the deal. In fact, this function of bridging the differences, by its nature, should not be my role because as the Federation of Labor Unions, I was initially eyed with tough treatment from some parties, Deeport in particular. However, throughout the negotiating process, perhaps also because I had the strong support from Governor Sherwood, I could become the one who could help bridge the differences of both sides: the side who had more power namely Deeport, Governor Sherwood, and the Federal Department of Coastal Resources; and the side who had less bargaining power namely the mentioned underdogs. The end result may not make Deeport as happy as it would have wanted to achieve. However, the other two underdogs, although may not be very happy especially Other Ports, were eventually satisfied with the end result of being included. I achieved the highest point among the 6 negotiators and also my personal mission of having everyone in the deal.
There were a couple primary barriers in this negotiation and I am pleased that on many occasions, I was actually the facilitator in tackling the barriers throughout the negotiating process. In retrospect, I could see that confrontation became much less severe once there is a good facilitator to pull every interest together. Undoubtedly, this could be one of the important skills for me in particular in any future difficult negotiation, especially the ones that involved many parties with quite different objectives. From the experience, it is interesting to notice that I could assume the task of a facilitator, although the role of the Federal of Labor Unions should not really be the appropriate facilitator when compared to the role of other negotiators like the Governor and Deeport. I believe it is about the personality of the negotiators. Perhaps it is partly because my objective is also to include every one as mentioned (although I primarily, for sure, wanted to maximize my interest), partly it is also because I had more