An approach to negotiation that emphasizes assertiveness over empathy. Competitive negotiators have winning as a goal, and enjoy feeling purposeful and in control. They also may seek to control the agenda and frame the issues in a negotiation, perhaps resorting to intimidation or bullying to get the biggest slice of the pie. (Robert H. Mnookin, Scott R. Peppet and Andrew S. Tulumello, Beyond Winning [Belknap Press, 2004], 51)
The following items are tagged competition.
Adapted from “Team Negotiating: Strength in Numbers?”, first published in the Negotiation newsletter.
According to conventional wisdom, when it comes to negotiation, there’s strength in numbers. Indeed, several experimental studies have supported the notion that you should bring at least one other person from your organization to the bargaining table if you can. On average, this
Adapted from “Negotiating with Sole Suppliers,” by David Lax (managing principal, Lax Sebenius LLC), first published in the Negotiation newsletter.
Negotiators often wonder how to do business with sole suppliers who know they don’t have any real outside alternative and who take advantage of this. Without the power of a realistic best alternative to a negotiated
For many people, thinking about the role of power in negotiation can be paralyzing. In fact, the same people who are anxious about negotiating in general tend to be anxious about exerting their power during negotiation. Why? Perhaps because most of us realize that power, even when not explicitly discussed, is often the precipitating and driving force of negotiation processes and outcomes. Obviously, power can generate competition and conflict. But when channeled effectively in negotiations, it can be a catalyst for win-win outcomes.
Winners of Harvard Law School’s 57th annual Williston Competition, Harvard’s annual contract negotiation and drafting competition for first-year law students, were announced on Monday, April 5.
This year’s winners were:
Best Contract Overall: Russell Herman, David Roth, Kristi Jobson and Aaron Dalnoot
Best Representation of Save Our Square: Fentress Jamal Fulton and Betny Townsend
Best Representation of McMillin’s: Adam
When negotiators sign on the dotted line, they sometimes worry about the wrong concerns. “Did I overpay?” wonders the buyer as he inks the sales agreement. Across the table, the seller is thinking, “I bet if I’d pushed a little harder, I would have gotten more.”
Ford vs. GM. Coke vs. Pepsi. Oxford vs. Cambridge. These famous rivalries remind us that the top two achievers in a given realm often compete fiercely with each other. Researchers Stephen M. Garcia and Richard Gonzalez of the University of Michigan and Avishalom Tor of the University of Haifa have produced a useful series of studies on when competition between entities will exist—with findings that are relevant to all negotiators.
Guhan Subramanian is the Joseph Flom Professor of Law and Business at the Harvard Law School and the Douglas Weaver Professor of Business Law at the Harvard Business School. He is the first person in the history of Harvard University to hold tenured appointments at both HLS and HBS.
For decades, General Electric (GE) and the Environmental Protection Agency sparred over who would pay for the removal of PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, that GE had discharged into New York’s Hudson River, a cleanup project expected to cost hundreds of millions of dollars. In October 2005, the two sides came to an agreement.
In the business world, why is competition so often the norm, while cooperation seems like an impossible goal? One of the most destructive assumptions we bring to negotiations is the assumption that the pie of resources is fixed. The mythical-fixed-pie mindset leads us to interpret most competitive situations as purely win-lose.
For those who recognize opportunities
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Today’s organizations may face greater potential for conflict than ever before in history. The marketplace, with its increasing competition and globalization, magnifies differences among people in terms of gender, race, ability, age, life orientation, personality, values, perceptions, languages, cultures, and national background. With
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