(long post, but worth it in my opinion...) julie, the negotiator. so the course in this saint paul institute of finance is making me a vicious aggressive negotiator. could be useful and you know what? it worked!
we had this exercise last night and here's how it went.
RULES:
we were divided into 3 teams: A, B and C. we had a sum of R$130 to be negotiated. we had three rounds of talks of 7 mins each. between each round, each group could speak for a minute or two. each group had one and only one negotiator. the other team members were only allowed to pass written notes to the negotiator, but not speak. the agreement must be made between 2 groups only and the third group, that didn't get into an agreement, was to be left out of the money splitting getting 0%. also, the agreement could not be 100% to one team - 0% to the other. and it also couldn't be 50 - 50.
here's the catch: when A negotiated with B, they were negotiating for 100% of the money. when A negotiated with C, they could only discuss 80% of the money. and B and C, only 60% of the money.
GAME:
for obvious reasons, A and B together would be the best bet but if for some reason, one group could get a better deal with C, they can fake and pretend that they were closing A and B, but then, when writing down the answers, they could write C and the other group would be left out, thus getting no shares. this is hard to explain, but trust me, very exciting.
so at first, C has nothing to lose because it has the least to offer. so they're willing to close a partnership with anyone basically therefore, giving them actually a lot of power. whoever does business with C is sure to close a deal.
B is the middle group so they're sort of stuck between a rock and a hard place. they could get a real good deal with A (but end up negotiating pennies - it did happen! - because an almost accurate definition of 2nd place is "i'm almost 1st").
and A can seem just cocky because "everyone wants to negotiate with me and they'll get the best deal." so how to assure a partnership (which was key in this exercise)??
this was fantastic!
NEGOTIATIONS:
B did come out last nite very aggressive offering a 40% - 60% agreement for A group. (i was in A) when we, A, tried negotiating a bit, even at some point 61% - 39% (pennies!), they wouldn't budge. so to us, they couldn't really be trusted.
so how to make sure that C knows we're not kidding about closing a deal with them, since we'd get the least money (remember? A and C = only 60% of the total R%130)? we could be aggressive and ask for anything from them because they didn't have much but maybe B asked for just the right amount that would keep them. we obviously couldn't hear the other groups negotiating.
STRATEGY:
so on our 1st round, C offered us R$70. we asked if they'd be willing to give us R$78. they seemed flexible but not up to that number. 2nd round, they went up and offered us R$80. in my opinion, they were not really offering but more so clarifying if we were bluffing with them or not. we had agreed as a group to ask for R$75 and we could have asked for that, they would've signed for it maybe... BUT maybe they got a better deal with B. so how to ensure they were ours? i'm so proud of myself. i slipped a note to the negotiator "ask for R$65 only." he was in shock and when he said it, group C was totally in shock as well. but this was only 2nd round and we could convince them we were serious on round 3 if we maintained our proposal. ooooh, this is exciting.
round 3: group C offered R$80 again and we, eye to eye, maintained our R$65 telling them that this isn't about money, we just really want to close a deal or else, we end up with nothing.
FANTASTIC!! it worked! group B thought they had closed with C. but A, us, and C knew we had closed our partnership. agressive but humble, i'd say. aggressive offer but humble because in the end, we were getting less money.
STATISTICS:
well, turns out that because people already assume A is arrogant, for having the 100% option if A and B agree, 90% of the time this game is played B and C form a coalition. and only 5% of the time, A and C combine forces. so this is the best result we could've asked for and i'm so happy i caught it, passed it on and it worked!! very very exciting class! and maybe, yea, as someone just told me, negotiating might be in my blood. well then, thank you previous generations. it worked and i'll keep making good use of it. ;)
