Due to the globalization, negotiation becomes more common and increasingly important in our daily life. How to achieve a successful negotiation and reach win-win situation? At the very beginning, Professor Sharone illustrated two basic concepts to us: Reservation Price (RP) and Best Alternative To a Negative Agreement (BATNA). Negotiators shall evaluate counterparties’ RP and assess their own BATNA in a bit to possess an advantage position in one negotiation. In an interesting simulation called “Sold Car” , students were grouped into several pairs, acting as car buyers who would like to pay lowest for a used car and sellers who would like to be paid highest. The final bids were diversified from pair to pair, highlighting a fact that under-estimating or over-estimating counterparty’s RP would venture your position in the negotiation. Furthermore, the negotiator who opens first offer would set an “anchor price” to its counterparty psychologically, affecting the final bid profoundly.
Negotiation is not win-lose but win-win. All parties involved could reach their targets in a successful negotiation. The “Recruit Game” told the students vividly that the outcome could be maximized. Professor Sharone also emphasized that the key to manage the negotiator’s dilemma is to develop relationship and trust and try to avoid common mistakes.
We have experienced a wonderful course introducing negotiation skill systematically and logically. After the lecture, many students raised questions to Professor Sharone and expressed their appreciation. We are looking forward to the next lecture from Professor Sharone.
By 2014 IMBA Zhang Li
October 23rd, 2014
