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Showing posts with label legal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label legal. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Men, Women, and Status in Negotiations


Men, Women, and Status in Negotiations

EDITED BY PON_STAFF ON  / BUSINESS NEGOTIATIONS
A growing body of research suggests that status concerns vary depending on the gender of interested parties.
First, men tend to care more about status than women do. Using a university sponsored fundraising campaign, researchers Bruno S. Frey and Stephan Meier of the University of Zurich examined how social-comparison information affected contribution rates.
  • Male students who learned that a high percentage of students had contributed to the campaign were more likely to make a contribution than were female students who received the same information.
In the context of negotiation, professors John Rizzo of Stony Brook University and Richard Zeckhauser of Harvard University asked a group of young physicians about their reference groups and salary aspirations.
  • Male physicians compared themselves to reference groups that earned higher salaries than the ones female physicians selected. 
  • In addition, men’s salary reference points were more indicative than women’s of how much they earned later.
  • Finally, women tend to compare themselves to particular individuals whom they know, while men tend to assess themselves according to information about typical behavior.
For this reason, when negotiating, consider offering different social comparison information to men and women. You might tell a male prospective hire that you’re offering him more than you’ll give others with his qualifications (assuming that is true).
When negotiating with a female prospect, you might be more specific:
“We recently interviewed someone similar to you, a Kellogg MBA with several years of consulting experience. To signal how much we want you to work for us, we’re offering you more than we offered her.”

To Improve Your Negotiation Skills, Learn from a Pro


To Improve Your Negotiation Skills, Learn from a Pro

EDITED BY KEITH LUTZ ON  / NEGOTIATION SKILLS
On February 16, in the midst of the National Basketball Association’s (NBA) All-Star weekend, members of the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA) unanimously voted to oust Billy Hunter as the union’s executive director.
“This is our union and we have taken it back,” National Basketball Players Association president Derek Fisher said, as reported by ESPN.com. Fisher said the union had been “divided, misled, [and] misinformed,” by its leader. Hunter hinted in a statement that he might contest his firing in court.
As the union’s leader since 1996, Hunter negotiated three collective bargaining agreements for NBA players, contributing to raising their average salaries to more than $5 million, the highest in team sports.
Divided Union
Conflicts between Fisher and Hunter divided union members during the 2011 NBA lockout. According to ESPN.com, “agents didn’t like [Hunter], questioning his bargaining strategies, and they were frustrated they didn’t have a bigger role in his union.”
After Hunter was accused of numerous indiscretions, Fisher pushed for a review of him. In its review, an independent law firm criticized Hunter for various conflicts of interests and poor decisions, such as hiring family members and friends and billing the NBPA for questionable travel and gift expenses. The review did not find Hunter guilty of any criminal activity, but three government investigations of Hunter are ongoing.
After the review was released, the members of the NBPA put Hunter on a leave of absence. About 35 NBA players attended the union committee’s annual meeting in February to discuss Hunter’s future.
Hunter’s Dismissal
NBA superstar LeBron James and longtime player Jerry Stackhouse reportedly took the lead in arguing for Hunter’s dismissal, according to the New York Times. James’s involvement was unusual: league superstars rarely get involved in the nitty gritty of labor negotiations and union management.
James “practically cross-examined the lawyers to prepared the report on Hunter,” the Times reports. And he and Stackhouse demanded explanations from committee members who previously had sided with Hunter rather than Fisher.
NBA players widely respect James for his business savvy and interpersonal skills. So it was not surprising, given James’s forceful arguments against Hunter, that the committee voted unanimously to release Hunter from his duties.
The situation speaks to the power of convincing influential parties to lead important negotiations. One well-respected and admired leader may be uniquely posited to wrap up a negotiation that took many behind-the-scenes players to engineer.

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

A recent study of selfishness in negotiation has interesting results


The Dictator Game: Justifying Selfishness in Negotiation

 / MEETING FACILITATION
In a recent study of selfishness in negotiation, Fei Song of York University and C. Brian Cadsby and Tristan Morris of the University of Guelph had participants play the “dictator game,” adapted from experimental economics literature. In this game, Party A is given a sum of money to allocate between himself and Party B. Because Party B has no power, Party A’s allocation goes into effect without debate. The dictator game captures the essence of negotiations in contexts with an extreme power differential.
Song and her colleagues compared the behavior of people who played the role of Party A on their own versus those who made the allocation decision as part of a two-person team. The authors also compared how males and females behaved in the role of Party A. Male participants were significantly more selfish when they represented a team than when they acted alone; female participants were less influenced by whether they represented only themselves or a two-person team.
The results for males were broadly consistent with past research by Professor Kristina A. Diekmann of the University of Utah, which showed that negotiators are more selfish when they can attribute selfish behavior to their group rather than to themselves. As David Messick of Northwestern University has observed, football coaches don’t justify the decision to take a new position by saying, “I want more money.” Rather, they tend to say, “I need to protect the financial interests of my family.” Obviously, the two statements mean more of less the same thing.
Song and her colleagues raise the possibility that female negotiators are less influenced by the social context of representing a group. These results shine new light on claiming behavior as it relates to gender and whether negotiators act alone or as part of a team. Specifically, when negotiators begin to reference their family, department, or team, they may be about to claim more than their fair share of the pie.

Saturday, February 16, 2013

Smart negotiation tactic by musical band to keep their name


Here is the smart negotiation tactics used by the electro-pop duo The Postal Service. After selling more than 400,000 copies of their 2003 album, band members Jimmy Tamborello and Ben Gibbard received a cease-and-desist letter from the United States Postal Service (USPS) citing infringement of its trademarked name. The dispute could have turned ugly. The USPS was concerned about a dilution of its name in the marketplace. Given their recent success, the band members were reluctant to change their name.

Yet during negotiations, the band managed to turn the dispute into a syner- gistic opportunity by identifying the priorities and non-competing preferences of both sides. Tamborello and Gibbard pointed out that the losses the USPS had suffered to Internet and e-mail communication were large, especially among the age cohort of the band’s fan base. The USPS agreed to grant a free license allowing The Postal Service to continue to use its name. 

In exchange, the band agreed to print a trademark notice on its albums, to promote the use of the USPS by its young fans, and even to perform at an annual USPS event. As this story illustrates, when negotiators take stock of each other’s priorities and resources, they often will spot opportunities for wise trades. 

From Harvard's Program on Negotiation,
 Effective Conflict Resolution Strategies to Avoid Litigation
 
www.pon.harvard.edu/publications