Chapter 16: International and cross cultural negotiation

Question 1

Why are international negotiations so much harder?

Think of the art and science behind these negotiations

Answer 1

• The science of negotiation provides research evidence to support broad trends that often, but not always, occur during negotiation.
• The art of negotiation is deciding which strategy to apply when, and choosing which models and perspectives to apply to increase cross-cultural understanding.

Question 2

What makes international negotiations different

(Explain the two various overall context)

Answer 2

• Environmental context
  Includes environmental forces (external) that neither
  negotiator controls that influence the negotiation
• Immediate context
  Includes factors over which negotiators appear to
  have some control

Question 3

What are some of these factors of external environmental context

Answer 3

• Political and legal pluralism
• International economics
• Foreign governments and bureaucracies
• Instability
• Ideology
• Culture
• External stakeholders

Question 4

What are some of these factors of immediate context

Answer 4

• Relative bargaining power
• Levels of conflict
• Relationship between negotiators
• Desired outcomes
• Immediate stakeholders

Question 5

Draw the diagram of context of international negotiations

Answer 5

negotiation process (innest circle)

Immediate context (inner circle)

environmental context (outer circle)

refer to 16-6 of notes

Question 6

What are the challenges for negotiators when it comes to doing such negotiations

Answer 6

Understand the multiple influences of several factors
on the negotiation process

Update this understanding regularly as
circumstances change

Question 7

How should one approach conceptualizing culture and negotiation

Answer 7

1. Should see culture as a learned behaviour
   - negotiators have a catalogue of behaviours to include dos and donts
2. Should see culture as shared values
   - use hofstede’s model of cultural dimensions

Question 8

What are hofstede’s model of cultural dimensions (List 4)

Answer 8

 Individualism/collectivism
Power distance
Career success/quality of life
Uncertainty avoidance

Question 9

What is individualism vs collectivism? How does it affect negotiators

Answer 9

Definition: the extent to which the society is organized around individuals or the group.

individualism/collectivism influences negotiation process, outcomes and preferences

• indidualistic societies more likely to swap negotiators using whatever short term criteria deemed appropriate
• collectivistic societies focus on relationships to be maintained with same negotiator for years

Question 10

What is power distance? How does it affect negotiators

Answer 10

Definition: “The extent to which the less powerful members of organizations and institutions (like the family) accept and expect that power is distributed unequally.”

Cultures with stronger power distance is likely to have decision making concentrated at the top of the culture

Question 11

What is career success/quality of life ? How does it affect negotiators

Answer 11

cultures differ to which how they hold values that promote career success or quality of life

cultures promoting career success characterized by the acquisition of money and not caring for others

cultures promote quality of life characterized for relationships and nuturing

Question 12

What is uncertainty avoidance ? How does it affect negotiators

Answer 12

Definition: indicate extent a culture program its members to feel uncomfortable or comfortable in unstructured situations

Question 13

How Hofstede cultures ranking in the top 10 across countries

Answer 13

Individualism:

1. US
2. AUS
3. GB
4. Canada /netherlands

Power Distance:

1. Malaysia
2. Guatemala/Panama
3. Philippines
   5.Mexico

Assertiveness:

1. Sweeden
2. Norway
3. Netherlands
4. Denmark
5. Costa Rica

Uncertainty avoidance:

1. Greece
2. portugal
3. guatemala
4. Uruguay
5. Belgium

Question 14

How should one conceptualize culture and negotiation (list 2)**

Answer 14

• Culture as dialectic
  All cultures contain dimensions or tensions that are called dialectics
  Example: Judeo-Christian parables “too many cooks spoil the broth” and “two heads are better than one” offer conflicting guidance**
  This can explain variations within cultures
• Culture in context
   No human behavior is determined by a single cause
  All behavior may be understood at many different levels simultaneously

Question 15

How does culture influence negotiation outcomes

Answer 15

1. ALthough not direct, culture has an influence through different negotiation process in different cultures
2. some evidence suggest cross cultural negotiations yield poorer outcomes than intracultural negotiations

Question 16

How to be culturally responsive when choosing negotiation strategies

Answer 16

• Be aware of their own and the other party’s culture in general
• Understand the specific factors in the current relationship
• Predict or try to influence the other party’s approach

strategies should be based on level of familiarity that one negotiator have with the other party’s culture

Question 17

What you should do when you have low familiarity as the negotiator (list 3)**

Answer 17

• Employ agents or advisers (unilateral strategy)
   Useful for negotiators who have little awareness of the other party’s culture
• Bring in a mediator (joint strategy)
  Encourages one side or the other to adopt one culture’s approaches or mediator culture approach
• Induce the other party to use your approach (joint strategy)
   The other party may become irritated or be insulted

Question 18

What you should do when you have moderate familiarity as the negotiator (list 2)**

Answer 18

• Adapt to the other negotiator’s approach (unilateral strategy)
  Involves making conscious changes to your approach so it is more appealing to the other party
• Coordinate adjustment (joint strategy)
  Involves both parties making mutual adjustments to find a common process for negotiation