Styles, strategies and tactics in Negotiation Flashcards
What are the different ADR styles?
- Co-operative
- Competitive/confrontational
Co-operative approach
Approach:
- focus on settlement
- offering information
- accepting concessions
- fairness
- conciliatory approach
- constructive tactics
Strengths:
- agreement likely
- appropriate concessions are seen as principled
- supports a continuing relationship
- fewer risks of the negotiation breaking down
Weaknesses:
- undermined by competitive opponent
- too easy to see settlement as main goal
- can lead to unnecessary concessions and weaker outcome
- may volunteer information and get little/nothing in return
- may try to avoid confrontation instead of seeking best outcome
- may fail to fully use strengths of case
Competitive/positional approach
Approach:
- seeks to win, get best possible outcome
- settlement not seen as a goal
- adversarial
- not constructive
- high demands
- limited justification
- giving limited information but seeking a lot
- seeking success on every issue
- using unpleasant tactics (threats, bluffing)
Strengths:
- very successful against weak/poorly prepared opponent
- high starting position tends to lead to better settlement
- more successful where there are fewer issues (where issues are money based, too)
- successful for party with strong case
- little chance of exploitation
Weaknesses
- many lawyers not susceptible to this aggressive and manipulative behaviour
- damages ongoing relationship
- focus on ‘winning’ may ignore potential advantages of collaboration
- increased stress and tension
- over-confidence can be undermined by well-prepared opponent
- not effective to deal with complex issues
- can become a battle
Collaborative
Principled/Problem-solving
Different strands:
Principled – tries to achieve outcome that is objectively fair against some external authoritative norm (e.g. based on the example of an agreed expert)
Problem-solving – focuses on both parties’ real needs and interests, tries to get a practical solution without building costs
Approach:
- parties explore underlying interests, share information and are creative
- trying to identify options for mutual gain
- working together is stressed at the start
- constructive approach, focus on best possible outcome
- issues approached from point of view of needs and interests rather than fault and blame
- open and reasonable atmosphere
- emphasis on objectivity, and a potential settlement is often judged against agreed criteria to test fairness
Strengths:
- capable of achieving very good outcomes because it explores anything of potential benefit
- creative
- good chance of success
- even if there is no agreement, areas of conflict usually decreased
- techniques to expand resources rather than divide them
- rational and reasonable approach easy to manage
- well-prepared collaborative strategy can be successful against a competitive opponent
Weaknesses
- both parties must be collaborative
- may require substantial preparation of options
- attempts to collaborate may be defeated or exploited by competitive opponent
- may be difficult to use in court-door negotiations because of time pressure
- may have little to offer in a case where options cannot be developed
Principled negotiation elements:
- separating the people from the problem (avoiding emotion)
- focusing on interest rather than positions
- looking for options to benefit both sides (win-win)
- using objective standards
- developing a best alternative to a negotiated agreement
Pragmatic strategy
- adapting strategy to meet the needs of the particular negotiation
- different strategy for each separate issue
- may be most effective where there is limited information and need to get more facts before deciding how to proceed
- may be appropriate where you do not know your opponent and cannot predict what strategy he will adopt
How do you choose a negotiating strategy?
Planning should include:
- a preferred overall strategy
- how to open the negotiation to provide a firm foundation
- fallback option
- separate strategies
Be aware of how the parties’ strategies can interact:
- two competitive may create deadlock
- two co-operative may not get the best agreement
- do not try to exploit too much – the opposing party can always refuse an offer
What negotiating tactics can be used with:
Information
Offers and Demands
Structure
Presentation
Law
Information
- questioning
- statements
- revealing/concealing information
- reframing – to objectively redress how a difficult opponent is presenting his case
Offers and demands
- pre-conditions and setting parameters
- objective standards
- authority to settle
- ultimata
- proposing additional outcomes
Structure
- imposing structure
- ignoring structure
- parking issues
- moving on
- re-opening issues
- “Just one more thing”
- avoiding deadlock
Presentation
- abruptness
- evasion
- silence
- time to think
- prepare a draft
- bluffing
- aggression
- threats
Law
- using legal terminology and tests
- using research