We are being asked to GO OUT AND NEGOTIATE. You can negotiate for anything you like – a hotel bill, a signing bonus, a piece of jewelry, anything. You do not have to buy anything to complete this assignment. On the contrary, you may be on the sell side in the negotiation, or your negotiation may not involve a purchase at all. There are only two rules. First, you are not allowed to resort to a plea of “Please help me out, this is for a class…”. You may not tell the person you are negotiating with that this is for a class project until the negotiation is completed (and then you can decide whether or not you want to tell them). Second, you must be willing (at some price, under some conditions) to acquire the item for which you are negotiating. Do not start a negotiation in which you would never want to come to agreement. What if you try to negotiate and are not successful? Do not get discouraged! Often, we learn as much or more from negotiations that fail as from those that succeed. The paper should contain a description of exactly what happened and what the outcome of the negotiation was. However, you will do more than simply recount the details of the interaction. You must apply the course concepts, theories, and approaches to critically analyze what happened in your negotiation and why. You will also discuss your preparation and strategy. You should include all of the relevant strategic elements of the negotiation (e.g., issues, interests, priorities, BATNAs, etc.) in your paper. The course concepts are easy and will be attached in Power Point Format. They include:
• Intro to Negotiation and Planning
• Distributive Bargaining
• Communication and Bias
• Persuasion and Ethics in Negotiations
Finally, you paper should include some self-reflection. What have you learned about your negotiating style and skills from this negotiation experience? What would you do differently in the future? What value did you derive, what lessons did you learn, and/or what realizations did you come to as a result of this exercise (if any)? The paper for this project should be approximately 7-10 typed (double-spaced, 12-point font) pages. Please note that this assignment involves planning and then conducting a real negotiation. It does NOT involve analyzing a previous negotiation that you may have conducted. Any paper that is simply an analysis of a past negotiation will receive a 30 point penalty.
