Mgt 373 Negotiations

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Alfaisal University

College of Business

Undergraduate Business Administration Program

Course Syllabus for

MGT 373 Negotiations

Course Description:        

We negotiate every day with potential employers, coworkers, roommates, landlords, parents, bosses, merchants, service providers, etc. Determining what price we will pay, the amount of our salary and compensation, what movie to watch, who will clean the kitchen… all of these are negotiations. Although negotiations are a ubiquitous part of our everyday lives, many of us know little about the strategy and psychology of effective negotiations. Why do we sometimes get our way, while other times we walk away feeling frustrated by our inability to achieve the agreement we desire?

Negotiation is the art and science of securing agreements between two or more dependent parties. The purpose of this course is to understand the theory and processes of negotiation as they are practiced in a variety of settings. The course is designed to be relevant to a broad spectrum of negotiation problems that are faced by the manager and the professional. A basic premise of this course is that while a manager needs analytical skills to develop optimal solutions to problems, a broad array of negotiation skills is needed for these solutions to be accepted and implemented. Successful completion of this course will enable you to recognize, understand, and analyze essential concepts in negotiations.

Course Format

• Negotiation Exercises: The course is built around a series of negotiation exercises. We will be negotiating in each and every class. While the class officially meets at scheduled course times, students will be expected to meet with other students outside of class to prepare for and execute certain negotiation exercises. Students should also be prepared to stay a few minutes after class to arrange meetings with other members of the class.

• Preparation for Negotiations: Your classmates expect you to be fully prepared for each negotiation exercise. Prior to each negotiation, you are required to submit a planning document. Also, note that some exercises require students to prepare outside of class as a team, either by phone, email, or in person.

• Negotiation Debrief: We will debrief every negotiation in class. You are expected to participate in these class discussions. Your agreements will be posted so that the class can analyze the relationship between different negotiation strategies and outcomes and learn from everyone’s experience.

• Learning: You are encouraged to experiment with alternative styles in this “safe” environment. This is where you can “lose” a million dollars and in retrospect be happy because you will never forget that lesson! Recognize your strengths and weaknesses and track your individual progress over the quarter.

• Readings: It is important to do the session’s readings AFTER class. The concepts will be more comprehensible if you have already experienced them directly and foreknowledge of the concepts could prevent mistakes that are the critical part of the learning process.

Assignments and Methods of Assessment

• Attendance and Participation in Class Discussions (25%)
  
  Because negotiation exercises are critical to the learning process in this course, you should be fully prepared for every negotiation. Thus, you should plan for every exercise; this requires that you come to every class with a written planning document that will help guide you through the negotiation. You should try your hardest to get the best possible outcome for yourself or group. You are not graded on the outcomes of your negotiations (except for Round 2 of the on-going negotiation exercise), but rather on the quality of your preparation prior to the negotiation and your participation in post-negotiation discussions.
  
  Your participation in class discussion will be evaluated on the quality of your contributions and insights. After each negotiation exercise, a debriefing session will include sharing information about results, sharing information about strategies attempted, and sharing reactions to the process. Quality comments possess one or more of the following properties:
  

• Offer a different and unique, but relevant, perspective based upon analysis and theory (not intuition or casual observation).
• Contribute to moving the discussion and analysis forward.
• Build upon the comments of your classmates.
• Link relevant concepts to current events.

• Planning Documents (20%)
  
  To help you prepare fully for the role you will play in each negotiation, you are required to submit a negotiation planning document prior to each negotiation exercise. These documents are worth 20% of your grade. You or your team (if you are negotiating in a team) should bring 2 copies of your planning document to each exercise so that you can give one copy to me and use the other as a reference during your negotiation. Together, the planning documents will help you structure your negotiation experience. The planning documents will enable you to fully understand the nature of the particular negotiation exercise and plan strategies that will maximize your outcomes.
  
  Before every negotiation (both in class and in the real world) you should construct a planning document. The purpose of the planning document is threefold:

• It will help you prepare systematically for negotiations.
  
• Some weeks you will have a partner on your own side of the table with whom you will develop and implement your negotiation strategy. Having completed a planning document will expedite your strategy session with your partner.
  
• It will help you transfer the negotiation skills you learn in class to negotiations you will do outside of class.

Preparation is a vital part of the negotiation process.  Time spent in preparation should focus on assessing your interests and goals and those of your opponent.  The more complete the information you have about yourself and your opponent, the more control you can assume over your own actions and reactions during the negotiation process.  When you don’t have information, especially about your opponent, GUESS.  One way of beginning the negotiation process is to ask questions to try to fill in gaps in the information you have, or to test the assumptions you made in your guesses.

The Planning Document Forms at the end of this syllabus are provided as examples.  The first is a list form that asks for information about both yourself and your opponent.  The second and third are in a chart form and allow at-a-glance comparisons of the parties’ information.  Feel free to choose the format that is most comfortable for you or to modify the existing forms in any way that helps you to prepare for your negotiations. As the course progresses and new concepts are added, you may wish to change the format of your planning document. Just make sure that you do not leave out any of the basic concepts in doing so.

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