Relations in Negotiations

Relations in Negotiations

Introduction

The process of negotiation enables the involved parties to discuss their issues and dilemmas, through an open dialogue. The primary objective of the activity is to enable all the concerned parties to reach a mutual agreement. If the process of negotiation is not implemented, the stakeholders involved in a certain dispute would have to resort to uncivilized and chaotic measures to reach an agreement. This kind of attitude in any form of organization is very adverse for the overall environment and the culture. Without the process of an organized negotiation process which is headed by a neutral and objective third party, the groups involved in the negotiation process will seldom reach an agreement. In such a scenario all of the parties generally feel hostile towards each other, and feel that their objectives have not been achieved through the process of an open negotiation (Albin, 2001). These rivalries caused by the lack of a proper negotiation authority can lead to several long term dilemmas for the organization, as the employees will start to from rival groups. In any organization the strength of the corporate culture stems from the unity and shared values of the employees, if the employees are involved in rivalries and opposing groups within the organization, the effectiveness of team work would be negatively impacted. Hence the negotiation process is an essential part of the organizational entities as it enables the management to help maintain a harmonious and unified culture within the organization.

Different dilemmas require various negotiation strategies so as to reach a mutual agreement among the involved stakeholders. In the Distributive negotiation strategy, the parties involved are generally very confrontational, and they seek to maximize their own interests. Such an aggressive negotiation strategy is appropriate for situations such as haggling with a shop owner or market to attain the best price for a product. The goal of the parties is not to reach upon an agreement which both of the participants will be satisfied with; rather it is to maximize the self interests (Clark, 1997). The Integrative negotiation strategy on the other hand is considerably different from the distributive approach. In this strategy the negotiation process is an attempt to widen the perspectives of the involved groups, and induce them to adopt a mutual agreement approach. In contrast to the previous strategy, the integrative perspective manages to ensure that the negotiation process is utilized to mediate the conflict between all of the parties. Instead of people fighting to attain limited resources, this strategy enables them to adopt a comprehensive approach and broaden their perspectives. The gains that these parties can achieve from mutual agreements and cooperation are considerable higher than a confrontational and aggressive approach. In the contemporary business as well as the social environment, the integrative negotiation strategy has become a highly popular and widely used process. This is due to the fact that the Integrative approach is more effective in resolving dilemmas, and helps all of the parties involved to adequately resolve their ...