Academic writing and self reflection
Nathan111
negotiationtaskbackground.docxAnderson’s Manager
You are a Manager at Anderson’s. You are responsible for graduate recruitment. This year you had over 100 applications for your graduate jobs. You are recruiting 3 graduates. Last week you interviewed 10 students for these vacancies.
Student A did a placement with you last summer and last week you interviewed [him/her] for a graduate job. Student A did very well on placement and was very hard working and conscientious. [He/She] was also a real team player which is important to Anderson’s. You have therefore decided to offer [him/her] a job. You would really like Student A to join the company. However, if they don’t accept you have plenty of other students who you could offer the position to. You therefore feel that you are in a strong negotiating position.
You are meeting them next week to discuss the offer:
Place of work – you have offices in Birmingham, Manchester and a small office in Bristol. Ideally you would like him/her to be based in the Manchester office because this is the Head Office. During their first few years with X Co they move around different departments to acquire experience. The best place to do this is the Manchester office. However, you appreciate that [he/she] did their placement in Bristol and currently live in Bristol but this is only a small office and doesn’t have all the necessary departments. Perhaps therefore if they are not willing to work permanently in Manchester he/she could do some of their training in Birmingham and a very small amount in Bristol.
Hours - 9.00am – 5.30pm, Monday to Friday. However, when they work in certain departments they will be required to work on a Saturday. However, they will then receive a day off in the week. This is expected of all graduates.
Pay – Your salary for graduates varies from £17,500 to £21,000 depending upon their degree, and other elements of the overall package.
Bonus – Graduates do not receive a company bonus.
Pension – Graduate trainees are entitled to join the company pension scheme. If they do a contribution of 3% is made by the company.
Share purchase scheme – All employees after 6 months can join the companies share purchase scheme.
Holidays – 20 days plus bank holidays. Employees are not permitted to take more than 10 days holiday at one time. This is company policy and is not negotiable.
Company car – Graduate trainees do not get a company car, only Directors.
Start date – 1st August. All graduates start in August, straight after they finish degree. It makes it easier for the company to have them all starting at the same time. One employee a few years ago did delay her start because she had just had a baby but, this is something that you would prefer not to do. If they wanted to delay you would prefer to delay it a year until the following August.
Laptop - Graduates are not normally provided with a laptop. However, the company has plenty so you could if necessary provide [him/her] with one if there is a business need. If the graduate is going to work in several offices it might be justifiable to provide [him/her] with a laptop.
Mobile phone – Graduates are not normally provided with a mobile phone. However, you could at your discretion provide [him/her] with one. Again however, there would need to be businesses need for example a requirement to travel.
Working from home – Graduates are not allowed to work from home because they need to be supervised. On one occasion a graduate trainee was allowed to work at home a few days a week but that was only because she had health issues.
Accommodation – All graduates work in an open plan office with the secretarial staff.
Travel – The Manchester office is on the outskirts of Manchester. Therefore most staff drive to the office. You have a large number of parking spaces. Staff who do not drive usually get lifts with other employees.
Probation period – 6 months. During [his/her] first 6 months of employment their performance is reviewed. This is called their probation period. If [his/her] performance is not satisfactory and they do not pass their probation period, their employment is terminated. You cannot vary this because it is dictated by HR.
Duties – As a graduate [his/her] duties will be fairly junior at first. However, they will be supervised and providing their performance is satisfactory, they will be given more responsibility.
Method of payment – all employees are paid into their bank account on the last Friday of every month.
Bike – employees can’t join the companies’ bike to work scheme, until they have been employed for 1 year. However, you may be able to negotiate an employee being allowed to join early.
References – All employees must provide 2 references.
You are a student at UWE. Last year you did a placement at Anderson’s in Bristol. You worked really hard on your placement and had a good review at the end of it. A few months ago you applied for a graduate position at Anderson’s. The interview went well. Last week you got a letter stating that they would like to offer you a job but need to meet with you to discuss the offer. You are meeting with a Manager responsible for graduate recruitment next week.
You would really like a job at Anderson’s but had planned to have a 6 month break and go travelling. Initially you were not going to apply for the job at Anderson’s but decided to in the end as they are a good company and you had really enjoyed your placement. You also know that if you are going to get a graduate job, you are most likely to be successful with the company that you did the placement with. Therefore now that they have stated that they will be offering you a job you don’t feel that you should turn it down. You also have debts that you need to start repaying. However, before entering the world of work you would really like to travel. You like to go to New Zealand, Australia, and Singapore. Therefore you need at least 6 months. You would therefore like to accept the job but delay it for 6 months.
Place of work – Anderson’s have offices in Birmingham, Manchester and Bristol. You did your placement in Bristol and really liked the team in Bristol so would like to work in Bristol. In addition, your partner and all of your friends live in Bristol. However, you are conscious that it is a fairly small office. Therefore to gain the necessary experience you accept that you might have to work some of the time in the other offices. You don’t mind travelling to Birmingham because it is not too far and there is a train from Bristol. You also have a few friends that you could stay with. However, you don’t really fancy going to Manchester. That is miles away!!! If you really have to go to Manchester you would only want it to be for a very short period of time.
Days and Hours – You are happy to work full time. You don’t mind what hours you work Monday to Friday but you really don’t want to work weekends as you play sport competitively at the weekends.
Pay – You got a 2:1 and therefore you are hoping for about £20,000. If however, you do have to go to Birmingham or Manchester you would want more because of the cost of travelling. Manchester would be particularly expensive because you would have to find accommodation. At present you live with a group of friends in Bristol which is fairly cheap.
Bonus – A bonus would be nice. You have heard that other employees get them so you think that you should.
Pension – You don’t want to join the company pension scheme. You can’t even think about retirement. You want to know if you can opt out.
Share purchase scheme – You are not really interested in the share purchase scheme.
Holidays – You would like as many holidays as possible. If they don’t allow you to delay your start you will need enough holidays to go travelling in the future. Perhaps you can save them all up and perhaps take them in 1 go, perhaps a month off.
Company car – You can’t drive.
Start date – You would like to delay your start date and start in February so you can go travelling for 6 months. You could compromise on 3 months but would really prefer 6 months.
Laptop – Your computer has just died so you would really like a laptop.
Mobile phone – you would also like a mobile phone because if you are going to be away from Bristol you need to keep in contact with your partner.
Working from home – As you can’t drive it would be really helpful if you could work from home some days, perhaps 1 or 2 days a week. It would also save money.
Travel – In Bristol Anderson’s office is in the centre so you can use public transport to get to work. Their office in Birmingham is also in the centre of the city so again you can use public transport. If you had to go to Manchester you would struggle as their office is on the outskirts of Manchester.
Probation period – You understand that all graduates have a 6 month probation period. During this 6 months graduates performance is reviewed. If it is not satisfactory and they do not pass their probation period their employment is terminated. As you have already been on placement with the company for 10 months surely they could remove the probation period.
Duties – As a graduate you are concerned that you don’t want to be given really boring junior duties. You want to know what your duties will be. How much responsibility will you be given?
Accommodation – you want to have your own office. You don’t like working in open plan as you find it difficult to concentrate.
Payment – as you have lots of debts you want to be paid in cash
Bike – you want to buy a bike through the companies’ bike to work scheme, through which you can get cheaper bikes
References – you don’t see why you should provide a reference as you have already worked for them.
Anderson’s Manager
You are a Manager at Anderson’s. You are responsible for graduate recruitment. This year you had over
100 applications for your graduate jobs. You are recruiting 3 graduates.
Last week you interviewed 10
students for these vacancies.
Student A did a placement with you last summer and last week you interviewed [him/her] for a graduate
job. Student A did very well on placement and was very hard working and conscientious. [He/She
] was
also a real team player which is important to Anderson’s. You have therefore decided to offer [him/her]
a job. You would really like Student A to join the company. However, if they don’t accept you have
plenty of other students who you could offer th
e position to. You therefore feel that you are in a strong
negotiating position.
You are meeting them next week to discuss the offer:
Place of work
–
you have offices in Birmingham, Manchester and a small office in Bristol. Ideally you
would like him/her t
o be based in the Manchester office because this is the Head Office. During their
first few years with X Co they move around different departments to acquire experience. The best place
to do this is the Manchester office. However, you appreciate that [he/
she] did their placement in Bristol
and currently live in Bristol but this is only a small office and doesn’t have all the necessary departments.
Perhaps therefore if they are not willing to work permanently in Manchester he/she could do some of
their tra
ining in Birmingham and a very small amount in Bristol.
Hours
-
9.00am
–
5.30pm, Monday to Friday. However, when they work in certain departments they will
be required to work on a Saturday. However, they will then receive a day off in the week. This is
expected of all graduates.
Pay
–
Your salary for graduates varies from £17,500 to £21,000 depending upon their degree, and other
elements of the overall package.
Bonus
–
Graduates do not receive a company bonus.
Pension
–
Graduate trainees are entitled to
join the company pension scheme. If they do a contribution
of 3% is made by the company.
Share purchase scheme
–
All employees after 6 months can join the companies share purchase scheme.
Holidays
–
20 days plus bank holidays. Employees are not permitted
to take more than 10 days holiday
at one time. This is company policy and is not negotiable.
Company car
–
Graduate trainees do not get a company car, only Directors.
Start date
–
1
st
August. All graduates start in August, straight after they finish degr
ee. It makes it easier
for the company to have them all starting at the same time. One employee a few years ago did delay her
start because she had just had a baby but, this is something that you would prefer not to do. If they
wanted to delay you would pr
efer to delay it a year until the following August.
Anderson’s Manager
You are a Manager at Anderson’s. You are responsible for graduate recruitment. This year you had over
100 applications for your graduate jobs. You are recruiting 3 graduates. Last week you interviewed 10
students for these vacancies.
Student A did a placement with you last summer and last week you interviewed [him/her] for a graduate
job. Student A did very well on placement and was very hard working and conscientious. [He/She] was
also a real team player which is important to Anderson’s. You have therefore decided to offer [him/her]
a job. You would really like Student A to join the company. However, if they don’t accept you have
plenty of other students who you could offer the position to. You therefore feel that you are in a strong
negotiating position.
You are meeting them next week to discuss the offer:
Place of work – you have offices in Birmingham, Manchester and a small office in Bristol. Ideally you
would like him/her to be based in the Manchester office because this is the Head Office. During their
first few years with X Co they move around different departments to acquire experience. The best place
to do this is the Manchester office. However, you appreciate that [he/she] did their placement in Bristol
and currently live in Bristol but this is only a small office and doesn’t have all the necessary departments.
Perhaps therefore if they are not willing to work permanently in Manchester he/she could do some of
their training in Birmingham and a very small amount in Bristol.
Hours - 9.00am – 5.30pm, Monday to Friday. However, when they work in certain departments they will
be required to work on a Saturday. However, they will then receive a day off in the week. This is
expected of all graduates.
Pay – Your salary for graduates varies from £17,500 to £21,000 depending upon their degree, and other
elements of the overall package.
Bonus – Graduates do not receive a company bonus.
Pension – Graduate trainees are entitled to join the company pension scheme. If they do a contribution
of 3% is made by the company.
Share purchase scheme – All employees after 6 months can join the companies share purchase scheme.
Holidays – 20 days plus bank holidays. Employees are not permitted to take more than 10 days holiday
at one time. This is company policy and is not negotiable.
Company car – Graduate trainees do not get a company car, only Directors.
Start date – 1
st
August. All graduates start in August, straight after they finish degree. It makes it easier
for the company to have them all starting at the same time. One employee a few years ago did delay her
start because she had just had a baby but, this is something that you would prefer not to do. If they
wanted to delay you would prefer to delay it a year until the following August.
