MGT 2

Best Book

Concrete Experience

As I was the representative of Bestbooks publications, I had to sit and talk with the agent who was there on behalf of Paige Turner. We had to negotiate and come to an agreement on the eight points mentioned, which included: royalties that had to be paid to Paige, the contract signing bonus, the advance given to Paige, along with the number of print runs of the book, number of countries where the book would be distributed, number of book clubs that would adopt the book, and number of weeks that Paige would carry out the promotion for the book. This negotiation was a sensitive one because I had to arrange more points at my end and that would mean fewer points on the other end. Paige Turner’s agent was also aiming for more points so the negotiation was definitely a difficult one. I tried to be as sweet and as compromising as possible but I could see that it was not working. The agent was adamant on his points and therefore I had to change my conversation style and make it a little dominating. Around us, the whole class was carrying out negotiations in their respective pairs. Some pairs were polite while some negotiations were heated and things got rough between them. Many times, I had to control my anger and display patience even when Paige’s agent was being inconsiderate. After many discussions, we had to reach a middle ground for majority of the points, even though it meant I did not achieve the maximum points for my side of the negotiation.

Reflective Observation

Throughout the negotiation, I could see that people were trying their best to be as polite and compromising as possible because they wanted to show the class that their pair was the best in negotiation. After some time, however, things got different and some of them forgot that they were under observation. It was all human emotions being portrayed. Even if this was a role-play, after some time people got engrossed in their roles and they started taking the negotiations seriously. However, a few students were not at all interested in the negotiation and they were just doing it for the sake of completing the assignment. The professor must have observed the changing pattern of behaviors amongst all the pairs. The initial time was certainly peaceful and all proper but soon after even she got irritated because some students were getting too carried away in the assignment that they started shouting above their pace. This was definitely a good exercise because I learned how to negotiate with the other person and try to persuade them without losing your temper.

Abstract Conceptualization

While I was at the table carrying out the negotiations, I used the mental shortcuts several times, also referred to as heuristics. Basically, when the agent kept quiet for a second or showed little resistance to my point, I knew at that moment that this was a good chance to have my demand accepted and that is exactly what happened. I took advantage of this judgment of the agent’s behavior because it reflected his agreement or willingness to agree with my point. The time factor was another thing that put pressure on my decision-making. As time was passing by, I knew that I had less time to make decisions and due to this I sometimes used a non-rational model of decision making. For example, the contract signing bonus didn’t seem right to me because already royalties were being agreed upon. I wanted to have this point removed in a way that the 0 bonus should be agreed upon. The agent, however, was obviously adamant on getting a bonus as well. At this point I knew that if I start negotiating then that would take up a lot of time so I relied on my intuition and my intuition said that this one-time expense might be worth it in the long run because Paige turner is a good author and his books will certainly make great sales in times to come. This is how these concepts helped me in my decision making process. Comment by Yates, Mariah: Go back and review the specific heuristics that we talked about in class…this is not a clear example of any of those. Heuristics are not just general judgements about others’ behaviors but they are “rule of thumb” that we use to quickly analyze a situation. While I understand that you were using his hesitation as a way to quickly act, I’m not sure what heuristic you’re applying here. Comment by Yates, Mariah: Be sure to define intuition Comment by Yates, Mariah: Good example of intuition! Other concepts I see described here are aspects of bounded rationality, as well as an obliging conflict style.

Active Experimentation

If I was given a second chance for this assignment then I would certainly manage my time first. I should have given equal time to all eight points. I will try to make the discussion as factual and as rational as possible without bringing in any irrational models. At some points, I was too carried away in the situation. Because of the time pressure, I agreed on some terms that were definitely not fully in my favor. The total points that we earned were 42,600, which compared to rest of the class results, were not that promising. The highest scores earned by a pair was about 51,000 and this proved that if I would have presented better decision making skills then maybe I would also have been able to succeed with such scores. Nonetheless, this assignment was certainly helpful and I learned a lot from it. Managing temper also proves to be quite successful and can accelerate the negotiating process by giving a positive impression to the other person. In fact, if you have a compromising attitude then the other person might agree to some of your terms and the friction between you two will possibly be low compared to if you were impatient. Comment by Yates, Mariah: While I understand the point you’re making here, just realize that irrational decision making is not always a bad thing (and it’s honestly how most decisions are made). Intuition can be extremely helpful but it should be supplemented and backed by facts and evidence if possible.

These were the things I learned and I would definitely try to change if I was given a second chance on this task. The results too will be much better than what we achieved in the first attempt. Comment by Yates, Mariah: Would want to say that the results “would likely” be much better, as there is no guarantee that they would improve.