Introduction
The topic of this assignment is to analyse a negotiation that demonstrates the use the of Harvard Seven Element framework. Firstly, a brief outline of the case under negotiation which is based on real world events will be described. The assignment then moves onto an analysis of this negotiation, discussing what went well, what went badly and what can be improved. Finally, the assignment concludes with a brief description of what happened in the real world and what insights my negotiation provided to explain the outcome.
Negotiation Outline
This negotiation was based on a the Crossways Community centre case in the Mt Victoria neighbourhood (Johnson, A. 2008). This large house was owned by the Anglican Church and used by a large number of community groups including a crèche. The property was being sold in order to fund the restoration of St Andrews Church on The Terrace. The two parties negotiating the issue of the ownership and use of the building were the Anglican Church and Crossways Community Trust. For the purposes of this assignment, a negotiation was put together based on the facts of case and using two groups of two people from the local community who were volunteered to represent the parties in the case. The Harvard framework was used to generate the negotiation worksheets that are included in Appendix A.
Negotiation Analysis
The Anglican Church approached this negotiation with its primary interest in mind; it needs the money for the St Andrews restoration. St Andrews is a historic landmark in Wellington and is also used for community purposes so the state of the building already has a direct impact on the community at large. The Church representatives took the position right from the start that they needed the cash however much they empathised with the Mt Victoria community needs. Options that they explored included the provision of other Church property or coming to a rent-to-buy proposal that would transfer ownership of the property to the community but still meet the Church interests. The BATNA for the Church was to accept an offer for purchase from a private buyer of 1.3 million dollars. Based on this information, the Church really didn’t have to negotiate with the community at all, however their secondary interest includes maintaining their profile in the community and this was of importance to them.
For the Trust the primary interest was to maintain the status quo. Options for them included lobbying the council for money to support the Church interests and their BATNA was to buy the property outright. The community had independently raised 1 million dollars from various events for this purpose. When entering the negotiation the community immediately presented their interests and the options they had considered. The Church representatives pointed out that their criteria was very easily quantified, that the community would have to match the offer that the private buyer had put forward. As the two sides discussed their interests and the options, both parties quickly found that there was an option that would meet everyone’s interests and that was a rent-to-buy approach where the community could give the Church the 1 million dollars and then lease the property for the balance of the cash. The Church representatives thought this was a great idea because it satisfied their short term interests, provided future cash flows and resulted in a positive relationship going forward.
My experience with participating in this negotiation as a Church representative was that the two parties actually had a very strong common interest, to serve the larger community. The conflicting interest was really the issue of the short term cash requirements of the Church and the fact that we had an easy walk away BATNA. As such I felt the social interests of the Church were actually met by taking the BATNA and that we didn’t really need to negotiate at all. The community representatives had thought through a really good alternative and had used the media to bring attention to their plight. This media attention assisted the community with fund raising and they had a sizable chunk of cash to offer the Church. This alone caught my interest as a Church representative and the possibility of a rent-to-buy option seemed a real way to add value to this negotiation.
In both cases the parties acted like reasonable people with their interests firmly in mind. All four of us who were representing the parties concerned had not had a direct hand in the real world negotiation and we were all university educated people so there was no emotional baggage in our respective approaches. The discussion did not degenerate into squabbling and it seemed obvious after only a few minutes of discussion that the interests of both parties could be met. This aspect of the negotiation went really well and I believe that this was a result of using the Harvard framework to really get to the bottom of what each party wanted out of this deal. It is likely that a more unsophisticated community representative may have relied on playing emotive cards and the outcome of the negotiation would have been quite different. The community’s use of the media could have been seen as an attack by the Church and could easily have lead to a stand off between the parties. This issue was not brought up by the Church during the negotiation and probably saved the outcome. Because the community representative focussed on how the purpose of the media campaign was for fund raising it highlighted to me as a Church representative that the community meant to deal fairly with me and that there was not a public relations war going on.
Outside of the areas covered by the framework the community representatives were very keen to discuss how the relationship had been ongoing for 30 years and that the uses of the building had been changed over time to meet the needs of the community. This relationship was important to me as a Church representative and impressed me with how the community had acted as stewards for the building, ensuring that it was maintained and that it evolved to meet community needs as those changed over time. The outcome of these generalised, relationship building discussions was that the Church would continue to have a seat in the Trust that would operate the building and keep its activities on mission for the community in the future. This agreement insured that the negotiation ended with a solid ongoing commitment from both parties.
What really happened?
An interesting fact is that the outcome of our simulated negotiation was quite different to what actually happened, providing some insights into how the real world negation may have left value on the table that was not realised. At the time of writing, the real outcome was that the house was sold to a private family and the community groups have been given six weeks to vacate the premises. Due to the nature of crèche operational requirements it is unlikely that there will be a suitable location for them to relocate too in the Mt Victoria area, thus the interests of the community were not met in any way by the negotiation process. It seems likely that the Anglican Church exercised its BATNA, suggesting that real world negotiators did not explore their options to the same depth as the contrived negotiators did.
The Church merely exercised its rights as the owner of the property and has done nothing that could be construed as wrongful. That being said there was value on the table in terms of the community interests and it seems that the outcome of this negotiation was not as optimal as it could have been. In the real world negotiation the council were approached by the community for additional funding which was granted. Later, the council changed its mind as their criteria were not met. The implication of this is that the community trust could have been better off not bringing a 3rd party into this discussion and come to agreement with the Church directly.
References
Johnson, A. (2008). Homeless in Mt Victoria, City Life Wellington South & East,
APN News & Media, Wellington.
No comments:
Post a Comment