Final Assignment – Negotiations

Vanessa Abrams – Case Study

Introduction

This case describes a typical win-lose negotiation in which lack of trust is at stake. On one side, Jerome Bailey (Jerry) is standing for employer and is imposing on the opposite side to sign a non-disclosure agreement, on the other side, the employee (Vanessa Abrams) is trying to take the opportunity to renegotiate compensation package in return (as reciprocity), and this by leveraging on her outstanding business outcomes. The main issue in this negotiation is about power and influence use within the same organization which may be disruptive if stakeholders cannot reach an agreement in a win-win way.

Questions answers:

First of all, Vanessa knew that her boss was under pressure from the corporate headquarters because she was the only one not signing the nondisclosure agreement, and she was using her good results as leverage for not signing the document, then making a counter-move in order to open negotiations. She tried to negotiate using a third party influence in order to stick up for herself and this led to conflict between her and her company. Moreover she negotiated in such a way which was not natural for her and this had weakened her bargaining power as an unexpected result. By the way, she’d like her boss to recognize that she was important for the company but she did not control the climate at all (time, place, and mood) from the beginning to end of the negotiation.

From the company point of view, signing such an agreement would protect company’s data and prevent Vanessa to leave the company with crucial information concerning customers. Then, Jerry did not understand why she didn’t want to sign the agreement. The company’s stood for an inflexible position which is characteristic of a competitive negotiation. The company had shown little or no interest to Vanessa’s needs.

This is overall a typical distributive negotiation in which one party claim the most value