Negotiation Lab

Dubai Workshop Program

Session One: What is Negotiation?

This session will explain what a BATNA  (best alternative to a negotiated agreement) and a ZOPA (zone of possible agreement) are. Learn the Harvard method of “principled negotiation” and how you can use it to overcome resistance to your position by bargaining over interests and needs.

Harvard Law School Simulation: Orange Exercise Learn to create value in a negotiation, not just claim value, in this dispute between two children over a piece of fruit.

Session Two: Negotiation Skills – How to Change the Game in Your Favor

This session will explain the theoretical framework for successful commercial negotiation by highlighting the differences between traditional positional bargaining and principled negotiation developed by the Harvard Program on Negotiation. Key learning points include:

• Learn how to create added value to strengthen your negotiation position rather than just accept what is on offer.
• Learn how to recognize and understand your own personality traits and tactics as a negotiator and those of your opponent.
• Learn how to manage the inherent tensions of a negotiation.
• Learn how to map out the negotiation process.

Harvard Law School Simulation: Oil Pricing Learn to define what constitutes a “good outcome” in a negotiation over a vital commodity which drives our economy and the consequences that has in this simulation of trading oil futures. Is it “to win”?; to “beat the other side”?; to “avoid losing” ? or to “protect your reputation”?

Coffee Break

Harvard Law School Simulation: Sally Soprano Learn to move from a limited positional point of view to an interest- based outcome in which both parties can benefit in negotiating an employment contract between an Opera House and a Diva.

Lunch- Sandwiches

AFTERNOON SESSION

Session Three: Cross-Culture Negotiation Styles & Etiquette

United Nations Simulation: The Crocodile River Story - An exercise that demonstrates the importance of personal values in the context of a negotiation.

High Context v. Low Context Negotiation Styles - How different cultural attitudes towards negotiation differ from the Western approach: These styles are analyzed in terms of process; information exchange; means of persuasion; terms of agreement. Learn how to recognize and negotiate at different levels of trust.

Viewed in the context of these two paradigms, it is easier to understand what our common interests are, if we are able to identify and overcome the barriers of our cultural difference.

"This course is a convincing insightful, valuable and hugely enjoyable experience. I strongly recommend it."

Brigadier-General John Deverell, CBE
Former Director of Defence Diplomacy in the UK Ministry of Defence, Head of Global Security for Invensys Plc, London.

Coffee Break

Session Four: West Meets East

 Harvard Business School Case Study: “Levendary Café – The China Challenge”

Scenario: Just weeks into her new job, Mia Foster, a first time CEO with no international management experience, is faced with a major challenge at Levendary Café, a $10 billion US-based fast food chain. Strategically, many of her corporate staff have become concerned that the company's major expansion into China is moving too far from Levendary's well-defined concepts of store design and menu.

Organizationally, Foster has been frustrated by the apparent unwillingness of Louis Chen, president of Levendary China, to conform to the company's planning and reporting processes. Meanwhile, financial evidence shows that Chen's efforts have produced strong results and suggests that he knows China far better than U.S headquarters does. The entrepreneurial Chen has resisted attempts by Foster and others to discuss corporate plans for China. As Foster flies to China to meet with Chen she faces a decision that will determine the future of Levendary China and perhaps the entire globalization effort: can she manage Chen at all, and if so, how? The discussion of this case study will center on identifying the eight elements of Chinese negotiation and highlighting the differences in approach to the negotiation by Ms. Foster (the Westerner) and Mr. Chen (the Chinese).

"Samuel Passow was my student at Harvard. He is highly expert and knowledgeable in the field of conflict management and dispute resolution and has worked with a wide range of countries and private companies facing difficulties or sometimes dangerous situations."

Baroness Shirley Williams
Member of the House of Lords, Former Leader of the Liberal Democrat Party in the Upper House of Parliament, Professor at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government