Negotiation Impasse

So I guess I have to write something about my Negotiation Analysis course atleast today. We have this course in this term and its mostly the talk of the day when we are done with our role plays.

We did one on one negotiations for a while and we learnt some things. And then we had the group negotiations. I was part of the Union and we had a four member team. We were pretty aggressive and it was quite good. We also had a management team with whom we had to negotiate. I'd rather not comment anything on them. Then I'd be called a chauvinist and what not.

So in our first round, we had to negotiate on production terms, wages and some clauses that had benefited the workers. At the end of the negotiation, we were quite sure that we were going to give away some to the management. That was quite clear and we were going to accept that in some way or the other. But then we pushed hard for pay rises and incentives. It was fun trying to convince them. And you know how management sees all this. They were like - gimme a break. u r not getting a single penny more. So that was what it was a week back.

And the second round came today. Both teams clearly knew that this time the problem was with the wage. We had to make a deal with the wage scene and we knew that the management was going to reduce the wage anyway. Although we werent supposed to give out some of the case facts, we actually told them what we could least agree to. We did tell them that we were no way going to get down to that rate because that was 20% lesser than our current wage. Management quoted 40% less and we just got effin pissed. Then our negotiations started. Initially, we didnt budge from our original 10.69 and management told us that they cannot go more than $8. This carried on for a while and the union came down from 10.69 to 10.00 to 9.69 to 9.5 while the management came up from 8 to 8.67 to 9 to 9.25. We came to a stage where we had like 5 mins remaining. And then one person from the management realises that this activity was being graded and an impasse in the negotiation would affect the grades a bit. We still didnt budge. After some more talks, we came down till 9.4 and still they werent happy. They said 9.33 and kept quiet. These are the people who first said that they cannot offer more than $7.5.

The drama came to an end and we had an impasse. We couldnt agree on a wage. The management finally realised that even in the case of an impasse the wage rate stays at 10.69. And they didnt even read that clause. While we as a union had planned for every move in today's negotiation, the management read the material only today and they took 10 mins out of the 45 mins negotiation time. And then they were like "oh my god, we didnt know that". There was also a mistake on our part though. In our case, the impasse results in a wage reduction to $8.69. But our argument was that we we have already come down more than a dollar per hour per employee and still there was not result.

The Prof listened to us and told the management - Sincere lack of planning. And this goes back to the first class of negotiation. Planning activity in a negotiation occupies 80% of the negotiation and this time the management had done zilch of that. And it was more like brooding over spilt milk.

For a change today's negotiation was highly emotional. In some other groups, it almost led to a serious fight. People were upset and disturbed. It clearly showed to us what situations would one face when working with unions.