Creativity in resource allocation negotiations
The department heads negotiate (or fight) over budgets, salaries, and staff in resource allocation meetings. Some participants will wrongly label a compromise as a proverbial “win-win.” A few proudly declare they were good corporate citizens because they accepted an uninspired compromise.
It does not have to be that way. Often parties can avoid compromise when negotiating challenging allocable issues.
A multi-level auto parking lot in NYC used an elevator to move cars to the upper floors. Customers in a hurry will get quite animated with the waiting time because only one car can fit in the elevator. Often there were arguments about precedence in parking – a customer who got there first or the regular parking lot user with a monthly rate.
The customers and parking lot management were stuck with thinking within the two possibilities – higher-paying one-time users or customers with a recurring monthly membership.
The author of “The world is a bazaar. Life is a negotiation” proposed a different solution. The elevator could accommodate only one vehicle in the current “portrait” layout. Changing it to a “landscape” layout could carry close to two full-size cars and one compact vehicle. This straightforward solution allowed both sides to get what they wanted – without having to toss a coin, take turns, arguing over precedence.
Whenever negotiators haggle over resource allocation, they will likely have vastly different views. You think that your proposal is credible and legitimate, but the other side may not agree, so it’s a deadlock.
Often hidden in the deadlock, there is an opportunity for a creative solution. In the Negotiation Skills workshop, the author of “The world is a bazaar. Life is a negotiation,” Satish Mehta offers skills to claim value while strengthening relationships in negotiations for resource allocation.
HAVE YOU APPLIED ANY OF THE NEGOTIATION SKILLS I HAVE SHARED WITH YOU OVER THE PAST FEW YEARS? WOULD YOU PLEASE SHARE THE OUTCOMES WITH ME HERE?
