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The Impact of Personalities in Bargaining. Presented at: Illinois Association of School Business Officials 60th Annual Conference on: Wednesday, May 18, 2011 by: Susan Harkin, CFO-Crystal Lake CCSD #47 Luann Mathis, Business Manager-Prospect Heights School District 23
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The Impact of Personalitiesin Bargaining Presented at: Illinois Association of School Business Officials 60th Annual Conference on: Wednesday, May 18, 2011 by: Susan Harkin, CFO-Crystal Lake CCSD #47 Luann Mathis, Business Manager-Prospect Heights School District 23 Brad Shortridge, Assistant Superintendent- Genoa-Kingston CUSD #424
Negotiations Yikes! Anyone look forward to negotiations?
Our Focus Today • The Art of Listening • The Interest Based Bargaining Process • Understanding the Personalities at the Table
Listening Luann Mathis
How Well do you Listen? Activity
Listening Skills: The Key to Successful Negotiations • Hearing is with your ears, listening is with the mind • Keith Davis, Human Behavior & work • Listening is playing catch with words • To play catch, both parties must participate • Dr. Mortimer Adler
Skillful Active Listening Can • Calm tensions • Break Impasse • Get information needed to build creative ideas
Then - Why Don’t We Listen? • Our brain is faster than our mouth • We speak 125-150 words/minutes • We listen to 400 words/minute • Our brain can process 1,000-1,500 words/minute!! • Untrained listener understands/retains 50% of conversation! • Experts suggest that we all make at least one major listening mistake/day.
Pitfalls of Listening • Negotiating is a job of persuasion - persuasion means talking NOT listening. • See talking as an active role. • See listening as a passive role. • Over preparation of what you are going to say. • Emotional filters or blinders
Bad Habits – Are you one of these? • Attention Faker • Fact Gather • Criticizer • Boring • Blockers • Distracter • Note Taker • Mental Rehearser
We Educate our Students in • Reading, Writing & Speech • When in reality our skill set requirements are: • 9% Writing • 16% Reading • 30% Speaking • 45% Listening
Why Effective Listening? • Increase your Knowledge • Save Time • Reduce Stress • Real Dialogue • Trust • Understand • Self-Esteem • Influence & Power • Develop your Potential
To Be a Great Listener • One must develop listening skills: • Be Interactive • Be Attentive • It does not come easily!! • Skills will help you to better receive true meanings your speaker is trying to convey!
Attention Attention!! • Be motivated to listen • Ask questions if you must speak • Be alert to nonverbal clues • Allow speaker to tell their story first • DO NOT interrupt • Fight off distractions
Are you being Attentive? • Do not trust your memory. • Listen with a goal in mind. • Give speaker undivided attention. • React to message - not person • DO NOT get angry • It is impossible to listen and speak at the same time.
Are you listening to me?? • Interacting with speaker by: • Ensuring that you understand what they are communicating to you. • Acknowledge the sender’s feelings.
How do we Ensure & Acknowledge Speaker?? • Clarify information • Verify or paraphrase the speaker’s words • Reflect - be empathetic - acknowledge the speaker’s feelings. • To create win/win listeners MUST be empathetic • Empathy is a skill not a memory that affects the counterpart’s behavior and attitudes.
To be Empathetic: • Need to accurately perceive message content • Give attention to emotional components and unexpressed core meanings of the message • Attend to the feelings of speaker • BUT remain detached!!! Do not become sympathetic! • Make no judgments - pass along no opinions - do not provide solutions!
Empathetic but not Sympathetic?? • That’s right - they are two different things! • Webster defines them: • Empathy - the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts and experience of another. • Sympathy - An affinity, association or relationship between persons or things where in whatever affects one similarly affects the other.
We have two ears and one mouth for a reason - use them in their respective proportions!
Final Thoughts The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what I thought and attended to my answer. • Henry David Thoreau Every person I work with knows something better than me. My job is to listen long enough to find it and use it. • Jack Nichols
Understanding Personalities Susan Harkin
Ladder of Inference A common mental pathway of increasing abstraction, often leading to misguided beliefs. The automatic and unconscious process of forming beliefs.
At the Bargaining Table What if you…….. • actively listened? • understood the personality characteristics present? • were able to see other’s words through their own lens? How could that impact the bargaining process?
Personality Tests • Aim to describe • aspects of a person's character that remain stable throughout that person's lifetime, • the individual's character pattern of behavior, thoughts and feelings
Examples of Personality Tests • Woodworth Personal data sheet • Rorschach inkblot test • Myers-Briggs Type • Keirsey Temperament Sorter • 16PF Questionnaire • Five Factor Personality
True Colors – Valuing Differences and Creating Unity Uses color symbols to demonstrate different temperaments Appreciates differences of individuals Harnesses human potential by captivating motivation By creating a positive environment, provides knowledge as a catalyst for successful behavior and interaction
True Colors For more info: http://www.true-colors.com/index.html
Interest Based Bargaining Brad Shortridge
Interest Based Bargaining (IBB) is also called… • Win-Win • Integrative • Principled • Collaborative • Best Practice • Mutual Gain
IBB is a PROBLEM SOLVING MODEL- it helps the negotiations process… • Communicate everyone’s concerns & ideas • Explore a variety of solutions and agree on one that is acceptable to all concerned • Work together productively
Components of Commitment Necessary to Engage in IBB • Accept the right of the other party to exist • Recognize that each side has legitimate interests • Agree to sincerely help each other meet those interests • Share information • Educate those outside of the proceedings on the process • Be creative- solve problems jointly • Mutual gain is possible!!!
Definitions ISSUE • A topic or subject of negotiations • Improving healthcare coverage & premium costs • Employee and student safety
Definitions POSITION • One party’s solution to an issue • The Board shall pay for all costs associated with the health and hospitalization program of the district.
Definitions INTEREST • One party’s concern about an issue • Health care premiums are becoming very expensive • There have been a number of incidents over the last two years which have made people feel unsafe
Definitions OPTIONS • Solutions that can satisfy an interest • How do options get presented and discussed???
Brainstorming • ENCOURAGES INDIVIDUALS TO GET INVOLVED AND CONTRIBUTE… • New, innovative, creative ideas
Brainstorming • PRINCIPLES • Respect all ideas • Encourage all ideas • Have fun • NO JUDGMENTS!!! NO CRITICISMS!!! • The more ideas, the better • The more variety, the better • Be creative; use imagination! • Build on your ideas and the ideas of others
Brainstorming • HOW TO BRAINSTORM • Record all ideas as communicated • Express simply • A “headline” • Do Not Analyze!!! • Assume every idea will work • Do Not self-censor • Encourage involvement
Conclusion • Brainstorming is just one component, or technique, of Interest Based Bargaining. • Training, probably from a 3rd party, is necessary, especially the first time IBB is to be used. • Financial considerations, almost always the last issue to deal with, often reverts the parties to Traditional Bargaining. • After a contract is settled, a system of on-going communication between the two parties is necessary.
BRAINSTORMING • Let’s help a vacationing couple
CASE STUDY • We are part of the Marital Assistance IBB Team • Using good IBB Brainstorming Techniques, we must create OPTIONS for helping our couple with their vacation issue
VACATIONING ISSUE • Husband & Wife Planning a Vacation Together • POSITIONS • Wife- “I must spend a week on the beaches of Marseille, France, sunning, shopping, and eating great food.” • Husband- “This year I am going to spend a week on a cruise ship.”
VACATIONING ISSUE • Husband & Wife Planning a Vacation Together • INTERESTS- if we take the Positions and turn them into Interests, how would they sound???
VACATIONING ISSUE • Husband & Wife Planning a Vacation Together • Now, let’s take those Interests and create Options for our couple