Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Moneyball









Topic – Negotiation
Movie Title - Moneyball

Movie Summary - This movie is a true story based on the Oakland's A's general manager Billy Beane's successful attempt to put together a baseball club on a budget by hiring baseball players based on the input from the computer generated analysis. This movie is less about sports and more about corporate wrangling and intrigue. Bill Beane is played by Brad Pitt has to run and manage his expenditure on a shoe string budget. He plans on recruiting players based on the statistical data and place a value on them. He has to hire, fire, lie and negotiate to get the players he needs.

Concepts - Negotiations is a part of everyday life. Negotiation is a dialogue between two or more people or parties to reach an understanding or resolve a conflict. The main aim of negotiation is to reach a compromise between the parties. Manipulating others to get what you or your party wants is not negotiation. An ethical negotiator does not use the shortcuts or ploys but instead uses a methodical or professional approach to negotiate and reach an understanding. Their are different approaches to negotiations. But they all agree that the individual needs to plan his/her strategy in advance as to what they want, what they think they will get etc. Due to rapid globalization negotiation in forms of teams is widely being used.

3 comments:

Kristi said...

I think there is a lot of skill that goes into a successful negotiation, but I also think much of the success if derived from the amount of pre-work that the interested parties do on one another. It important to not only know what you want out of the negotiation, but to know as much as possible about what your opposition wants. The more you know, the more bargaining power you have.

hale said...

Negotiator need to remember "Two elements are essential: Reasonableness and Flexibility" which is well applied by Bill when he "hire, fire, lie and negotiate to get the players he needs"

pht said...

Similar to what Kristi touched on, I learnt from my negotiation class that, not surprisingly, probably the most important determinant of a successful negotiation is the stuff that happens before the negotiation itself-- It's the planning process. It’s where information gathering occurs and using that to plan out your strategy, tactics, BATNA, resistance points etc.

“Manipulating others to get what you or your party wants is not negotiation.” I think it’s the exact opposite—negotiations are about subtle manipulations. They can do this through the use of emotions or framing or even bluffing, for example. And you may not agree with their tactics, but that doesn’t stop other people from trying to “manipulate” your target and resistance points.

It may be ethically blurry line, but it’s still a negotiating tactic.

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