Negotiating Skills Training and Industrial Relations Development
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb055324 |
| Date | 01 January 1977 |
| Pages | 29-31 |
| Published date | 01 January 1977 |
| Author | John R. Knibbs |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour |
Negotiating Skills Training and
Industrial Relations
Development
John R Knibbs
Head of Management Studies, Public Sector, Leicester Polytechnic
Introduction
The last 15 years have seen an upsurge of writings, research
and debate in the field of industrial relations. Allan Flanders
in the early 1960s, the Royal Commission on Trade Unions in
the late 1960s, the Training Boards and the Commission on
Industrial Relations in the 1970s, have all emphasized the
need for increased industrial relations training. In this paper it
is intended to consider only one aspect of this training - the
development of negotiating skills. The paper will be con-
cerned with the elements that go to make up negotiating
skills,
the methods of training, and thereafter look at the
limitations of these methods, based as they are on 'manager
development', as opposed to developing more effective indus-
trial relations policies - that is, 'industrial relations develop-
ment'.
Skill Requirements of Negotiators
Writers on negotiations have identified different skills and
abilities. Kniveton has suggested that there are three abilities
required by the negotiator - information, social skills, and
judgement.1 This framework has similarities to that of know-
ledge, skills, and attitudes, a framework often adopted by the
Training Boards, in their analyses of training needs. The sig-
nificant difference is the reference by Kniveton to judgement.
Dempsey has indicated that the successful negotiator needs
thorough preparation and understanding - 'ideally, manage-
ment should be able to put together the entire union case and
then prepare a comprehensive answer to it'.2 He also
emphasizes the negotiator's ability 'to cope with emotional
factors'.3
In conjunction with M Barnwell, a colleague in the School of
Management at Leicester, I have been conducting a survey of
what managers consider to be the characteristics of an effec-
tive negotiator. Four main clusters of abilities have been
noted. The one most often mentioned, perhaps because it was
easier to articulate, was the need for a thorough knowledge of
the facts and a detailed understanding of the issues involved
in the negotiations. The second most frequently identified was
concerned with communication skills, the ability to speak
clearly, concisely, to think and respond quickly. Phrases such
as 'the ability to express
himself,
'verbal skill in argument',
'ability to communicate effectively' were used by managers to
describe this set of characteristics. The third referred to an
objectivity, or fairness, an ability to sift the information and
make judgements without excessive emotional involvement
or bias. The fourth cluster of abilities came under the heading
of 'social skills', tactfulness, diplomacy, flexibility, acceptabili-
ty, awareness, ability to control emotions, empathy, coolness,
etc.
Teaching Methods - A Critique
From this survey and from the other studies, there would
seem to be broad agreement that the effective negotiator
requires a thorough grasp of the issues under discussion, and
a capacity to speak with ease and conciseness upon these. He
needs the ability to understand the dynamics of the situation
facing him and to be able to judge objectively the most
appropriate response or offer to make. He, thereafter, makes
this intervention with timeliness, tact and understanding. But
the difficulties of developing these types of ability - aware-
ness,
judgement, tact, timing, etc - are considerable, and for
this reason many training programmes in industrial relations
have fallen into the seductive trap of concentrating on infor-
mation needs. Ten years ago, the enthusiasm of the lecturer in
industrial relations was curbed by the lack of published mater-
ial.
The situation has now radically changed. The Royal
Commission and the associated research, the Industrial Rela-
tions Act, productivity bargaining, worker participation, the
reports by the Commission on Industrial Relations, the new
legislation, all these have stimulated a mass of published mat-
erial and the course member in the field of industrial relations
is in danger of being swamped. 'Thus the tutor must be con-
stantly on guard, limiting the facts and figures fired at the
management course members, striving to preserve him from a
mass of detail which he cannot hope to remember.'4
An important contribution to this debate about appropriate
teaching methods was made by Rackham. Writing in 1973, he
drew attention to a considerable number of courses purport-
ing to teach skills, still relying exclusively on the lecture
method and small group discussion, offering 'no opportunity
whatever for practising negotiating skills and techniques.'5 He
pointed out that even where role playing was used it appeared
to demand approaches such as aggression, concealment,
over-statement, withholding information, point scoring, etc.
By apparently encouraging the use of these malpractices, the
programme tended to confirm them as appropriate.
Rackham also criticized negotiating skills training for its failure
to provide accurate feedback. He went on, therefore, to
propose a controlled-pace negotiating exercise, in which a
great deal of the complexity of role playing was removed and
the process of negotiation slowed down to provide a greater
opportunity for clear feedback within an objective
framework. I have used Rackham's approach and support his
claims of the insights it provides into characteristic ways of
responding and the consequences of such responses. In addi-
tion, course members gain a deeper understanding of the way
conflict can be generated, reduced or prevented. Rackham's
approach here is based mainly on simplifying the situation
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