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Negotiation In Cross Cultures

Negotiation In a Cross-Cultural Environment—American versus Japanese

By Therese Perlmutter

HR595 Negotiation Skills

Keller Graduate School of Management

Dr. Larry Ray

May 10, 2005

Table of contents

I. Introduction

II.

III.

IV.

V. Conclusion

VI. References

I. Introduction

Negotiations always occur between parties who believe that some benefit may come of purposeful discussion. The parties to a negotiation usually share an intention to reach an agreement. This is the touchstone to which any thinking of negotiations must refer. While there may be some reason to view negotiations as attempts by each party to get the better of the other, this particular type of adversarial negotiation is really just one of the options available. Among the beginning principles of a negotiation must be an acknowledgment that the parties to a negotiation have both individual and group interests that are partially shared and partially in conflict, though the parameters and proportions of these agreements and disagreements will never be thoroughly known; this acknowledgment identifies both the reason and the essential subject matter for reflection on a wide range of issues relevant to a negotiation. (Gregory Tropea, November 1996)

Any negotiation challenges the parties involved in a variety of ways, but parties with conflicting interests face important additional difficulties when attempting to negotiate an agreement across culture lines. Not only will the difficulties arising from the known similarities and differences of opinion be more pronounced, but also unsuspected factors could easily enter the picture and condition perceptions of the situation. In cross-cultural negotiations, a reasonable second acknowledgment should be that the hidden factors that are always at work are more likely to interfere with reaching an agreement. It is especially important that this acknowledgment be understood to apply not only to the dynamics of interactions...